In the framework of the 4th Conference on Southeast Europe and Eastern Mediterranean held in Washington D.C on 6 and 7 February 2023, Copelouzos Group presented GREGY, the electrical interconnection between Greece and Egypt that is being developed by its subsidiary company ELICA SA.
In the thematic session “The Green Revolution in the Eastern Mediterranean”, and with the participation of distinguished speakers, including the former United States Ambassador to Greece Geoffrey Pyatt, now Assistant Secretary of Energy Resources at the State Department, the former United States Ambassador to Egypt Jonathan Cohen and the Executive Director of Bulgartransgaz of Bulgaria, Vladimir Malinov and in the presence of high-ranking guests and officials from the political and business world of the United States, the CEO of the Renewable Energy and Energy Storage Business Unit of Copelouzos Group, John Karydas, presented the strategic importance of the electrical interconnection project between the two countries in the effort of Europe to achieve energy security and independence from natural gas, a project which is a candidate for inclusion in the 6th PCI/PMI project list of the European Commission.
The electrical interconnection between Greece and Egypt, via a submarine cable with a length of approximately 950 km and bi-directional transmission capability, aims to transfer from Egypt to Greece and through Greece to the rest of Europe, 3,000 MW of green electricity, which will be produced from 9.5 GW of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) that will be constructed and operated by Copelouzos Group in Egypt. Such green energy will replace 4.5 bcm of natural gas per year and to reduce CO2 emissions by 10 million tons per year.
The crucial choice of route: why “GREGY” is a feasible project.
During the presentation of GREGY, the reasons for choosing the route of the cable, which satisfies the complex geopolitical parameters of the region and directly connects Egypt to Attica, bypassing Crete, were also analytically explained. Such route , that has been very carefully studied, makes the project feasible, which otherwise would have been for a number of reasons; such reasons include the limitations of the existing network on the island of Crete, its full energy sufficiency with the development of a significant number of GW renewable energy projects on the island, the fact that there will be essentially no free capacity on the submarine cable being installed by IPTO (the Greek Transmission System Operator) to be used, as well as the additional high cost and increased environmental footprint of the equipment that would have to be installed at the landing points of connection on the island, would make an electrical interconnection with Crete unfeasible, both for clear technical and economic reasons.
The benefits of GREGY
As the CEO, Mr. John Karydas mentioned, GREGY has multiple and extremely important benefits for Greece and Europe that are not only environmental, contributing to Europe’s efforts to achieve transition to green energy and zero CO2 emissions by 2050; the project will also make a decisive contribution to the effort to achieve energy diversification and energy security in Europe and will implement the European Union’s strategy to create green “corridors” linking Europe with North Africa. At the same time, GREGY will make a decisive contribution to the transformation of Greece as an important hub of “green” energy in the wider Eastern Mediterranean region and will strengthen our country’s sovereign rights in the region.
The progress of the project
Copelouzos Group is accelerating the development of the project by proceeding with the preparation of the final technical and financial studies, in order to reach the final investment decision stage, implementing a project that will create new circumstances in the energy map in South-Eastern Europe, showing the strategic direction that the whole of Europe must follow in the area of “green evolution”.
