Brussels Agreement to Allow Kosovo to Save EUR100 Million

Electricity (BETAPHOTO/EMIL VAS/EV)

The director of Kosovo’s power grid and transmission operator KOSTT, Jeton Mehmeti, said on June 22 that the agreement reached in Brussels would make it possible for Kosovo to save more than EUR100 million in the second half of 2022.

Kosovo and Serbia approved in Brussels, on June 21, a road map to implement energy agreements in the north of Kosovo. The actual agreement was reached in 2013, but hasn’t been implemented. It’s about the energy the Serbs have been using in Kosovo’s north without paying for it. The agreement provides that the Regulatory Energy Office should issue a supply license to Elektrosever, expected to operate in four municipalities in the north.

According to KosSev, Pristina-based media have quoted Mehmeti as saying that the cost of used but unpaid power in the four northern municipalities reached EUR25 million from January to April. He also said that there’s a risk of energy price jumps, and that the citizens in northern Kosovo should not expect the benefit of unpaid electricity to continue next winter.

“The energy price at international stock markets is EUR300 per a megawatt-hour. If the energy crisis continues, the price may go up over 500 percent during the cold months, as last year it jumped from EUR50 per MWh to EUR700. In a word, we don’t have the luxury to start the next winter with the north of Kosovo resting on the shoulders of Kosovo’s budget or any public enterprise. If the agreement is broken, the license will be revoked,” Mehmeti was explicit.