More than EUR66 million will be allocated under the first Interreg NEXT European cross-border cooperation program for Hungary, Slovakia and Romania’s partnership with Ukraine in health, environment and good governance, the European Commission (EC) announced Friday. “This program is part of the EU’s overall support and unwavering solidarity toward Ukraine. By implementing a cohesion policy, Interreg will help Ukraine and its bordering member states to face common challenges and seize joint opportunities,” said Elisa Ferreira, EC member for cohesion policy and reforms.
The program covers the period of 2021-2027. Hungary, Slovakia, Romania and Ukraine are expected to work together to ensure equal access to health services and improve the sustainability of their health systems.
The program will support climate change adaptation and disaster risk prevention solutions. The participating countries will cooperate to protect nature, develop “green infrastructure” and tourism.
It is also a question of aligning Ukraine’s norms with EU member states in the area of effective public administration. Relevant projects will promote legal and administrative cooperation to remove common barriers to interaction in border areas, while supporting cooperation between citizens, civil societies and state institutions, according to a communiqué from the European Commission.
CROSS-BORDER COOPERATION, HUNGARY, ROMANIA, SLOVAKIA, UKRAINE
Ukraine, Moldova and Romania have agreed to sign an agreement to increase cross-border capacity to increase electricity trade, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
“We reached several important agreements today to develop our relations in the energy sector, and our teams will continue to work on their implementation. In particular, we agreed to sign a trilateral intergovernmental agreement on increasing cross-border capacity to increase the volume of electricity trade,” Kuleba said at the meeting. press conference in Odessa on Thursday.
Kuleba drew attention to the fact that the meeting in the format of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Ministers of Energy of Ukraine, Moldova and Romania is taking place for the first time.
“Three of our countries, and immediately foreign ministers and energy ministers. There is a very clear reason and goal for this – we want to build qualitatively new relations in the energy sector between our three countries, and this will be important not only for energy, but also for security and prosperity in our region,” the minister stressed.
Currently, Ukraine exports electricity to Moldova in the amount of about 165 MWh, with a possible maximum of 600 MWh, and to Romania – 150 MWh.
Moldovan state company Energocom will buy 10 million cubic meters of natural gas for $16.6 million from Moldovagaz, which gets gas from Russia’s Gazprom, Deputy Prime Minister and Infrastructure and Regional Development Minister Andrei Spinu said on his Telegram channel, citing a decision made by the country’s National Commission for Emergency Situations.
“This transaction will also enable Moldovagaz to pay the advance for August by September 1,” Spinu said.
It was reported earlier that the the National Commission for Emergency Situations, which is chaired by Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilita, had ordered state company Energocom to buy 10 mcm of natural gas for storage in Romania.
The gas will be purchased and delivered under a framework EFET (European Federation of Energy Traders) type purchase-sale contract between Energocom and Moldovagaz, the government’s press service told Interfax.
For the first tranche of 5 mcm, the purchase price will be about $1,459 per 1,000 cubic meters. The second tranche of the gas purchase will be made in September at a price of $1,881 per 1,000 cubic meters.
The gas will be stored in neighboring Romania, as Moldova does not have its own gas storage facilities.
Moldovagaz was unable to pay an advance to Gazprom for supplies in August and the Russian company agreed to defer the payment to September 1. Moldovagaz said that current gas rates in the country do not cover its purchase price.
The commission also decided to allocate MDL 322 million from the state budget to increase Energocom’s charter capital.
Proceeds from sales of NPC Ukrenergo’s available interstate transmission capacity for electricity exports to Romania and Slovakia amounted to UAH 200.3 million since the opening on June 30.
These data are based on the results of the latest auctions in the Romanian and Slovak directions, held on July 10 with delivery on July 12. According to them, the section price to Slovakia was UAH 10.3 million and to Romania – UAH 10.2 million.
Traditionally, the most active participants in these auctions are DTEK Zakhidenergo, ERU Trading, and Le-Trading Ukraine.
At the same time, Energoatom began to participate in auctions for the export of electricity to Slovakia from the moment they started on July 5 for supplies on July 7 (two days before delivery). For the first time, the company bought almost 500 MWh of the possible 1200 MWh for export at the auction on July 9 with delivery on July 11. The plans for July 12 are to export 131 MWh.
At the same time, Ukrhydroenergo, which for the first time bought out a section to Slovakia for export of 148 MWh on July 9, and then for export of 110 MWh on July 10, ended the last two auctions with delivery on July 11 and 12 to no avail.
