Djedovic Handanovic, Romanian PM sign MoU on Djerdap 3 hydropower plant

BUCHAREST - Serbian Minister of Mining and Energy Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic and Romanian PM and acting Energy Minister Ilie Bolojan signed on Thursday in Bucharest a MoU on facilitating information exchange regarding a project to build a Djerdap 3 reversible hydropower plant.

"This year, Serbia plans to start preparing spatial planning documentation, as well as design and technical documentation, and we have already established joint working groups with the Romanian partners and we intend to ensure regular exchange of information," Djedovic Handanovic said after meeting with Bolojan and signing the MoU in the Romanian government building.

She noted that Serbia and Romania had traditionally excellent relations.

Djedovic Handanovic: Technical preparations for Djerdap 3 to take about three years

BUCHAREST - Serbian Minister of Mining and Energy Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic said on Thursday she expected technical preparations for a project to build a Djerdap 3 reversible hydropower plant would take about three to four years and that construction works could take another six to seven years.

"Every large-scale energy project can neither be developed nor implemented overnight. It takes years of preparations and work, very hard work, and that is why we must not waste a single day. That is why we have worked diligently in the past," Djedovic Handanovic told Tanjug in Bucharest after signing with Romanian PM and acting Energy Minister Ilie Bolojan a MoU on facilitating information exchange regarding a project to build the Djerdap 3 plant.

She said work on the general project, on completing a preliminary justifiability study and on a strategic environmental impact assessment was expected to begin in the next few months.

"Very soon, we will issue a public call for that, it is ready, and we expect a government working group as part of strategic partnership with the US to also approve an evaluation of companies interested in preparing technical documentation for development of Djerdap 3. I expect the technical preparations to take some three to four years, so that construction can start afterwards, taking some six to seven years," she said.

The minister said the MoU was important for further project development.

"We had a very good meeting with the Romanian PM about our cooperation in the energy sector. Bolojan is acting minister of energy, and we concluded that we have decades-long excellent cooperation and that Romania and Serbia are best neigbours in that sense," she said, adding that Romania was a country with which Serbia had "excellent comprehensive bilateral political and economic relations."

"Djerdap 3 represents true potential for us to strengthen that cooperation further and bring more energy security to our citizens. They (Romania) are very open and interested in us cooperating in development of the Djerdap 3 project and in exchanging information," Djedovic Handanovic said.

She noted that analyses of hydrological studies, as well as an analysis of the future plant's impact on the operation of the existing Djerdap 1 and Djerdap 2 hydropower plants, had been shared with the Romanian side.

"It is comprehensively positive in the sense that it can also have a positive effect on Djerdap 1 and Djerdap 2 within a range of 1 to 3.2 pct, depending on the model and the season," the minister said.

She said the project would be carried out as part of a Serbia-US strategic partnership and an agreement with Washington that had entered into force in March 2025.