Auvere oil shale power plant back up and running
While repairs at the Auvere Power Plant were finished ahead of schedule, this is not expected to bring down soaring electricity prices.
"Enefit Power succeeded in completing repairs to the masonry of the Auvere Power Plant's heat exchangers and brought the plant back online ahead of schedule," said operator Enefit Power CEO Raine Pajo.
"The startup process began on Wednesday, February 4 and the plant was synchronized with the power grid on Thursday evening. Due to the specific nature of the plant, it can take up to 48 hours from the start of the restart procedures to reach a stable operating mode," Pajo added.
According to Pajo, the original repair deadline of February 10 was set with a buffer in case any additional faults were discovered during the process or if setbacks occurred during the plant's restart.
Currently back in operation, the Auvere Power Plant joins Eesti Energia's portfolio alongside the sixth generating unit of the Eesti Power Plant, which remains under repair until February 12. That unit has a capacity of 165 megawatts.
"This is one of the four oldest still-operating generating units at the plant and rarely enters the market. Prior to this cold January, it only ran for a few hours in February last year," Pajo noted.
Eesti Energia is unable to precisely estimate how much the restart of Auvere might reduce the currently high electricity prices.
"Estonia is part of the Baltic electricity system where consumption currently exceeds 5,000 megawatts. Thanks to strong cross-border interconnections, electricity prices tend to level out across the Baltics," Pajo explained.
"Lately, we've also been in the same pricing zone as Finland for almost the entire day and consumption there sometimes exceeds 15,000 megawatts. In such conditions, where demand remains very high and renewable energy is scarce, virtually every added or missing megawatt affects the price. The exact impact depends on the specific demand and supply conditions within each pricing cycle, not only in Estonia, but across the Baltics and Finland," he added.
According to Nord Pool, the average market price for electricity in January was €154.44 per megawatt-hour, the highest monthly price since 2024.
Electricity consumption in Estonia hit a new record on Thursday morning, with grid operator Elering recording demand at 1,723 megawatts.
The Auvere Power Plant, part of the Eesti Energia group, is an oil shale-fired facility handed over to the energy company in mid-2018. Its designed reliability rate is 92 percent.
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Editor: Huko Aaspõllu, Marcus Turovski
