SOFIA (Bulgaria), January 20 (SeeNews) – Bulgaria intends to finalise, by end-March, the renegotiation of the terms of long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs) it has signed with US companies AES and ContourGlobal, which own two thermal power plants (TPPs) in Bulgaria, the country's energy minister said on Tuesday.
In December last year, the Bulgarian energy regulator requested that the state-owned National Electricity Company, NEK, open talks on revising the terms of the PPAs.
Negotiations have already started and two working groups have been formed for the purpose, Temenuzhka Petkova said at the ninth annual meeting of business and government, organised in Sofia by Economedia.
“We are leading a very good dialogue together with our colleagues from the American plants,” she said.
The energy regulator decided last month to cancel its decision dated May 27 and to request from NEK to open talks with AES and ContourGlobal on revising the terms of the PPAs signed in 2001.
In May, the regulator decided that the PPAs signed between NEK and the two US companies should be amended so as to provide for a 30% cut in the price of electricity produced by Maritsa Iztok 1, owned by AES, and a 20% cut for electricity produced by Maritsa Iztok 3, owned by ContourGlobal. The regulator also required part of the output of the two TPPs to be sold on the free market in Bulgaria.
Both AES and ContourGlobal have appealed against the regulator's decision taken in May.
The two TPPs claim that the terms requested by the regulator make it impossible for them to meet their obligations to creditors and suppliers.
ContourGlobal acquired a majority stake in the Maritsa Iztok 3 TPP from Italy's Enel in June 2011. AES launched the Maritza Iztok 1 power plant in 2011.
The power plants are part of the country's largest energy complex Maritsa Iztok, located in the southeastern region of Stara Zagora. The complex hosts lignite coal mines and three coal-fired power plants.