ELECTRICITY MARKET DEVELOPMENT IN LATVIA

Electricity is crucial to the development, progress, security and overall lifestyle in the global economy. A common European electricity market requires market integration and transmission grid expansion, including cross-border interconnectors. The electricity market opening in Latvia was divided into four stages; it began with legal persons in 2007 and ended with household users on 1 January 2015. The aim of the research is to assess the development of the Latvian electricity market since the beginning of the electricity market liberalisation.Research methods used: monographic, descriptive, analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction and regression analysis. The Diamond Model was employed to acquire information for market analysis.The electricity market’s development was affected by its liberalisation. With the interconnections still being developed, the Latvian electricity market is slowly fitting into the Scandinavian market and decreasing its supply dependence on third countries. Now the electricity market is developing naturally; yet, it requires stricter monitoring of its development and stimulation