Bulgaria's Supreme Administrative Court confirmed a decision by the Sofia
municipal authorities to award a 213.5 million lev ($147.8 million/109.2 million
euro) contract for the construction of a waste-to-biofuel plant to Greek tie-up
Aktor-Helektor, local media reported on Friday.
The court cancelled a
decision by the country’s competition watchdog to cancel Sofia municipality's
choice of contractor and hold a new tender, Capital Daily reported.
The
ruling cannot be appealed.
In June, two months after two other bidders
for the contract - the VSM-SPH and Stanilov-Daneko consortia - filed complaints
against Sofia's choice of Aktor-Helektor, the antitrust regulator overruled the
municipality's decision, saying that it had disqualified one of the five bidders
without proper justification.
If the project for the plant's construction
had been delayed for next year, the Sofia municipality would have lost the EU
funding, covering nearly 85% of the costs.
The construction works have to
be completed within 19 months after the contract is signed.
The plant
will treat more than three quarters of the city’s waste and will produce energy
from refuse-derived fuel, which will be used for heating production by the
city’s heating utility Toplofikatsiya Sofia, reducing its usage of natural gas
by at least 10%.
The construction of the plant is part of a project for
an integrated waste management system in the Bulgarian capital city, whose
combined value is 346 million levs. As much as 84.26% of the total project costs
are covered by EU funds.