Electricity production fell by 7% in May

Electricity production in May was 7% lower than at the same time a year ago at 787 GWh. The main reason behind this fall was the larger amount of hydroelectricity from Scandinavia coming to the market at a lower price, which meant that Estonia preferred to import electricity rather than produce it.

Electricity consumption in May reached 592 GWh, which is the same as last year. Despite falling 7%, electricity production in May exceeded consumption and Estonia continued to be a system that exports electricity.

The amount of electricity produced from renewable energy in Estonia was 44% higher than in May last year and the rise was above all due to the production of electricity from biomass at the Narva power plants. In only five months, 47% of Elering’s forecast for 2012 for electricity produced from renewable energy has been met. In May 18% of all electricity produced came from renewable sources.

Electricity production in Latvia was 4% lower than a year earlier because conditions were more favourable for electricity imports. Electricity consumption in Latvia was 3% higher than in May last year. The Latvian electrical system had a positive balance of 53 GWh in May, mainly because of the increase in the production capacity of local hydro plants.

As the exchange price fell, Lithuanian electricity production fell by 16% in May to its lowest level in recent years at 151 GWh. This meant that the total production in Lithuania in May only managed to cover 20% of the country’s consumption and there was a shortfall of 614 GWh. Electricity imports from third countries made up almost 50% of total imports, but this was 20% less than a year earlier as imports from Latvia increased.

Overall the electricity production in the Baltic States was 7% lower than a year earlier and there was a total shortfall of 366 GWh in May, equivalent to 19% of the total consumption of the Baltic States.

Electricity production in Finland was 12% down on the previous year, but the production of hydroelectricity in Finland has grown rapidly resulting in 35% of total energy production in Finland coming from hydro power. The largest share, 87%, of Finnish imports continued to come from Sweden, while imports from Russia fell to 12% of the total in May. The majority of electricity exports went to Estonia, which accounted for 93% of electricity sales.

Lithuania took 49% of exports of Estonian electricity, Latvia accounted for 45% and Finland received 6%, while 57% of Estonia’s imports of electricity came from Finland, 35% from Latvia and 8% from Lithuania.

The full report on the electricity market for May is available at here (only in Estonian).