Great Sea Interconnector: Cyprus’ shareholding and the outcome of the Papanastasiou-Keravnos meeting

By the end of the week, the situation regarding the Republic of Cyprus's shareholding or not in the special purpose company, Great Sea Interconnector, is anticipated to become clearer.

The Great Sea Interconnector company was set up by Greece’s Independent Power Transmission Operator (IPTO or ADMIE) for the implementation of the project of the electrical interconnection of Cyprus, Greece, and Israel, including in the first phase, Cyprus-Crete and in the second phase, Israel.

On the afternoon of 30 January, as InBusinessNews has been informed, a meeting was held between the Minister of Energy George Papanastasiou and the Minister of Finance Makis Keravnos, where all the facts were put on the table in the light of what the study/evaluation of the issue carried out by an international house of experts on behalf of the Republic of Cyprus demonstrated.

The purpose and objective of the meeting was for the two ministries to formulate and make a joint decision on the participation or not of the Republic of Cyprus in the stock composition of the Great Sea Interconnector, which will be put as a proposal before the Council of Ministers for approval next Friday.

However, according to the same InBusinnessNews sources, at the meeting that took place on 30 January and lasted for about two hours, no final decision was reached and therefore the consultations between the two ministries will continue through the exchange of information and clarifications that will be given on both sides over the coming days towards a final conclusion. The prevailing scenario is, according to the sources, the formulation of a proposal to the Council of Ministers for the Republic’s participation.

At least this seems to be the aim of the Minister of Energy, since the results of the study carried out by the foreign company, and which were presented to George Papanastasiou last week, conclusively demonstrated that the Great Sea Interconnector will be of great value to the electricity market of Cyprus and at the same time have very high geopolitical value, due to the fact that Cyprus will be in the middle of the interconnection of the national electrical networks of Israel and Greece, and by extension of Europe.

The study put the sustainability of the project under the microscope, along with its contribution to the electricity market of Cyprus and its geopolitical value in the wider environment of the eastern Mediterranean.

Essentially, its findings justify to a large extent the position of the Minister of Energy in favor of the Republic of Cyprus’ equity participation in the project, contrary to the reservations he showed in this regard in the past, and before the change of the implementing body, to be maintained by the Minister of Finance.

In this context, the Ministry of Energy's effort is to formulate and submit a proposal to the Ministry for the participation of the Republic of Cyprus in the Great Sea Interconnector.

And this, on the basis that the Republic of Cyprus together with IPTO will have the majority stake in the special purpose company, but also that the decisions will be made through the majority vote system.

It is noted that the amount available from the Republic of Cyprus for entry into the share capital of Great Sea Interconnector, in case this is finally decided, amounts to €100 million which was included as a loan through the Recovery and Resilience Plan. However, the exact amount which will be invested, even if the tide eventually tilts in that direction, remains up for debate.

And all this while the United Arab Emirates Investment Fund (TAQA) has expressed its interest in investing in the Great Sea Interconnector, which was reaffirmed during the recent meeting of the Fund's managing director, Jasim Husain Thabet, with the President of the Republic, Nikos Christodoulides, at the Presidential Office.

An agreement in principle to participate in the project has also been reached with an Israeli fund, while at the same time, IPTO has scheduled meetings with other interested investors in the near future.

It should be noted that just a few days ago, IPTO announced the increase of the European financing of the project to €164.5 million, from €55.2 million, as well as the finalisation of the administrative structure of the Great Sea Interconnector.

As announced by IPTO, the board of directors of Great Sea Interconnector was formed in a body and consists of:

1. Manos Manousakis, Chairman of the Board of Directors
2. Ioannis Margaris, Deputy Chairman of the Board of Directors
3. Eleni Zarikou, Member
4. Ioannis Vrettos, Member
5. Liu Yin, Member
6. Theodoros Tsakiris, Member
7. Nikolaos Frydas, Member

Tilemachos Panagiotidis, an IPTO executive with extensive experience in international projects, who served -among others- as project manager of the Crete-Peloponnese electrical interconnection, which was successfully completed on schedule, was appointed as Executive Director with overall responsibility for the operation of the company.

In its announcement, IPTO characterized as the "next milestone" the expansion of the share composition of Great Sea Interconnector, as, as it indicated, the final decision of Cyprus is expected immediately.

It is recalled that the Great Sea Interconnector, formerly the EuroAsia Interconnector, concerns the interconnection of the national electricity transmission networks of Cyprus, Israel and Greece (via Crete), with a capacity of 2,000 MW.

(Source: InBusinessNews)