News & events

2016-09-23

Power market design requires regional agreement

In order for Baltic countries to further develop a single electricity market, they must first and foremost agree on its development directions on the political level. It is particularly important when addressing the issues of trade in electricity with third countries. This was pointed out by Aistė Krasauskienė, Head of Market Development at Litgrid, in a round-table discussion organised by the World Energy Council and the National Lithuanian Electricity Association.
 
“The key prerequisite for an effective electricity market is to ensure equal conditions to all its participants. At present everybody can trade in the Nordic and Baltic market, yet traders from third countries do not have obligations assigned to all other market participants. In order to eliminate this asymmetry, we need to have clear and uniform regulations of trade in electricity with third countries,” said Ms. Krasauskienė.
 
According to her, the principles of this trade require a regional political agreement. It should involve not only three Baltic countries, but also other countries of the region, including Poland and Finland which have power links and are able to trade in electricity with third countries.
 
“While defining the directions for Baltic electricity market development, market participants, experts and political institutions must cooperate, otherwise technical and political agreements will diverge. Lack of expert analysis could be one of the reasons for the absence of a similar political agreement so far. Electricity transmission system operators and other market participants aim at offering such an analysis so that politicians are duly informed and are able to make the necessary regional agreements,” stated the Head of Market Development of Litgrid.
 
The Baltic countries are in synchronous operation with Russian and Belarusian power systems which are not subject to the requirements of the European Union Network Codes; therefore, the Baltic electricity market trade is not harmonised and connected with electricity market trade of third countries.