ÚOHS rejects new request from Areva to halt Temelín tender

Brno, Jan 24 (CTK) - French company Areva, which was excluded from the tender to extend nuclear power plant Temelin, again asked the antitrust office UOHS to halt the tender, but the UOHS rejected the request, UOHS chairman Petr Rafaj told CTK Thursday.

However, the injunction issued in November 2012, banning energy company CEZ from signing a contract with the winner of the tender, is still in force.

But CEZ can continue in evaluating offers submitted in the tender by US-Japanese company Westinghouse and Czech-Russian Konsorcium MIR.1200.

Areva has appealed to the UOHS in protest against its exclusion from the tender. The company was thrown out from the tender in October last year by CEZ because it breached the tender's conditions.

"Proceedings related to the public order are still going on," Rafaj said Thursday.

Reacting to the UOHS decision, Areva said in a press release it was surprised that the UOHS had turned down its request because the office had not got acquainted with the facts of the case.

Areva also said it was considering taking further steps, but it did not specify them.

CEZ said in December it will finish evaluation of the tender's offers at the end of February instead of end-2012, as it originally planned.

After finishing the preliminary assessment, CEZ should make public the ranking of the participants in the tender. It will then discuss their offers with them.

The energy company would like to know the winner of the tender by September 2013 and sign a contract with the winner by the end of the year. Temelin's extension should be completed in 2025 at the latest.

The winner of the tender, whose value is estimated to reach Kc200bn to Kc300bn, is to build the third and fourth unit of Temelin. The power plant's output will more than double from the current 2,000 megawatts after the new units are completed.

The project to extend Temelin has already met the requirements of environmental impact assessment. The approval for the project was issued by the Environment Ministry earlier in January.