Electrical Power

Electrical power to Ventspils City is supplied via three independent 110 kW overhead electrical transmission lines, one of them double circuit and other two single circuit lines. All three lines merge to 110 kW sub-station Ventspils. Altogether, four 110 kW sub-stations are located in the territory of Ventspils. Further electric power to the city is distributed via medium voltage 10 kW network. The electricity supply loop in the city ensures undisrupted supply of electric power. At this particular moment a cogeneration station project with 40 MW heat power and 20MW electricity power is under development. This is additional grant to safe supply of energy.

The electrical power in Latvia is provided by two companies:

• AS Latvenergo - electricity price rates available under www.latvenergo.lv.
• SIA Enefit - electricity price rates available under www.enefit.lv.

Water Supply and Sewerage

Centralized water supply to the city and treatment of sewage is provided by the municipal enterprise Udeka (www.udeka.lv). Ventspils City is supplied with water from bore-wells located 11 km from the city. Bacteriological contents of the underground water fully correspond to requirements of existing regulations. In the iron removal station an express laboratory is operating, which regularly controls the quality of drinking water. All sewage is collected and purified in biological treatment. The sewage treatment complex purifies both the city and the industrial sewage. All major industrial sites are connected to the water and sewerage system of the city.

Telecommunications and IT

Telecommunications in Ventspils City are provided by state monopoly company SIA Lattelecom (www.lattelecom.lv). Telecommunication lines are connected to digital network. SIA Latvijas Mobilais Telefons (www.lmt.lv), SIA Tele2 (www.tele2.lv) and SIA Bite Latvija (www.bite.lv) are operating along SIA Lattelecom, providing telecommunications in GSM system. Since 2005 in Latvia is available next generation connection CDMA (Code division multiple access). It is provided by AS Telekom Baltija (Triatel) (www.triatel.lv). This new system has several advantages and one of most important is that users can transfer larger amount of information via cell phone.

Development of Information Technologies is one of the key issues in municipality and commercial enterprises. Up-to-date resource and financial management systems SAP/R3 and Navision are introduced by the largest enterprises. Various IT companies (SIA FIX, SIA Infoservs Ventspils, ITL) and subsidiaries of acknowledged IT companies are operating in the city.
Over the past years Ventspils City Council has been concentrating on promotion of IT development. Ventspils has its Digital Centre, which supports City Council and Ventspils University College activities in the field of IT, as well as works for development of information society and relevant technologies. With the support of City Council a high speed optical connection between Ventspils University College and Royal Institute of Technology of Sweden (KTH) in Stocholm has been introduced. Optical cable opens up opportunities of high quality video conferencing with multiple participants and further development of high speed and high capacity communications systems, thus promoting the growth of expertise in science and education in Ventspils, its region and Latvia in general.

There are two international optical submarine cables coming to Ventspils. The  infrastructure owners with international connection in Latvia – Lattelecom and Baltcom Fiber. At present 2-3 different independent routes are used in Latvia, but the number can be easily enlarged to 5, if necessary.

• Lattelecom (www.lattelecom.lv) as the national phone company owns extensive network in Latvia, interconnected to the neighbouring countries. It owns as well an optical submarine cable that goes directly from Ventspils to Sweden.
• Baltcom Fiber (www.bcfiber.lv) is owner and operator of fiber optic submarine cable „Ventspils – Gothland – Stockholm”. The construction of the optical fiber cable was finished in 2002 and is the newest submarine cable in the Baltic Sea. It consists of 68 fibers (manufacturer of the fibers is Ericsson) with the present theoretical capacity from 10 to 40 Gigabit/sec each fiber. Up to now the cable has 0% damage rate and the operator guarantees a 99.7% availability of an international IP transit service. Used capacity is 5 Gigabit/sec, but the company can upgrade it to the necessary 10 or 20 Gigabit/sec in two months time.
  Both companies are ready to collaborate and a combination of the two could be a good option. Advantage of Ventspils in this case is the direct access to the both independent submarine international optical cable lines as well as possibility to use the extensive Lattelecom overland infrastructure with international connections to other EU countries.