Energy, Latvia, Legislation

According to reports on possible fraud in several cogeneration plants, a control group established by the Economics Ministry conducted extraordinary inspections to the first eight cogeneration plants in the time period between October 17 and October 23.

The control group inspected the cogeneration plants on site and recorded the situation in the presence of a law enforcement officer, as well as inspected documentation of Sadales Tikls in respect of the plants. The control group inspected cogeneration plants of Briedis Buve, Madonas Eko, Tektus, M Parks, E Strenci, Elektro Ridzene, E Seda and Rigas Energija.

"The inspections prove that there is no power generation taking place in the inspected cogeneration plants, and it is credible that the plants had been run just for the necessary 72-hour test period," the ministry said.

Thus, the present legislation or its application does not meet the goal to ensure that the cogeneration plants are commissioned until the set deadline or they lose the right to produce power in line with the mandatory procurement.

The ministry noted that Rigas Energija had inaccuracies in its documents. The ministry also recorded that the cogeneration plant’s capacity at the time of inspection reached just 5-7%.

In case of Briedis Buve, for example, the ministry discovered that the permission to connect to the system has been issued to the plant one day before the 72-hour test period was completed.