During a trip to Baden-Württemberg this Thursday, a high-level delegation from the Republic of Montenegro led by Prime Minister Milo Đukanović visited the engineering company Voith to gain information about hydropower and the company’s activities in this field.

The members of the delegation also included Minister of Economy, Vladimir Kavarić, and Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Petar Ivanović. The guests were welcomed by Dr. Roland Münch, Chairman of the Man-agement Board of Voith Hydro, and other leading representatives and hy-dropower experts from Voith Hydro. The visit from Montenegro followed an invitation from Prime Minister of the State of Baden-Württemberg, Winfried Kretschmann.

"We are greatly pleased by the interest in hydropower shown by Prime Min-ister Đukanović and the delegation from Montenegro," said Dr. Roland Münch on the occasion of the visit. "Montenegro has relied on climate-friendly electricity generation from the power of water for many years. As well, the country possesses a great potential for further expanding this en-ergy source. We at Voith are optimistic that for these reasons, there will continue to be a positive impulse for hydropower development in Montene-gro in the future."

Today, Montenegro covers about 70 percent of its electricity consumption with energy from hydropower. At the same time, only about 18 percent of the hydropower potential in the country has been developed. To guarantee electricity generation even as demand rises and to shape a climate-friendly energy mix into the future, the government increasingly relies on renewable energies such as hydropower. The objectives of this long-term energy de-velopment plan include modernizing existing hydropower plants as well as improving conditions for investment in new stations.

One focus in this projection is small hydro plants, which will help stabilize electrical power consumption and further reduce dependence on energy imports. According to estimates, in Montenegro an installed capacity of about 240 megawatts can be realized solely with small hydropower plants, while the actual installed capacity in this area today is just below 10 megawatts.

Among the advantages of small hydropower plants are comparatively fast installation times and low investment costs, their contribution to a decentral-ized local electrical power supply and the possibility to construct them at locations less suitable for larger hydropower stations. The StreamDiver, an especially compact, cost-efficient and environmentally friendly solution for energy generation from hydropower, is just one of Voith’s approaches to maximizing small hydro resources.

The Importance of Hydropower
Hydropower is the largest, oldest and also most reliable form of renewable energy generation. Worldwide it makes an indispensable contribution to stable power supplies and hence to economic and social development - in industrial countries and also in rapidly growing regions. At the same time, hydropower significantly contributes to climate-protecting energy genera-tion. Voith has been a leading supplier of this technology since the early beginning of hydropower utilization, and continuously develops and im-proves this technology.

About the Company
Voith sets standards in the markets energy, oil & gas, paper, raw materials and transport & automotive. Founded in 1867, Voith employs more than 39,000 people, generates €5.3 billion in sales, operates in over 50 countries around the world and is today one of the biggest family-owned companies in Europe.