
On June 21 of this year, electricity was suddenly cut off in the vast majority of Albania for nearly 30 minutes.
A little later it was realized that something serious had happened, as the same thing had happened in Montenegro, Bosnia and Croatia.
Immediately in an appearance for the media, Minister Balluku explained that the cause of the collapse was a problem in Montenegro, while the cause, according to her, was related to network overload due to high temperatures and the use of air conditioning instruments, etc.
But a report drawn up by its subordinates in OST and provided by Hashtag.al ( read here ), suggests that it is not Montenegro, but Albania that caused the collapse and the cascading effect created in the broadcast network.
The report even reveals that three transmission lines were out of order at the time the incident occurred, because work was being done on those lines for the construction of new roads, including the Kashar-Thumane road.
How did the event happen?
At the time of the collapse, Albania was importing quantities of energy from Greece, at the same time exporting part of this quantity to Montenegro.
At 12:09 p.m. on a line inside the Montenegrin territory, tracking was suspended after suspected damage to the network by tall trees or another motive.
The Montenegrin authorities announced the accident and only 12 minutes later, at 12:21, the major collapse occurred in 4 Balkan states.
The OST report says that 12 minutes after the event in Montenegro, the line that was importing from Greece was blocked in Albania. and automatically the R/L system stops the forwarding.
But in its report, the OST also lists three very interesting points as the cause of the collapse.
The OST officially admits that our country has long held three interconnection capillaries related to the construction of new roads, they are:
- The lines that pass near the Thumanë-Kashar road,
- The line that passes near the new road that is being built on the outer ring of Tirana
- The Fier-Babicë line
It is not known if OST has reported these line outages to the regional energy network, but what is known for sure is the fact that matrix interconnection systems always have a plan B when a breakdown occurs somewhere.
So, after the blackout happened in Montenegro, the TSO could activate plan B or what is called 'level 1' blackout protection and immediately capillarize the current in other directions.
But at the time of the accident in Montenegro, three of the main capillaries were out of order.
"It's like having a 10-lane highway, where 10 cars pass at once without a problem. But if suddenly the highway narrows and becomes one lane, the road must be immediately capillaryized somewhere else, otherwise the system collapses, turns off completely and the network remains with zero energy", - explained the situation in simple words, an expert of transmission lines.
Question mark on public works
At the moment when the energy collapse occurred, the Kashar-Thumane road was being worked on at a fast pace for the completion and inauguration of this road.
An unofficial source told Hashtag.al that the power lines passing by this road had been down for several weeks.
As a rule, when the track of a new highway requires the interconnection lines to be moved, i.e. the poles and cables, the OST has a special initiative that resolves the situation with portable poles within 3 or 4 weeks.
Therefore, portable poles are installed and used near the road trajectory, so that when the old poles are removed, there will be no blockage of the capillary.
The data suggest that on the Thumanë-Kashar road and the works on the outer ring road of Tirana, this undertaking of the OST that installs the portable poles has not been engaged, but two procurements of several million euros have been made by the OST, both private companies to carry out this work.
Apparently, the "work" was done by completely blocking the lines for a long time, which allegedly led to the restriction of the capillaries and the transformation of a normal breakdown in Montenegro, into a total collapse in four countries./ Hashtag.al