The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) stands ready to invest hundreds of millions of US dollars in Armenia’s power grid, Bruno Balvanera, EBRD Regional Director told Armenian journalists on Monday. According to him, the bank is considering the possibility of investing in the construction of hydroelectric power stations, solar power plants and high voltage power lines.
“In Armenia, there is a fairly large range of activity in the energy sector, which we consider quite promising. It is too early to talk about concrete projects, but we are conducting negotiations that we do not want to announce in advance,” Balvanera said, adding that EBRD does not impose restrictions on the financing of projects.
He said at a record time of 10 months, EBRD reached an agreement and signed a large loan agreement to the tune of $80 million with Tashir group of companies, the owner of several energy producing and distributing facilities. “This is the first investment of the bank in the modernization of power grids to reduce losses and introduce new meters and we are ready to continue financing the group and discussing future plans,” Balvanera said.
Earlier today a representative of Tashir group of companies said it will invest $900 million in the modernization of the Electrical Networks of Armenia distribution company, saying also that 30% of the money will be spent on replacement of the outdated equipment, 27% of the money will be used to replace power lines. Also 13% will be used to expand the networks, 23% on installing automatic meters and the rest on emergency and repair operations.
As a result the losses are supposed to be cut by 4.6% to achieve the international standard of 6.4%. repair expenses are supposed to be halved. As of the beginning of September this year, the package of bilateral cooperation between Armenia and the EBRD included 158 programs for about 1.1 billion euros.
