Power Plant In Albania?

TIRANA, April 21 – The Greek media has reported that the Greek electricity utility, Public Power Corp’s (PPC) board, will discuss a cooperation agreement with Germany’s RWE next week in an effort to help modernize its operations and expand into southeast Europe to offset a drop in domestic market share since the country liberalized its energy sector last year under EU guidelines.
The agreement will focus on the creation of a joint venture to build a 500-800 MW coal-powered plant in Albania, noted Takis Athanasopoulos, Chief Executive.
According to the agreement, RWE would hold 51 percent of the company, PPC will have 39 percent, while Greek cement company Titan, already active in Albania, will have a ten percent stake.
PPC has entered talks with RWE to expand its business in Greece and the Balkans. However, an agreement has yet to be finalized due to union opposition, which has halted board meetings to finalize the deal.
Contacted by media, the RWE spokesperson, Lothar Lambertz, declared that PPC and RWE should start negotiations with the Albanian government to obtain the building permit for a coal-fired power plant. The site is going to be selected at a latter phase. Lambertz declared that Albania was chosen because both Albania and Greece are experiencing shortages of power and that electricity produced in Albania was going to be shared by Albania and Greece. The CEO of Greek PPC, Panagiotis ´hanasopoulos declared some days ago that all the electricity produced was going to be exported to Greece. Albania would get a small percentage of the production in exchange for the building permit.
According to the Greek newspaper ‘Ethnos’, the power plant was initially planned to be built in the northeastern part of Greece, near the city of Kozani, with a capacity of 1,600 MW. However, the project met a strong resistance from the community living close to the construction site. They claimed that the power station was going to destroy the environment and their health. The Greek opposition supported the local community in its actions. The PPC administration was forced to retreat, declaring it was a lost chance for the region and Greece. According to Ethnos, Greece is going to need next year 800 MWh, or face shortages in its power supply. Therefore, PPC is making every effort to build it as soon as possible.
Albanian Minister of Economy and Energy, Genc Ruli, admitted that the Albanian government was informed about the plans to build a coal-fired power plant in Albania. The Albanian government, according to Ruli, is going to study the project in detail, and only after that, it is going to decide. The capacity of the power plant is going to be 500-800 MW, or 5-8 times more powerful than the power plant planned to be build in Vlora.