Final version of Skavica hydro power plant to be decided soon

TIRANA, May 7 – A working group led by Economy and Energy Minister Dritan Prifit is discussing the final version on the design project to build the Skavica hydropower plant on the cascade of Drin River, northern Albania. The final version of the project considered one the most important in the past two decades will be submitted to government for approval soon. Government has said it will use its own budget to build the plant after an international tender to construct it through a concessionary agreement failed to attract interest from foreign investors earlier this year.
Minister Prifti said the construction of the Skavica hydropower plant was very important to better regulate the Drin River, increase the electricity production capacity and minimise flooding consequences during winter.
The working group is discussing two versions, one designed by Albanian institutions before the 90s during the communist regime and another version by Italian and French consortiums.
Minister Prifti said he personally supported the version of a hydro power plant with a 163-meter high dam and installed power capacity of 350 MW. The second proposed version is that of a 210-meter dam with a capacity of 450 MW but a reservoir stretching out to neighbouring Macedonia.
Another version introduced in the meeting was a project designed by Albanian Power utility, KESH, the World Bank and an Italian consortium to build a hydro power plant with two dams.
The working group on the Skavica power plant is composed of the director of the state-owned Albanian Power Corporation, Muharrem Stojku, the director of the Transmission System Operator, Ymer Balla, and officials of the ministry of Energy.
Skavica hydropower plant is an old project, first conceived in 1980s during communist rule, that aims to use the remaining space of Drini River. It has been considered a very strategic project for Albania because the plant could produce up to 1.2 billion kilowatt/hours (a 25 per cent increase from the current level of production) per year, while also increasing the amount of electricity produced at the three other hydro power plants that were built in the past on the Drin River.
Preliminary evaluations indicate that such a project could cost up to 600 million euro, while the major problem remains the remoteness of the area. Situated in a mountain valley in north-east Albania, Skavica is 50 kilometres from any paved road.
In 2008, the government opened an international bid. Six major foreign companies expressed preliminary interest in the project, but none of them filed an offer. The bid was considered officially failed in January 2010.