Experts believe that Kyrgyzstan’s plans to cut export of electricity to Kazakhstan in 2014 would not cause a deficit in the country., Tengrinews reports citing an independent expert in power industry Gennady Doroshin.
Experts believe that Kyrgyzstan’s plans to cut export of electricity to Kazakhstan in 2014 would not cause a deficit in the country., Tengrinews reports citing an independent expert in power industry Gennady Doroshin.
Kyrgyzstan’s Minister of Energy and Industry Avtandil Kalmambetov announced this decision earlier during the Parliament meeting. The minister explained that the major reason for reduction of the power exports was the lower level of water in the Toktogul water reservoir.
Doroshin said that Kyrgyzstan’s electricity supply to Kazakhstan was insubstantial in recent year. In 2013 Kyrgyzstan supplied 375 million kilowatt-hours, which equals to a yearly electricity consiumtion of one city in Kazakhstan.
“I do not think that it is critical for Kazakhstan. It might increase the import from Russia, we have good ties with this country. Russia is able to increase electricity supplies. There is also Tajikistan. They have a large amount of water flow in summer and thus a surplus of electricity. Tajikistan has a highly developed hydroelectric industry,” Doroshin said.
But it will be impossible for Kazakhstan to avoid loss of power during transportation to southern regions because of the large distance, in case the supplies of electricity come from Russian, Doroshin added. But this drawback is not critical.
“We had an agreement with Kyrgyzstan that balanced winter and summer electricity supplies. The agreement obliged Kazakhstan to buy electricity from Kyrgyzstan when the latter had an excess of it,” Doroshin said, adding that Kazakhstan's energy consumption peaked in winter.
Reporting by Dmitriy Khegai