Latvian Operator of Transmission System JSC “Augstsprieguma tīkls” (AST) will invest 89.05 million euros in development this year, of which 29.8 million is co-funding of the European Union. The largest part of investments are provided for the implementation of the 3rd stage of the project “Kurzeme Ring” – it is planned to invest 62.1 million euros in the construction of the line and reconstruction of substations this year.

“The significant financial support from Europe indicates that we have been able to demonstrate the importance of the development projects not only at a local, but also at a regional level. The new networks will improve the security of Latvia’s energy supply, will allow it to become an important transit country between Scandinavia and Europe, which will be especially important after 2025, when it is planned to start synchronous operation with the European electricity grid,” says AST Chairman of the Board Varis Boks.

Within the implementation of the 3rd stage of project “Kurzeme Ring” it is planned to invest 62.1 million euros of the total 128 million allocated for the project for the construction of the line and reconstruction of the substations, 4.25 million of the total allocated 102 million euros for the construction of the Estonian-Latvian third interconnection and the necessary infrastructure for it, while this year it is planned to invest almost 1 million euros of the total allocated 20 million euros in the construction of the power transmission line Riga TEC-2 – Riga HES. All of these projects, the total costs of which are 250 million euros, have received European Union co-financing in the amount of 128 million from the Connecting Europe Facility Projects.

But in order to modernise the already existing Latvian electricity transmission network and substations, it is planned to invest 22 million euros – 13.8 million euros for the reconstruction of substations and switchgears and the construction of new objects, 4.6 million euros – for restoring the power transmission lines, 2.4 million euros – for replacing the automotive transformers and transformers, while 1.7 million will be invested in other activities aimed at maintaining the capacity of the transmission system.

Within the framework of these projects, this year it is planned to complete the construction of two new substations – “Stīpnieki” and “Skrunda”, to perform various reconstruction works and the replacement of devices in 16 substations, as well as to replace the old supports in four power lines “Salaspils-Viskaļi”, “Viskaļi-Šauļi”, “Pļaviņu HES-Pļaviņas” and “Līksna-Daugavpils”.