Auctions with delivery on July 10 became an anti-record at the cross-section price: for Slovakia, it fell on this day to UAH 11/MWh with delivery at 12-16:00, and the highest was UAH 2,390 /MWh at 23:00. For Romania, the lowest price was UAH 100/MWh at 13-14:00, the highest was a little over UAH 2,200/MWh with delivery at 21:00-23:00. For comparison: according to the results of all auctions, the price for Romania was the lowest on July 3 – UAH 1,380/MWh.
It is noteworthy that Ukrhydroenergo reserved most of its daily resource at the lowest prices in both directions.
In general, in both directions, the price of a section on July 10 amounted to a little more than UAH 2 million.
As of July 11, this figure was already ten times more – UAH 20.5 million.
The section from Slovakia and Romania for July 10-12, as before, was not reserved.
The section to Poland continues to be purchased at daily auctions in addition to the 147 MW capacity purchased at the monthly auction by DTEK Zakhidenergo – at 65 MW every hour (1,560 MWh per day) on July 10-12.
The daily cross-section to Moldova on July 10-12, according to the traditional scenario, was divided by Energoatom, which bought out a cross-section for export of 9,400 MWh per day, and Ukrhydroenergo – 2,400 MWh per day.
The section price at all auctions, except for exports to Romania, is UAH 0/MWh.
Romanian Prime Minister Nicolae Chuque said that after the commissioning of the Greece-Bulgaria interconnector on Thursday, his country will be able to supply natural gas to Moldova and Ukraine, European Pravda reports with reference to the Romanian news portal Digi24.
“Essentially, this interconnector will connect the network passing through Anatolia and the Adriatic, as well as connect to the BRUA pipeline, thus ensuring gas supplies to Bulgaria and Romania,” Chuquet said at a press conference with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
“And, of course, we can provide gas supplies to our eastern partners – Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova and other countries according to the distribution scheme of this gas network,” the Romanian prime minister added.
COMMISSIONING, GAS, GREECE-BULGARIA, INTERCONNECTOR, MOLDOVA, ROMANIA, UKRAINE
Over seven days of daily auctions by NPC Ukrenergo for distribution of access to a cross-section for exporting electricity to Romania, the price of a cross-section increased to UAH 106 million.
Including, according to the results of the auction on July 6, the seventh day after the opening of exports to Romania, 8 winners of the auction, who divided the daily cut, must pay a total of UAH 19.8 million.
The highest cross-section price at this auction was the price at 23:00 – UAH 10.9 thousand UAH/MWh, which was shared by DTEK Zakhidenergo (by 60 MWh), Latest Technologies 3000 (by 15 MWh). h), ERU Trading (by 14 MWh), Energoatom (by 10 MWh) and Smart Trade Energy (by 1 MWh). The absolute record of the week is still the price of 11.67 thousand UAH/MWh. At the same time, experts note that traders in many positions are ready to pay for a cross-section significantly higher than the selling price of a resource in Romania for these hours.
In general, this time, as in previous auctions, more than half of the daily capacity was bought by DTEK Zakhidenergo (for export, a total of 1,377 MWh out of a possible 2,400 MWh per day).
“Le Trading” Ukraine bought a section for export of 281 MWh, “ERU Trading” – for 220 MWh, “Energoatom” – for 239 MWh (yesterday it was only 30 MWh), “Latest Technologies 3000” – by 198 MWh, Nexttrade by 45 MWh, Smart Trade Energy by 24 MWh and DE Trading by 16 MWh.
Once again, the state-owned Ukrhydroenergo participated in the auction without results.
Also, Artlex-Energy and Ukr Gas Resource did not buy anything in this auction.
From Romania on July 6, the section was not reserved.
The section to Poland continues to be purchased at daily auctions in addition to the 147 MW capacity purchased at the monthly auction of DTEK Zakhidenergo – as of July 6, at 65 MW per hour (1560 MWh per day).
According to yesterday’s scenario, the daily cross-section to Moldova on July 6 was divided by Energoatom, which bought out a cross-section for export of 9400 MWh per day and Ukrhydroenergo – by 2400 MWh per day. Another 1 MW per hour (24 MWh in total) was bought by Energy Lab Ukraine, which had not previously participated in the auction.
The section price at all auctions, except for exports to Romania, is 0 UAH/MWh.
As reported, the import-export of electricity to Romania for 100 MW started on June 30. The number of auction winners varies from 5 to 9 participants.
On June 27, ENTSO-E agreed to start commercial exports of the first 100 MW to Europe. First, the resource will be supplied to Romania, then the directions to Slovakia and Hungary will be opened, but in general, the export capacity is 100 MW. In a month, Ukrenergo expects an increase in exports.
