The Greece-Cyprus electricity interconnection, a project with a budget of 1.9 billion euros, has attracted the interest of major investors inside and outside of Europe.
After the October agreement on the designation of Independent Power Transmission Operator (IPTO) as the implementing agency, the project is on track for implementation.
“Since IPTO assumed the role of implementing body, there has been a very strong investment interest which is expected to be expressed officially in the next period, from various sides,” the president and managing director of IPTO, Manos Manousakis, pointed out in his statements to ANA-MPA. “The Cypriot government, he added, is gravitating toward participating in the project, which will make its implementation easier. The next steps include the transfer of the licenses that have been issued and the contracts that have been signed to the new project implementer, while a critical milestone is the signing of a loan agreement with the European Investment Bank that must be done within the first quarter of 2024.”
Last week, following Manousakis’ visit to Cyprus and the meetings he had with the President of the Republic of Cyprus Nikos Christodoulides, the Cypriot Minister of Energy, Trade and Industry Giorgos Papanastasiou, the Cyprus Energy Regulatory Authority (CERA) and the Transmission System Operator of Cyprus, it was announced that the first results of the relevant study commissioned are positive and that by the end of January the Cypriot government will decide whether to participate in the project. The participation of Cyprus is expected to be in the order of 100 million euros, while the Cypriot government together with ADMIE is expected to have the majority of the shares in the company constructing the project.
It is recalled that an agreement in principle has already been reached for the participation of an Israeli fund in the project, while in the framework of the COP 28 World Conference on Climate Change, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed with the Dubai-based TAQA energy group, also for the prospect of equity participation in the special purpose company GreatSea Interconnector, established by IPTO for the implementation of the interconnection.
