Ukraine eyes billions in euros from Europe electricity exports

Ukraine hopes to make 1.5 billion euros from electricity exports to the European Union by the end of the year and earn to more in the future after obtaining the right to export its energy there, a Ukrainian energy ministry adviser said on Wednesday.

Former Soviet Ukraine’s electricity grid began planning to decoupling itself from the Russian and Belarusian grid in 2014 after Russia annexed Crimea. It was testing the system’s autonomy in February when Russia invaded, which prompted Kyiv to fully disconnected 2.5 years earlier than planned.

Ukraine applied in March to join European energy system ENTSO-E as soon as possible and on Tuesday it received the right to export its energy to Europe, Ukrenergo said on Wednesday.

All the required Ukrainians lines are ready to export electricity to Romania, Hungary, Slovakia and Poland, said Lana Zerkal, an adviser to the energy minister, in an interview with the Suspilne public television channel.

“By the end of the year, under normal circumstances, we will be able to earn about 1.5 billion euros,” she said, adding that Ukraine’s system was working in sync with the European Union’s system.

“We started this in March, and now the EU is opening up to us the technical opportunity to start commercial flows and make money from it. It is very important to us that … despite the war we were able to do it 2.5 years earlier than planned,” she said.