* Penspen UK, accepted as a winner of the call for tenders
* Improved odds for AGRI, amid the issues encountered by Nabucco
The project company for the construction of AGRI (a pipeline for transporting natural gas over the Black Sea, on the Azerbaijan - Georgia - Romania - Hungary route) will begin the negotiations with the company which will accomplish the feasibility study.
Corneliu Condrea, a director in the Ministry of the Economy and member on the Board of Directors of AGRI, said: "At the call for tenders for the appointment of the company which will draft the feasibility study for AGRI, 12 offers were submitted of which three were selected. Following the submission of the firm bids by the three companies, the project company has appointed Penspen UK as a winner. Therefore, we begin the negotiations with it, for the signing of the final contract. If it all goes well and we sign the contract, Penspen will have 22 weeks to draft the feasibility study. If we do not reach an agreement with Penspen, we will then begin negotiations with the company which made the second best offer".
He said that the study will show whether the project is feasible and for what transport capacity. Most likely, the study will be ready in August-September 2012, even though the initial deadline had been set at Q2 2012. The delays in the implementation schedule were caused by the fact that the steps of the auction have to be approved by all the shareholders of AGRI (Azerbaijan, Georgia, Romania and Hungary), Corneliu Condrea said.
In case the project is feasible, the shareholders of AGRI will know the total amount of the investment and the participation quotas. This will be followed by the approval of the project and the decision of the shareholders concerning the final participation in the project.
The official of the Ministry of the Economy explained:
