Polish tycoon to import electricity from Ukraine

Polenergia, a unit of Kulczyk’s investment vehicle Kulczyk Investments, has already signed a preliminary agreement with Ukraine’s power-plant operator Elektroatom, Kulczyk, regarded as Poland’s wealthiest man, said in an interview for daily Rzeczpospolita.

“Ukraine has a 40 percent surplus of power,” Kulczyk is quoted as saying. “Enabling deliveries to the West could be a massive opportunity for the EU, where energy prices are currently 2.5 times those of the US, for example.”

Poland is a big producer of coal, but imports large quantities of the fuel from Russia. Russian coal is cheaper thanks to lower costs of mining, but its deliveries to Ukraine have recently faced political obstacles.

The same applies to natural gas imports from Russia, on which the Ukrainian economy depends. Poland also imports two-thirds of its gas from Russia with the rest covered by domestic production. (an)