Hotline of power engineering specialists:
November 6, at the State Duma of the Russian Federation General Director of JSC «Russian Grids» Oleg Budargin took part in parliamentary hearings on the results of reforming RAO «UES of Russia» and the performance of structures established on its basis.
In his speech Oleg Budargin stressed that the staff of the group of companies JSC «Russian Grids» over the past few years has done a lot of work to ensure the reliability and availability of the Russian power grid complex.
«Our primary goal is reliability. And lately we have reduced the failure rate in the power sector of the country by 38%. The average duration of interruptions of power supply has been reduces two times: from 4.8 hours per process failure in 2009 to 2.15 hours in 2013,» said Oleg Budargin.
Separately, the head of the electric grid holding company focused on the results of work in the field of increasing the availability of grid connection. «The cost of grid connection from 2010 fell by more than 3 times. The grid connection time has been significantly reduced,» he stressed.
In turn, Minister of Energy of the Russian Federation Alexander Novak also highly appreciated the steps taken to simplify the procedure for electricity grid connection. He noted that by the end of 2013 in terms of connection to the power grid infrastructure Russia has risen in the ranking of Doing Business, published by the World Bank, at once by 67 points (from place 184 to 117), which allowed Russia to rise from place 112 to 92.
Oleg Budargin also reported that during 2009 — 2012 the number of unavailable supply centres was reduced: in the distribution sector — by 7%, in the transmission one — by 33%. The set of measures taken to increase the availability of electricity grids allowed to increase the number of grid connections, which amounted to 34.8 GW.
As part of the report the head of «Russian Grids» noted the growth of new capacity: in 2012 the transformer capacity was commissioned one and a half times more compared to 2008, power lines — twice. In this case, the specific cost of construction of power lines and substations was reduced in 2012 compared to 2009 by 14%.
For further work on the development of the electricity sector an important stage of the reform, according to Oleg Budargin, was the Decree of the President on the consolidation of distribution and transmission grids.
«The creation of our company has already allowed to solve a few problems,» stressed the head of «Russian Grids», «First is making changes to the law on the «last mile». Considerable work has been done. At the same time, another part of the work is the realization of the provisions of this law at the regional level. Second is increasing the availability of grid connection. Our efforts were appreciated by the international community within the rating of the World Bank. Third is the adoption of the unified Technical policy for subsidiaries of «Russian Grids». However, as noted by Oleg Budargin, the power grid of the country has more than three thousand local grid companies (TGC), which is certainly a significant impact on ensuring the reliability of power supply to customers.
«In recent years the number of TGCs has significantly increased. It is necessary to restore order in this sector of the grid complex. In this case we are not talking about the need to consolidate them all under „Russian Grids“, but we are talking about making everyone act by common rules, comply with all the requirements of the unified technical policy, regulations and ensure reliable power supply. In this direction we are actively working with the Committee on Energy of the State Duma,» said the head of «Russian Grids».
Among the important steps for further development of the country’s electric power industry in the short term Oleg Budargin noted the offer of «Russian Grids», Ministry of Energy and representatives of the Committee on Energy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation to establish a common policy to develop the electric grid complex of Russia, as well as provide long-term parameters of the tariff regulation of the industry. He also added that the solution to these problems is possible only with the support of the state.