Although the construction of the third electricity transmission line between Armenia and Iran was officially launched 17 years ago, the construction on the ground actually began in 2015-2016, according to Vardanyan.

He said the full swing construction began in February-March 2018, and before that only 1-2% of the work had been done.

The work slowed down due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the war.

“We hope that by yearend we will fully complete the Iran-Armenia program, meaning the line will be ready up to Hrazdan,” Vardanyan said.

The third power line will increase the current mutual-flow capacity of 340MW to 1200MW per hour. This means that Armenia will have the capacity to export 7-7,5 billion kWh electric-energy if the electric-energy modes are arranged ideally. On an average it will be possible to export 5,5-6 billion kWh.

The loan for the construction is issued by the Export Development Bank of Iran, and the contractor is the Iranian company Samir.

Vardanyan explains the delays of the project with various reasons. For example, he said that Samir was experiencing financial problems for some time, as well as there’ve been problems with land acquisition and so on. But over 90% of obstacles are now resolved, there are no problems from the Armenian side and the Iranian contractor is overcoming its financial problems.

Vardanyan said the Armenian government has provided all possible support to accelerate the program.