Azernews.Az

By Rashid Shirinov

Azerbaijan, Russia and Iran will create a working group to integrate the energy systems of the three countries, the Azerbaijani Energy Ministry said on April 26.

This issue was discussed at the tripartite meeting of the countries’ deputy energy ministers in Baku.

The working group will consist of 18 people with six people from each country. The first meeting of the group will be held in July in Moscow. The group should also prepare technical tasks for the feasibility study of integrating the electric power systems of the three countries and the draft agreement on joint development of the feasibility study.

Deputy Energy Minister of Azerbaijan Natig Abbasov noted during the meeting that the current opportunities of the three countries in the field of energy export create the conditions for the formation of the North-South energy corridor.

Iran’s Deputy Energy Minister Homayoun Haeri, in turn, noted his country’s interest in the implementation and completion of the process of integrating the Iran’s energy system with the systems of Russia and Azerbaijan. He added that all three countries have favorable opportunities for energy exchange.

Deputy Energy Minister of Russia Anatoly Yankovsky also highly appreciated the existing cooperation in the field of electric power and noted the importance of concrete steps for this cooperation to cover all three countries.

The integration of Azerbaijan, Russia and Iran’s energy systems will create an opportunity for expanding export-import operations. Azerbaijan will strengthen its position as an exporter and transit country for electricity.

Power plants of Azerenergy JSC, Azerbaijan’s electricity producer, generated almost 6 billion kilowatt-hour of electricity in January-March 2018 as compared to around 6.04 billion kilowatt-hour in the same period of 2017.

Currently, the generation capacity of the electric power system of Azerbaijan is 7,172.6 megawatts, which makes it possible to generate about 24 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity annually. This enables Azerbaijan to export 2.1 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity every year.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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