The overhaul of the Gabcikovo hydroelectric power plant is being postponed again. At least by a month. The state-owned company Vodohospodarska Vystavba had to revise the international tender for the main contractor for the modernization and innovation project of the Gabcikovo hydroelectric power plant. Interested parties can submit their offers until September 16, originally it was supposed to be until August 11. The reason for the extension of the deadline for the delivery of the application for participation was the clarification of the participation conditions due to the update of the form in the eForms system. Points of the progress criteria and data on the application of the Regulation on Foreign Subsidies were added. „Due to the deployment of the new version of the eForms form, duplication in the conditions for participation of personal status has been removed,“ Vodohospodarska Vystavba stated in the announced tender.
The general overhaul of the Gabcikovo hydroelectric power plant is currently about the fourth tender in a row. More than ten years ago, Robert Fico‚s second government, when it „forcefully“ took over the largest hydroelectric power plant from Slovenske Elektrarne, shouted that a general overhaul of the Gabcikovo power plant was urgent. It was probably not that urgent, since the power plant in the south of Slovakia produces electricity even without a major overhaul, only after partial repairs. This is the second international tender during the current government’s term. The first one, announced sometime early last year, was canceled by the management of the state-owned enterprise earlier this year. The reason was supposed to be „serious risks related to the subject of the contract for technological equipment that is part of the Gabcikovo hydroelectric power plant, which were not known to them at the time of the public procurement announcement.“ We should therefore know the winner of the current international tender sometime at the end of this year.
The state plans to sign a contract with the winner of the tender for approximately nine years. The estimated value of the contract is already 371 million euros. The fact that the current government has upgraded the Gabcikovo hydroelectric power plant to a significant strategic investment should also help to kick-start its modernizatio. The state-owned enterprise Vodohospodarska Vystavba, which is an investor in the aforementioned project, requested the issuance of a certificate of strategic investment. The government approved it, and thus the investment project „Innovation and modernization of the Gabcikovo hydroelectric power plant“ became a strategic investment and its implementation is therefore in the public interest. The project should therefore have an easier path to implementation. The new management of Vodohospodarska Vystavba, installed after the current government took office, announced an international tender again at the beginning of last year. The public procurement was announced by the Minister of the Environment, Tomas Taraba, together with the then-designated Director General of the state-owned enterprise, Jana Jezikova.
According to the minister, the renovation of the turbines at the Gabcikovo hydroelectric power plant is an absolute priority. The then head of the state-owned enterprise, Jana Jezikova, assumed in January last year that the international tender could be evaluated within a year. The state-owned enterprise extended the deadline for submitting bids four times, but the tender still failed to be successfully completed.
