The European network expansion east wards

Abstract

The Western Europe electricity network has for long been one of the largest synchronous systems. During the sixties it spread for Spain to the eastern borders of Germany, Austria, former Yugoslavia and Greece. At the same time an eastern system was operated, under the leadership of Russia: the Iron Curtain also applied to the electrical systems. Thus continental Europe was covered by three separate synchronous systems : the Western system, so-called the UCPTE system, the Scandinavian system called NORDEL and the Eastern system. Only a weak DC connection existed between NORDEL and UCTE. The disappearance of the Soviet Union resulted into the disintegration of the Eastern system and a process of extension of the Western system. We are still in this process and the present open question to be answered is whether we can expect one day a synchronous system encompassing Europe and Russia, on one hand, and circling the Mediterranean Sea from Turkey to Spain, on the other.