The President of the Republic of Hungary Tamás Sulyok awarded the Knight’s Cross of the Hungarian Order of Merit to Mr. Attila Chikán Jr., President and CEO of ALTEO Plc. and President of the BCSDH. The Order of Merit was presented on August 15 by Minister of Energy Csaba Lantos in the Pesti Vigadó.

The prestigious state award recognizes the exemplary work of Attila Chikán Jr. in the field of green energy transition, as well as his commitment to society and the environment, and his openness to innovation. When receiving the award, Attila Chikán Jr. said: “The award primarily recognizes the commitment to sustainability that plays a central role in all aspects of the operations of ALTEO and BCSDH and is the result of the efforts of excellent teams in both organizations. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my colleagues for their high-quality professional work.”

ALTEO has commissioned a solar farm in the outskirts of Tereske which started its trial operation in August. The facility, that was built with ALTEO’s own investment and construction in just three quarters of a year, has an output of nearly 20MWAC, doubling the solar power plant capacity of ALTEO, a company listed in the premium category of the Budapest Stock Exchange (BSE).

ALTEO’s new solar power plant will be capable of generating 31 GWh of electricity per year, equivalent to the annual electricity consumption of more than 10,000 households. The company acquired EDELYN SOLAR Ltd, which owned the project to develop the solar power plant, back in 2022. ALTEO completed the project in the village of Tereske in Nógrád County, in the space of nine months, with its own investment and construction exceeding EUR 17 million.

The importance of the investment is demonstrated by the fact that this development means a twofold increase of ALTEO’s own solar power plant portfolio which will significantly increase the performance of the company’s renewable energy generation business. Even more significant is the integration of the Tereske solar power plant into ALTEO’s Renewable Regulation Centre. This will enable the use of weather-dependent solar power in the provision of resilience services to the national electricity grid.

The Budapest Stock Exchange (BSE) has published its 2023 Sustainability Report: for the second time this year, following last year, the BSE has prepared a voluntary report that provides a comprehensive picture of the company’s sustainability efforts. The publication also details the environmental, social and governance (ESG) achievements of the past year, underlining BSE’s commitment to sustainability.

The main objective of the Sustainability Report is to provide investors and the general public with information on the BSE’s activities in the field of sustainability. The report details the Exchange’s sustainability strategy for 2023-2025 and the initiatives it has taken during the year to implement this strategy. The BSE is implementing its strategy with a twofold objective: on the one hand, the company is striving to establish a high level of ESG principles in its own day-to-day operations, thereby also providing guidance to domestic capital market players, and on the other hand, it is seeking to provide support for issuing companies and the ecosystem around the stock exchange in the area of sustainability.

In order to facilitate a sustainable transition for market participants, In 2023 BSE continued the regulatory support, education programmes and market infrastructure development it launchedin the previous years, which are reported in detail in this report.

Over the past year, the Exchange has sought to provide its views on issues affecting capital markets as a speaker at a number of ESG conferences in the country and in the region, and to improve the skills of domestic listed companies through its sustainability education initiatives. By the end of the year, a dedicated platform on the BSE website was created to present the green issues of the exchange, providing a single point of access to all information on BSE green investment products. In additionthe activities and responsibilities of the Exchange’s Corporate Governance Committee have also been extended, and it now operates as the Sustainability and Corporate Governance Committee.

With its initiatives to reduce the volume of paper used in logistics and the stores, SPAR Hungary is saving more than 37 additional tonnes of paper per year. The company has also launched an internal communication campaign among its employees to raise awareness about cutting paper use.

“SPAR uses a large amount of paper every year in its food production plants, stores, the operation of logistics and the online shop. Reducing the amount of paper used is an important part of our company’s sustainability goals. In the recent years, we have implemented several successful programmes in this area: cleaning logs have been phased out in the shops and refrigerator control sheets are now available as digital data. As a result, 14 tonnes less paper was used in 2023. In the SPAR online shop, we use digital delivery notes, saving around 3 tonnes of paper each year. We have recently also launched new programmes for logistics and stores, which have reduced paper demand by more than 37 tonnes,” said Márk Maczelka, head of communications at SPAR Hungary.

In logistics, SPAR achieved a reduction of around 34.4 tonnes by streamlining the administration of goods receipt and reducing the number of outbound delivery notes. In the retail store network, the company has introduced electronic worksheets and digital service logs for SPAR supermarkets and INTERSPAR hypermarkets. From the last quarter of the previous year, the company converted a number of printed control documents to digital format. Also since last year, the annual HACCP-ISO training material is now only available to the staff in online format. In total, this has reduced the required volume of paper by around 3 tonnes.

SPAR also launched an internal communication campaign within the company. It used quizzes and useful tips to raise awareness of the importance of reducing paper waste, so that as little paper as possible ends up in the recycling bins and lost in desk drawers.

The study period, which began in 2023 and spans three full years, has its first-year results released by SolServices Ltd., the operator of Lumen Park Szolnok. Ecological experts assessed the area’s wildlife before the construction and after the first year of the solar park’s operation. According to the ecological monitoring results, both plant species diversity and bird species diversity have increased, with positive changes observed in the number of nesting and area-using species.

In the first year of operation, species richness has already increased in the surveyed area according to the latest results of the biodiversity survey

The study period, which began in 2023 and spans three full years, has its first-year results released by SolServices Ltd., the operator of Lumen Park Szolnok. Ecological experts assessed the area’s wildlife before the construction and after the first year of the solar park’s operation. According to the ecological monitoring results, both plant species diversity and bird species diversity have increased, with positive changes observed in the number of nesting and area-using species.

Lumen Park Szolnok is the first nature-friendly solar park not only in Hungary but also globally, implemented using the most modern sustainable methods, focusing on plant and animal-friendly approaches and the revitalization of soil depleted by decades of agricultural utilization. The ecological research, which provides insights over several years, has produced guiding results for environmental and sustainability authorities. The company has opened its professional database for academic research, resulting in the first scientific paper based on this data.

The results show that in 2023, the number of plant species increased significantly compared to the initial state, and the total coverage of regenerating vegetation is also substantial. The coverage of valuable species has increased, and the Shannon diversity index has also improved in the areas. The area, previously used for large-scale agriculture, now features a near-natural habitat, indicating the spontaneous formation of natural plant cover. Rare plants like the Sea Arrowgrass (Triglochin maritimum) and the protected Saltmarsh Buttercup (Ranunculus lateriflorus) have appeared. Despite the presence of higher naturalness species post-construction, to combat the significant coverage of agricultural weeds and invasive species, a special seed mix sown in 2023 promote further natural habitat formation, increasing species richness and diversity while naturally suppressing undesirable and invasive species.

figure1. Comparison of nesting species population data observed during the baseline survey and the 2023 survey (number of nesting pairs)

The bird diversity also increased post-construction compared to the baseline and control area surveys, partly due to the solar park’s function as a feeding ground compared to large-scale agricultural habitats. Certain species like the Eurasian Skylark (Alauda arvensis) and Corn Bunting (Emberiza calandra) have started nesting in fewer numbers, while others like the Eurasian Stonechat (Saxicola rubicola) showed no population change. New nesting species such as the Common Pheasant (Phasianus colchicus), Crested Lark (Galerida cristata), and others have appeared in the solar park. The total bird population observed in 2023 included 23 species and 697 individuals, with new area-using species like the Bluethroat, Lesser Grey Shrike, and Tree Pipit, Common Linnet. The survey also highlighted that the nesting success of Eastern Imperial Eagle and Saker Falcon was not affected by the solar park’, while the occurrence of the Common Buzzard and Kestrel increased significantly.

Insect community studies show that the solar park significantly did not alter the area’s insect fauna composition, with major taxonomic groups’ dominance structures remaining similar. Polarotactic taxa individuals were evenly distributed inside and outside the solar park, their proportion in the total caught insect material was only 0.15%,  indicating that these insects are not attracted en masse to solar parks. Similar to 2020, the taxa caught in the largest numbers were flies (Diptera, 51.79%), hymenopterans (Hymenoptera, 22.54%), beetles (Coleoptera, 17.29%), and true bugs (Hemiptera, 5.98%). Overall, it can be concluded that the number of insects in the area has increased compared to the baseline condition.

Among renewable energy sources, solar energy is one of our most significant sustainable resources, making it increasingly important in domestic energy production. Additionally, solar parks can effectively protect wildlife and enhance biodiversity. Properly planned and minimally managed solar parks provide undisturbed habitats for plants and animals for two to three decades, promoting biological diversity. These areas are not used for agriculture, plowed, sown, or sprayed with various chemicals. As a result, the flora and fauna flourish and diversify over the years. The creation of nature-friendly, new-generation solar parks must follow well-established principles and practices. SolServices Ltd. has developed a detailed professional guide in collaboration with experts and organizations, enabling other solar park developers to establish nature-friendly solar parks. “It’s important to emphasize that we’ve achieved all this with a highly diverse team of different professional backgrounds and nationalities, always aiming for concrete solutions and actual implementation, staying a step ahead of the market,” added Dr. Gábor Farkas, CEO of SolServices Ltd., when presenting the first-year research results of the ecological survey.