Lithuania has halted electricity trade with Belarus after the neighbouring country connected Astravyets nuclear power plant to its energy system on Tuesday.

In line with Lithuania’s so-called anti-Astravyets law that bans electricity imports from Belarus once the plant launches production, Litgrid on Tuesday set the capacity for commercial electricity flow from the neighbouring country to zero.

“Litgrid set a zero MW capacity for commercial electricity flow from Belarus at 11:38 after its System Control Centre recorded, at 11:06 today, data showing electricity production at the Astravyets NPP,” the power transmission system operator said in a statement.

Litgrid has informed the Nord Pool power exchange that no commercial electricity exchanges between Belarus and Lithuania will be available from now on.

Energy Minister Žygimantas Vaičiūnas said that Lithuania was now blocking its network for the needs of the Astravyets plant.

“These national measures ensure that Astravyets electricity is not traded on our market, but solutions reached at the regional level to bar the plant’s electricity from the Baltic electricity market are equally important,” he said in a statement, adding that “the EU must play a critical role in nuclear safety.”

Giedrius Radvila, director of Litgrid’s Power System Operations Department, said that the operator would give Belarus no access to its emergency power reserve maintained by the Kruonis Pumped Storage Plant.

In July, Litgrid informed the TSOs of Belarus and other countries in the so-called BRELL ring about its withdrawal from their emergency reserve agreement.

Lithuania is using the Kruonis plant’s capacity, its interconnections with Poland and Sweden and the Baltic market’s balancing capacity to ensure power reserves for its needs.

Litgrid estimates that electricity imports from Belarus totaled 0.3 TWh in the first half of 2020, accounting for around 5 percent of the total power imports. Lithuania is importing most of its electricity from Sweden, at 45 percent in the first half.

The Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian electricity grids will be physically separated from Belarus and Russia in 2025 after being synchronized with the Western European system.

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