The European Commission (EC) and the leaders of Poland and the Baltic States have agreed to synchronise the Baltic States' electricity grid with continental Europe by 2025. For historical reasons, the Baltic States' power grid is still operated in a synchronous mode with the Russian and Belarusian systems (referred to as the BRELL ring, which includes Belarus, Russia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania). The €560m Baltic synchronisation project is considered as a priority and is likely to benefit from the project of common interest (PCI) status.
Both the continental Europe and Russian systems operate at a frequency of 50 Hz but they are not synchronised. Lithuania could work autonomously from Moscow by June 2019 before switching formally in 2025. Central European countries - Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia - synchronised their systems with the continental European network (CEN) before their entrance in the EU, between 1995 and 2004.