Officials still positive on energy deal

  • 2007-10-24
  • By Kimberly Kweder

POWER PLAY: Poland's insistence on a bigger share of electricity from the new nuclear plant has hampered negotiations.

VILNIUS - Lithuanian officials, energy experts and economists forecast that Poland and Lithuania will be able to reach an agreement on construction of a new "energy bridge" linking the two countries' energy grids despite recent setbacks on the issue.
"I'm optimistic that sooner or later we will have this agreement because it's useful to both sides," said Birute Vesaite, chairwoman of the economics committee of the Parliament. "But it's too early to judge, we don't know how the power will be produced from the new nuclear power plant," she said, referring to a nuclear plant 's a joint project between all three Baltic countries and Poland 's that is scheduled to start up in 2015.

During an international energy conference held in Vilnius Oct. 10 - 11  both Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus and Polish President Lech Kaczynski said an energy bridge agreement should be signed before the end of the month.
"We had bilateral negotiations about the electric bridge," said Adamkus. "It has to be built and it will be built. Today we have not signed due to technical reasons. It will be signed immediately after a company structure has been established 's before the end of this month," he said.
Negotiations on the energy bridge were stalled just prior to that conference when Poland insisted on control of 1,000 - 1,200 megawatts of electricity from the Ignalina plant.

Later Lietuvos Energija and Poland's PSE SA (Polish Power Grid Company) failed to lock a deal during an Oct. 20 meeting, held while Poland was undergoing early parliamentary elections. President Kaczynski had also canceled a visit to Vilnius that was to take place the same day.
Lithuania won't be able to hold concrete discussions on megawatt allowances from the Ignalina plant until next spring at the earliest, when environmental impact studies to determine the capacity of the plant will be completed, experts say.
But officials are hoping that the greater need for an energy bridge will push the deal through sooner than that.
"The Polish side is trying to link the construction of the bridge and of the nuclear power plant project. Lithuania is stressing that this is part of the EU priority connections plan" said Nerijus Udrenas, the Lithuanian president's advisor on the issue.
"We need electricity sooner than having a nuclear power plant constructed, so that's why the two shouldn't be related," he said.
Algimantas Ziremba, director of the energy department at the Ministry of Economy, also stressed the importance of the bridge.

 "Once the project is implemented and the bridge is constructed, then it could only have a good effect because the Lithuanian energy sector could participate in the EU electricity market. Without the grid, we can't participate in the EU electricity market. An agreement is one of the first steps to implement the project," said.
Professor Wladyslaw Mielczarski of the Technical University of Lodz in Poland is the EU-appointed coordinator for the energy bridge project.
He said that since the European Commission is the driving force behind the energy projects,  he's optimistic the two member states will make progress on implementation.

"If in the worst case when the agreement on the investment in the power line between PSE SA and Lietuvos Energija is not signed in a few weeks, it does not delay the construction of the power link as there are other important issues that have to be addressed," said Mielczarski.
Mielczarski said factors that have to be worked out include investment by the independent transmission system operators, operation rules of the power link for emergency situations, what capacity of the line is available in public auction, and how to ensure enough power generation.