AD ESM secures Obiliq concession, will source Kosovo coal for three years

AD ESM has signed a three-year strategic agreement with Kosovo’s state energy corporation KEK that grants AD ESM a concession at the Obiliq mine and the right to exploit roughly three million tonnes of coal over the next 36 months. The contract was signed by AD ESM’s general director Lazo Uzunchev and KEK’s general director Gramos Hashani.

Guaranteed price, defined quality and logistics set to stabilise supply

According to the company statement, the deal includes a guaranteed and fixed price of 24.4 euros per tonne for the duration of the agreement and clearly defined quality parameters that will underpin purchases. The guaranteed volumes and contract price are intended to shield the domestic energy system from shortages of quality coal for electricity generation and from large, frequent swings in international fuel markets.

The company projects a direct operational benefit: burning Obiliq coal should raise thermal-plant efficiency and deliver an additional 800 GWh of electricity per year and roughly 57 million euros in revenue. Financial gains are expected to be greater once savings from reduced fuel oil usage are taken into account. The statement also forecasts annual CO2 emission reductions of 923,000 tonnes as a result of burning less coal and a further 55,980 tonnes owing to lower fuel oil consumption.

AD ESM says that about 70% of the country’s annual generation now and over the coming three years will come from thermal power plants. For the consolidation period of the mines and to ensure uninterrupted delivery under plans for 2027–2030, estimated annual supplemental coal needs amount to about 1.4 million tonnes: 600,000 tonnes for TE Oslomej and 800,000 tonnes for TE Bitola.

“Based on precise logistical and infrastructure analyses for the throughput of the Blace border crossing, which allows a daily transit of a maximum of 120 trucks or about 3,000 tonnes of coal per day, the realistic maximum annual quantity that can be expected to be delivered from KEK is about 800,000 tonnes,” Uzunchev said, noting the border-crossing capacity as the limiting factor for yearly supply.

Uzunchev added that AD ESM will publish a public tender under the Public Procurement Law no later than the end of August to select an economic operator to carry out excavation, quality testing and loading at the designated Obiliq extraction fields, as well as transport, freight forwarding and unloading at the TE Bitola and TE Oslomej stockpiles. “Parallel to the coal purchases, we are implementing an intensive plan for the complete revitalization of mining machinery and the remediation of neglected deformations of the excavation fields that occurred in the past. In the mines in REK Bitola there are sufficient quantities of coal which, according to plans and projects, by the end of 2027 we will be able to exploit without interruptions and thereby completely cancel the need for additional quantities of coal from other suppliers,” he said.

Photo: press material from the event