Decision on Baltic power grid synchronization to be made by December
Parties involved in the potential synchronization of the Baltic power grid with Western Europe came to an agreement during a meeting in Vilnius on Thursday that the political decision regarding the switch should be made by the end of this year.
Meeting in Vilnius on Thursday, representatives of the European Commission (EC), the Joint Research Centre (JRC) and countries belonging to the Baltic Energy Market Interconnection Plan (BEMIP) agreed that a decision regarding the potential synchronization, which has been noted as one of the most important energy projects of the decade, should be made in December of this year.
"Lithuania, just like the rest of the BEMIP countries, emphasized their expectation that the BEMIP political decision should be made before the end of this year, and the European Commission assured that this would be the case," Rimvydas Štilinis, infrastructure director at Lithuanian state-controlled energy company group EPSO-G, told BNS.
In his words, the EC Joint Research Centre will present a study of synchronization alternatives in October before a top-level task force made up of BEMIP countries approves the plans in December. Štilinis noted that actual synchronization work would begin only after this.
"All homework must be completed by then, and we will be able to start with the first intstrument," said Štilinis, adding that a political decision would need to be made first. "If we are synchronizing with continental Europe, there has to be an agreement between the Baltic States and Poland, and an address of operators on the technical level to [the European Network of Transmission System Operators] on initiation of the synchronization process."
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have made the political decision to withdraw from the energy ring shared with Russia and Belarus, known as BRELL, by 2025.
Countries involved in the BEMIP include Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Finland and Poland.
Editor: Editor: Aili Sarapik
Source: BNS