The Albanian government approved on Wednesday a deal with two foreign companies to build three hydro- power plants in eastern Albania, Xinhua reported.
Austria's EVN utility and Norway's Statkraft will invest 950 million euros (about 1.37 billion U.S. dollars) to build three power plants on the river Devol which flows into the Adriatic Sea south of the capital Tirana.
It was reported that the three plants would have a combined capacity of 340 megawatts of power and generate 1,000 gigawatt- hours of electricity annually.
In the past years, Albania has been hit by an acute energy crisis, with regular power cuts throughout the country, including Tirana.
More than 90 percent of Albania's domestically-produced electricity is generated by hydro-power plants, which are badly affected by droughts.