The Parliament of Kazakhstan ratified the protocol on the common electricity market of the EAEU

The Senate (upper house of parliament) of Kazakhstan ratified the protocol on amending the Treaty on the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) in terms of the formation of a common electricity market (CEM) of the Union.

The protocol was signed in Nur-Sultan on May 29, 2019. Its goal is to create the EAEU CEM by integrating the national electricity markets of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia, while maintaining a balance of economic interests of producers and consumers of electricity, as well as other entities of the CEM.

The conclusion of the Committee on Economic Policy, Innovative Development and Entrepreneurship of the Senate says that “The protocol was adopted in order to improve the energy security of the member states of the EAEU, to form a legal space in the EAEU to ensure fair competition, to create conditions for increasing the efficiency and competitiveness of the economies of the member states in the electric power industry, and to further strengthen economic mutually beneficial and equitable cooperation,”.

The document regulates the procedure for regulating and controlling the activities of subjects of natural monopoy entities in the field of electric power industry in the common electric power market of the EAEU and other organizations authorized to carry out interstate transmission of electric energy. Provisions have been established for the implementation of interstate transmission of electrical energy.

Participants in the EAEU common electricity market will be legal entities that sell and purchase electricity and are entities of domestic wholesale electricity markets, legal entities that purchase electricity from a neighboring state that is part of the EAEU via interstate power transmission lines, as well as legal entities authorized to settle hourly deviations of the actual balance-flows of electric energy from the planned values.

After ratification by the Senate, the protocol on the formation of a common electricity market of the EAEU will go to the President of Kazakhstan for signature.