Member Article

At a recently held Roundtable on the topic of the economic and environmental challenges that are surrounding the process of building the second block of the thermal power plant in Pljevlja, the Montenegrin Network for the Affirmation of the NGO sector (MANS), has scrutinised the whole idea behind this state-owned National Power Company of Montenegro's (EPCG) project.MANS representatives have claimed to have seen no reliable data that would back the economic viability of such a project, proceeding to state how the total costs of this endeavour are much larger than those presented by EPCG. While EPCG has projected the overall costs to be topping out at EUR 450 million, MANS coordinator, Ivana Mrdović, pointed out that these projections have not included costs of financing credits, the openings of new mines, the costs of re-cultivation, the openings of new ash and slag dumps, as well as ore landfills – all of which threaten to push the total cost close to EUR 1 billion. Moreover, Mrdović outlined that if CO2 emissions and their health effects were to be quantified, that number could very well grow to surpass EUR 3 billion. MANS then reiterated their stance on how a deficit in electric power should be solved by focusing on the construction of renewable energy sources – those of which that derive from public consensus, instead of artificially upgrading a thermal plant at such high financial and health costs.The EPCG's project control specialist, Ivan Mrvaljević, responded by labelling these claims as figments of the imagination, saying how the government would never risk venturing into a project that does not have realistic economic viability, as no bank would enter into a loan agreement without being shown a proven feasibility study first. At the same time, Mrvaljević expressed doubts about the vagueness of background validity behind the aforementioned cost estimates outlined by MANS representatives.Nonetheless, further doubts surrounding the decision to construct the second block of the thermal plant were cast at the Roundtable by Dejan Mijović, ex-EBRD development manager, who claimed that a study from 2009 had shown how the entire Pljevlja basin does not have enough reserves of coal whose exploitation would be cost-effective. He reminded everyone of the unsuccessful tenders for the Pljevlja plant and mine from 2009 and 2010, and the reluctance shown by foreign investors on those occasions, outlining them as proof for his claims.

 

Link to article