TIRANA, May 15 – Two Austrian companies and a French one have been qualified to submit bids on the privatization of four small and medium sized hydropower plants, the Ministry of Energy announced this week.
Austria’s EVN and Verbund which have formed a joint venture to build a giant HPP in northern Albania are competing separately in this tender along with France’s CNR & CN’AIR. The hydropower plants (HPP), which the government is selling, include the Ulez and Shkopet HPPs on the River Mat, in northern Albania, and two small HPPs on the Bistrica River, in southern Albania. The four HPPs are reported to have an installed power of 77 Megawatts, accounting for 5.3 percent of hydro electricity produced by state run Power Corporation KESH.
Speaking at a committee assessing expression of interest, Energy Minister Nasip Naco said the pre-qualified companies meet all conditions required in the international tender which will be held on June 4 and 6, 2012.
The hydro power plants of Ul캠and Shkopet, built in 1957 in a cascade sequence on the Mat River in northern Albania, carried the names Karl Marx and Frederick Engels under communist rule.
Ulez has a capacity of 25.2 MW with yearly generation of 110 GWh. Operating downstream from Ulez since 1963, Shkopet has a total capacity of 24 MW and generates 90 GWh annually.
The Bistrica 1 and Bistrica 2 have been in operation since 1963 and 1965 in the southern area of Sarande on the border with Greece. Bistrica 1 has a theoretical capacity of 22.5 MW for an average yearly generation of 135 GWh.
Bistrica 2 has an installed capacity of 5 MW and the average yearly generation amounts to 36 GWh. The electrical and mechanical equipment of both Bistrica 1 and Bistrica 2 have been rehabilitated by Germany’s Siemens thanks to German funding.
Two small HPPs inaugurated
Two new small HPPs with a capacity of 7 MW, an Albanian-Greek investment of Euro 7 million, in the southern Skrapar district were inaugurated last week, says the Economy Ministry.
Although having signed more than 200 concession contracts in the past few years, 2011 proved a bad year for private and concession hydropower plants which suffered lower production because of low rainfall.
An annual report published by the country’s Energy Regulatory Entity (ERE) shows six new HPPs, with installed capacity of 17.25 MW were made operational in 2011. ERE data show power generated from the 58 HPPs managed by 26 concession companies dropped by 14 percent to 136.8 GWh because of the unfavourable hydro situation, accounting for only 2 percent of total domestic production.
The companies’ revenues also dropped by 10 percent to 1 billion lek (Euro 7 million).
