September 25 (SeeNews) - Norwegian-based Nord Pool Spot, operating power markets in the Nordics, the Baltics, UK and Germany, said on Friday it has been appointed as the lead consultant in a project to assist the Albanian government with a high-level design of a competitive power market founded on the European target model.
Nord Pool Spot is currently working on the first phase of the project, which includes both capacity building and support for secondary legislation, a spokesperson for the company said in an emailed response to a SeeNews inquiry.
Albania is part of the Energy Community, a Vienna-based international energy policy organization, and this development is supported by their secretariat, the spokesperson said.
Elsewhere in the region, day-ahead exchanges are set to launch this year in Croatia, Bulgaria and Serbia. The projects in Croatia and Bulgaria involve Nord Pool Spot, which has teamed up with CROPEX in Croatia and IBEX in Bulgaria, while the Paris-based European Power Exchange, Epex Spot, is participating in the SEEPEX power exchange project in Serbia alongside a local partner.
The spokesperson said that the projects in Bulgaria and Croatia are going according to plan.
Earlier this year, Nord Pool Spot said that the Bulgarian and Croatian day-ahead markets are planned to become operational by the end of the fourth quarter of 2015.
The Energy Community was established by an international law treaty in October 2005. As of July 1, 2013, the parties to the treaty are the European Union and Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia and Ukraine. The key aim of the organization is to extend the EU internal energy market to Southeast Europe and beyond on the basis of a legally binding framework.