Sabancı says ready for second electricity distribution tender

Hakman said Enerjisa is targeting having a 10 percent share in the country’s electricity market by 2015 with a generation capacity of 5,000 megawatts and 6 million customers. The company currently has 3.2 million customers, who are served by Başkent Elektrik, which distributes electricity in Ankara, he underlined and added, “We are willing to bid for another district which has 2.5 to 3 million customers.”

Hakman was speaking at the 2010 Turkey Energy Summit, organized by the Gas&Power and Enerji Petrol Gaz magazines in Ankara. In his speech, Hakman also asserted that his company will invest a total of $6 billion to realize its target of having the capacity to generate 5,000 megawatts of electricity. The conference was well attended by almost all major players of Turkey’s energy business and the topic of privatization of electricity distribution grids and possible tenders for the sale of electricity generation facilities left its mark on the overall discussions during the summit.

Italian Edison S.p.A country representative Akın Özkan also said his company is interested in getting involved in the privatization tenders of Turkey’s state-owned electricity generation units. Özkan said Edison, an active player in the energy sector since 1883, has adopted Southeastern Europe as its major target for expansion and growth, so its interest in the Turkish energy market is meaningful from this point of view. The burgeoning demand for electricity in Turkey will continue in the period ahead and an extra capacity of up to 20,000 megawatts will be needed in the next 10 years, he acknowledged. Within this context, Özkan argued that Turkey has decided to launch the privatization of its electricity generation facilities, which marks a level that had not been witnessed even in Europe. He further stressed that his company is also evaluating investment opportunities in hydroelectric and thermal power plants.

Selahattin Hakman

In his speech, Özkan also addressed the Interconnector Turkey-Greece-Italy (ITGI) project. The project aims to carry natural gas from the Caspian Sea region to Greece and Italy through Turkey via a pipeline, which will have an annual transport capacity of 12 billion cubic meters.

He said the ITGI promises great benefits to Turkey such as increasing its transmission capacity and supporting its long-established target of being an energy-hub in its region. The decision on whether to invest in the project will be made in 2010, and if everything goes as planned, the project will start operating by 2015, he added.

Privatization Administration (ÖİB) Vice President Ahmet Aksu was also among the speakers and offered recommendations to interested companies in his speech. “Investors planning to bid in the privatization tenders should not only look at the balance sheets of the companies they are interested in,” he said, adding that they will indeed be investing in Turkey’s future.

There is a huge investment potential, especially in energy in the country, and investors in this field must make decisions they will not regret in the future. As regards the privatization of electricity production facilities, Aksu said only small progress has been made in this field so far due to a number of reasons. However, he added, the administration is working intensively on this issue.

The ÖİB had chosen to first focus on the sale of electricity distribution grids, Aksu said, adding that this method was adopted to ensure the smoothly operation of the energy market.

TPAO invites investors to Southeast

Oil and gas exploration studies in Turkey and abroad as well as the country’s potential in fossil fuel reserves topped the agenda of Turkish Petroleum Corporation (TPAO) General Manager Mehmet Uysal. He said there is an abundance of untouched fields in southeast Anatolia, which has the potential of carrying oil beneath, and invited investors to conduct drills in these lands.Uysal also criticized the government’s unwillingness to provide sufficient financial support for oil and gas exploration investments. Turkish Pipeline Corporation (BOTAŞ) General Manager Fazıl Şenel, on the other hand, spoke about ongoing investments to carry Egyptian gas to Europe via Turkey. “The gas will have reached Turkey by the middle of next year,” he estimated.