AS “Augstsprieguma tīkls” informs that electricity imports from Russia to the Baltic States and Finland stopped on May 22 this year. Trade has stopped at the borders of Russia-Latvia, Kaliningrad-Lithuania and Russia-Finland, through which commercial imports of Russian electricity took place so far.
This means that Russian electricity no longer gets not only in the Baltic States, but also in the entire single European electricity market. The cessation of Russian electricity imports has not affected the parallel synchronous operation of the Baltic energy system with the Russian energy system – Baltic energy systems are still technically connected to the Russian energy system”, Gatis Junghāns, the Member of the Management Board of AS “Augstsprieguma tīkls” (AST) explains.
The company of Russian energy company Inter RAO Group in Latvia has informed AST that it is discontinuing electricity supplies from Russia due to the fact that the electricity exchange Nord Pool has stopped trading of Inter RAO companies due to settlement risks.
The cessation of imports will not affect the security of electricity supply in the Baltic, because since March 3 the Baltic electricity import capacity from Russia has been limited to 300 MW, with a separate limit of 150 MW on the Russian-Latvian border and 150 MW on the Kaliningrad-Lithuanian border. The transmission system operators of the Baltic States – the Latvian AS “Augstsprieguma tīkls”, the Lithuanian “Litgrid” AB and the Estonian “Elering” AS – imposed restrictions to minimise the potential risk of negative impacts on the safety and stability of the operation of the Baltic electricity transmission systems. However, electricity imports from Russia to Latvia have not actually happened since the beginning of May.
Electricity transmission system operators in the Baltic States have taken important steps in recent years to integrate the Baltic States into the European electricity system. The Baltic energy system currently has four interconnections with European energy systems with a total capacity of 2200 MW, corresponding to half of the Baltic electricity peak consumption capacity in the winter. In addition to the construction of interconnection infrastructure, transmission system operators have integrated the electricity market of the Baltic States into the single European electricity exchange system, thereby providing access to the huge European electricity market.
The electricity transmission system operators of the Baltic States and Poland are currently continuing to introduce an ambitious package of projects to prepare the Baltic States’ energy systems for disconnection from the Russian energy system and for permanent synchronisation with Continental Europe’s energy system in 2025.