KYIV. Dec 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Head of Ukrenergo Vsevolod Kovalchuk and European Commission Vice President for Energy Union Maros Sefcovic have discussed integration of Ukraine’s power grid with the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity (ENTSO-E) in the realistic terms.
The press service of Ukrenergo reported that the sides arranged that consultations with representatives of the European Commission will be held in the near term at the expert level to accelerate the integration.
The meeting was held as part of the tenth SET Plan – Central European Energy Conference held in Bratislava on December 2, which the Ukrenergo’s delegation took part in.
Kovalchuk in his speech at the panel entitled “Market integration III: Regional market-coupling in electricity” told about the state of the Ukrainian power market reform, further possible ways of its integration with markets of the neighbor countries (Moldova, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania) and next steps in Ukrainian power grid’s integration with ENTSO-E.
He said that the integration even with several markets of neighbor countries would help Ukraine to better prepare for the complete integration with ENTSO-E.
“This could be done gradually, step by step, and start now. The will of Ukraine is needed. We have it. The interest of our partners is needed as well… One should not wait for a comprehensive technical and political decision on the full integration – the steps should be made now,” he said.
The press service said that at the panel where heads of Austrian, Polish, Czech, Hungarian and Slovakian systemic operators took part, it was clearly said that Ukrenergo is ready to start consultations with partners to determine top priority steps to integrate the markets and bring cooperation to the strategic level. One of the steps will be the launch of electronic annual/monthly/daily unilateral auctions between Burshtyn Energy Island and ENTSO-E.
Kovalchuk expressed confidence that the Ukrainian power grid could be useful for European consumers.
