February 28 (SeeNews) - Bulgartransgaz said on Thursday it has resumed its tender for construction of a 484 km natural gas pipeline worth an estimated 2.29 billion levs ($1.3 billion/1.2 billion euro) after a complaint against the procedure was withdrawn.
Bulgartransgaz extended the deadline for submitting offers to March 6 from February 15, the Bulgarian gas transmission network operator said in a statement.
The tender was suspended on February 14 after power plant equipment maintenance and repair services company Atomenergoremont filed a complaint to the Commission for Protection of Competition challenging Bulgartransgaz's clarifications on issues raised by persons interested in participating in the procedure. Bulgartransgaz's clarifications cover 15 questions by interested parties, mainly related to how the contract will be financed and the payment time frame.
Last week, Atomenergoremont withdrew its complaint and the Commission for Protection of Competition said that Bulgartransgaz can resume the tender process.
The tender is part of a larger project for building new infrastructure for transit of natural gas to Europe through a branch of TurkStream pipeline that will cross Bulgaria, Serbia and Hungary.
At the end of last month, Bulgartransgaz successfully completed the binding Phase 3 of the economic test for the project.
Russia's Gazprom plans to build a string of its TurkStream pipeline for transit of gas to Europe from Turkey via Bulgaria, Serbia and Hungary. The TurkStream offshore gas pipeline, stretching 930 km across the Black Sea from Russia to Turkey, consists of two parallel strings with annual throughput capacity of 15.75 billion cubic metres of gas each. One string is intended for consumers in Turkey, while the second will carry gas to customers in Europe.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)