Kurum Bids To Build Three Power Plants

TIRANA, Dec.8 – Turkish steel group Kurum Holding said on Friday that in a consortium with Iceland-based electricity company Landsvirkjun it has placed a bid in a tender for the construction of three hydropower plants in Albania. “We submitted our bid in November,” Kurum said in a statement. Kurum offered to build three hydropower power plants with 175MW installed capacity each, the company said, without elaborating on the projected investments. Kurum, through its four Albanian units, runs melting, hot rolling, oxygen and hydrated lime facilities in Elbasan in central Albania and Albania’s sole shipyard, Durres-Kurum Shipping, located at Durres port, on the Adriatic Sea.
Albania opened a tender for granting a 35-year build-operate-transfer (BOT) concession for the exploitation of the water resources of river Devoll in July. The winner is expected to be selected by the end of December or early January. The only other bidder in the tender is Austrian power utility company EVN. According to its offer, construction of three hydropower plants will cost a combined 700 million euro ($1.02 billion) to 1.0 billion euro. EVN, as the company that prepared the draft on the exploitation of the water resources of Devoll, has a bonus of 10 points ahead of the other bidders. Albania plans to import 2,215 GWh of electricity worth an estimated 201 million euro next year.