For two years, the story of Turkish investment in Romanian solar was written in law firms and data rooms. In 2026, it is being written on construction sites.
The shift is subtle but decisive. Between 2024 and early 2025, Turkish industrial groups were buying permitted, shovel-ready photovoltaic projects from developers who had done the hard early work. Now those same groups, alongside independent Turkish developers arriving greenfield, are signing engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contracts and putting steel in the ground. The capital that once flowed into acquisitions is now flowing into build-out.
Here is what that phase looks like, who is in it, and why so much of it is happening in Romania.
From acquisition to construction: the tell at Niculești
The clearest signal comes from Entek Elektrik, the energy arm of Tüpraş, which is itself Turkey’s largest industrial company and part of Koç Holding. Entek is 99.23% owned by Tüpraş.
In 2024, Entek entered Romania the way most foreign capital did: by acquisition. Through its investment vehicle Enspire Enerji, it bought two Romanian companies, Eco Sun Niculești, which held the permits, and Euromec-Ciocănari, which owned the land, from Israel-based renewables developer Econergy. The price was about 33 million euros. The asset was a solar project in Niculești, Dâmbovița county, north of Bucharest, rated at roughly 214 MWdc in peak capacity, with grid connection approval from transmission operator Transelectrica for 177 MW. It was Entek’s first step outside Türkiye, where it already runs around 490 MW of wind, solar, hydro and gas capacity.
For more than a year, that was where the story sat: a Turkish group holding a permitted Romanian asset.
Then, in December 2025, the phase changed. Entek signed a full EPC contract with WALDEVAR Energy, a Romanian general contractor, to build the Niculești plant out at a minimum of 200 MWp. WALDEVAR took responsibility for design, construction and installation, plus two years of operation and maintenance. For the Romanian firm, it is the largest contract in its portfolio. For Entek, it is the first construction of a solar asset in Europe, with more than 200 workers expected on site.
An EPC signature is not a press-release flourish. It is the moment a project crosses from paper to build-out. That is the line Turkish capital has now stepped over in Romania.
Tek Enerji: the greenfield arrival
If Entek represents “buy, then build,” Tek Enerji represents “build from scratch.”
Tek Enerji, an independent Turkish developer and the first company in Türkiye to develop build-operate-transfer (BOT) solar projects, has placed Romania at the center of its international growth. It is currently constructing a 3.8 MWp plant in Tecuci and has set a target of at least 100 MW of installed capacity in the country by the end of 2026. Just as telling as the number is the intent behind it: the company describes Romania not as a one-off market but as an operational hub for its wider push into European, Central Asian and African projects.
Two different entry routes, one destination. Whether a Turkish group acquires a mature project and moves it into construction, or develops greenfield capacity itself, the activity in 2026 is the same: building, not just buying. That is the Tek Enerji greenfield signal, and it rhymes with what Entek is doing at Niculești.
Why the build-out is landing in Romania
Turkish groups could deploy this capital in several European markets. The reason so much of it is converging on Romania comes down to a rare combination of scale, revenue certainty and capital support.
- Market momentum. Romania’s installed solar capacity is set to pass 7 GW in early 2026, after roughly 1.7 GW was added in 2024 alone. The government is targeting 8.2 GW of solar by 2030 and renewables at 30.7% of the energy mix by the same year. Solar still supplies only around 5% of electricity today, which is precisely the headroom that attracts builders.
- Revenue certainty through CfDs. Romania’s contracts-for-difference scheme, backed by roughly 3 billion euros from the EU Modernisation Fund, gives projects a guaranteed strike price for 15 years. Its second auction in August 2025 awarded about 2.75 GW, including 1,488 MW of solar at an average of 40.35 euros per MWh. The energy ministry noted the round attracted 37% more capacity than its target. For an industrial investor, that long-dated price visibility is the difference between a bet and a plan.
- EU capital and offtake depth. The European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development are financing Romanian solar directly, and builders can layer CfD revenue with corporate power purchase agreements and an emerging guarantees-of-origin market.
- The resource itself. Romania averages around 210 sunny days a year, with the strongest regions on the Black Sea coast, in Northern Dobruja and in Oltenia receiving about 1,600 kWh per square meter annually.
- A credible transition story. Romania has decoupled economic growth from emissions faster than anywhere else in Europe, cutting the emissions intensity of its economy by 88% between 1990 and 2023. That is the kind of macro backdrop that reassures long-term capital.
For Turkish groups specifically, regional proximity and access to the EU single market add a further layer of logic. Romania is close, it is inside the bloc, and it now has a financing framework that rewards exactly the kind of large-scale execution these companies are built for.
The constraints worth naming
An honest read of the market has to include the friction, because friction shapes who wins.
- Grid and permitting bottlenecks. Romania has well over 60 GW of projects holding grid connection approvals, but only around 11% are fully permitted. The gap between a connection approval and a build-ready permit is where many projects stall. Niculești itself shows the physics of this: a 214 MWdc project with a 177 MW grid connection, a normal DC-to-grid step-down that every builder has to plan around.
- Thin, competitive pricing. Solar CfD prices near 40 euros per MWh are excellent for the system and demanding for the developer. Margins reward disciplined engineering and cost control, not speculation. The fact that the same auction left part of its wind quota unfilled is a reminder that the market is selective.
- Timelines that can slip. Romania’s guarantees-of-origin framework and its wider market integration are progressing, but not always on schedule, which adds planning risk to revenue stacks that lean on those mechanisms.
None of this argues against Romania. It argues for a specific kind of participant: one that can actually deliver construction and operate assets, not merely acquire them.
What the shift means for Turkish industrials and Romanian partners
The build-out phase moves the center of gravity from deal teams to delivery teams. In the acquisition phase, value accrued to whoever could find and price a permitted asset. In the construction phase, value accrues to whoever can build it on time, connect it, and keep it running.
That reshuffles the partner map. Turkish groups bring two things Romania can use: capital and engineering pedigree. Tüpraş operates at industrial scale and is committing to reach 1 GW of installed energy capacity by 2030 and 2.5 GW by 2035 through Entek. Tek Enerji brings BOT development experience and manufacturing-grade certification. Romanian partners, in turn, bring what capital cannot import quickly: permitting know-how, land control, grid navigation and construction throughput. The Entek and WALDEVAR pairing at Niculești is the template, a Turkish balance sheet matched to a Romanian EPC engine.
For anyone selling into this market, whether EPC services, operations and maintenance, equipment, grid and permitting advisory, or skilled labor, the demand signal has changed. The question Turkish investors are asking in 2026 is no longer only “what can we buy?” It is “who can help us build?”
Momentum Energy’s View
We read this shift as a maturity signal, and a validating one for Romania.
When international capital moves from writing acquisition cheques to signing EPC contracts, it is telling you the market has cleared its early hurdles: the framework is bankable, the offtake is real, and the pipeline is deep enough to justify building rather than trading. Turkish groups are sophisticated, patient industrial investors. Their decision to break ground here, rather than simply hold Romanian paper, is a stronger endorsement of this market than any acquisition headline.
We would add one note of realism that we think serves inbound investors well. Romania’s opportunity is real, but it is an execution market now, not a shopping market. The projects that will define 2026 to 2028 are the ones that get permitted, connected and commissioned, not the ones that merely change hands. That is where local knowledge earns its keep, and where the right Romanian partner turns a promising asset into an operating one.
From where we sit, the Turkish build-out is early proof of a bigger thesis: Romania is becoming one of the most investable solar markets in the European Union, and the advantage is moving to those who can pair capital with on-the-ground delivery.
