Russian revenue from electricity exports down 32% in Q1 - customs
MOSCOW. May 8 (Interfax) - Russia's revenues from electricity export declined 32% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2014 to $206.5 million, the Federal Customs Service (FCS) said.
In physical terms, export fell 31% to 3.9 billion kilowatt hours (kWh).
Revenues from exports to non-CIS countries totaled $135.4 million in terms of value, but fell 37.2% to 2.6 billion kWh in physical terms. Exports to CIS countries totaled 1.3 billion kWh for $71 million.
The overall slump for electricity exports is connected with an unfavorable pricing environment on Russia's domestic market and foreign markets for electricity, Inter RAO UES , the Russian operator for import-export operations on electricity markets, has said previously.
As an example, average spot prices on the Finnish market (Nord Pool) fell 16.2% year-on-year in Q1, and those of the Lithuanian market (Nord Pool, Lithuanian zone), fell 4.4% while prices were high on the Russian market.
Russia imported 769 million kWh of electricity in Q1 for $19.7 million, representing 23% decline in physical terms, and 26% in terms of value. Russia imported 19.2 million kWh from non-CIS countries for $400,000, and 750 million kWh from CIS countries for $19.3 million. The decline in imports from the CIS occurred because of significantly less shipments from Kazakhstan. This was due partly to economic reasons, and partly to a reduction in the framework of parallel grid operations, Inter RAO has said. Imports from non-CIS countries grew because of test electricity imports from Finland.
Kazakhstan accounts for the main share of import, while the largest markets for Russian electricity are Finland, Belarus, Lithuania and China.