SOFIA (Bulgaria), November 11 (SeeNews) – Workers in Varna thermal power plant (TPP), which will suspend operations on January 1, will get severance pay packages that are double the average for the country's energy sector, the plant's owner CEZ Bulgaria said on Tuesday.
CEZ Bulgaria will pay out all workers the equivalent of up to 11 monthly wages, depending on their length of service at the plant, the company said in a statement published on its website.
The TPP's units 4, 5 and 6 need to be eco retrofitted until the end of the year in order to comply with EU and national regulations. However, earlier this month, CEZ Bulgaria said that in the current context of the regional electricity market, a reliable business plan for Varna TPP is not possible.
In an attempt to come up with a solution for the problem, Czech utility group CEZ was considering setting up with state-run Bulgarian Energy Holding (BEH) a project company to finance an eco retrofit of the three units of coal-burning Varna TPP.
Earlier this year, CEZ Bulgaria told SeeNews the initial investment programme, drawn up at the time CEZ completed the acquisition of TPP Varna in 2006, called for replacement of three of its six 210 MW units but that the economic downturn that ensued forced the shelving of the project.
The coal-fired Varna TPP posted a loss of 67.6 million levs ($42.9 million/34.6 million euro )in 2013. It generated a total of 566 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of electricity last year, down 970 GWh (63%) from 2012.
Varna TPP operates six units. Units 4 and 5 of the power plant have been off-line since January 1, 2013 and January 1, 2014, respectively, due to non-compliance with environmental limits set in the respective integrated permit.
In Bulgaria, CEZ also operates as a power distributor, supplying electricity to 1.9 million end-users in the country's west, including the capital Sofia.