Odebrecht & Enagas win bid for 4.000 bln pipeline in Peru

A consortium of Brazil's Odebrecht and the Spanish Enagás Monday won a tender to build and operate a pipeline that will require an investment of 4,000 million dollars in Peru, the largest energy project in the country and key to the government of President Ollanta Humala.

Proinversión, the body that promotes private investment in Peru, awarded the project to a group called South Peruvian pipeline, wherein the Odebrecht construction company has a 75 percent stake and 25 percent Enagás.

The pipeline will run 1,000 kilometers from the rich deposit of natural gas from Camisea, located in the jungle south of Peru and cross the Andes to the coastal region of Moquegua, where large mining operate.

"The resources of Camisea, which have served to development in the past 10 years, will arrive this time to southern markets and will allow sustain growth, which is the only viable way to fight poverty in our country," told reporters the Minister of Energy and Mines, Eleodoro Mayorga.

The deadline to construct the pipeline is 56 months, once the concession contract signed, according to the state agency.

The grant project comes at a time when Peru's economy has weakened with lower demand for minerals exports to major markets such as China.

Proinversión said Odebrecht and Enagas won the auction bid of $ 7.329 million, including investment of between 3,600 million and 4,000 million dollars to build the pipeline and administrative expenses that will be generated during the 34-year concession project.

The bank rejected the offer of the other group interested in the project, the French Suez, U.S. Sempra, the TGI Techint Argentina and Colombia.

The consortium submitted a claim to Proinversión, saying the process was "irregular" to be disqualified without the deadline of relief to his proposal. Later, the Government denied failures in the auction and said the losing bidder wanted studs modify the composition of the group.

KEY AREA

The Spanish Enagás said in a statement that act as "qualified operator" in the consortium and will be responsible for maintenance of the pipeline, while Odebrecht will be responsible for the installation and construction of infrastructure.

Enagás currently participates in the consortium Transportadora de Gas del Peru (TGP), which operates a gas pipeline in Camisea born and extends to Lima, the capital.

This pipeline supplies the fuel that generates at least 50 percent of the electrical energy in the country.

A key objective of the plan is to strengthen the electrical system vulnerable Peru, a country still growing at one of the highest rates in Latin America and where large mines with a high energy start producing in the next five years.

The first stage of the Government comprehensive energy plan is already underway, with the award late last year of an electric pole in the south currently considering an investment of $ 800 million.

Israeli Samay and the local subsidiary of the French GDF Suez won separate plan for the construction and operation of the two power plants of 500 megawatts each.

The tender for the pipeline to southern Peru was concluded after several delays. Another obstacle in the process was for security, as in the Camisea, with proven reserves of 12.7 TCF (trillion cubic feet) of gas-operated remnants of the Shining Path guerrillas.

Humala's government has stepped up the fight against the rebel groups operating in collusion with drug traffickers.

(Additional reporting by Jose Elias Rodriguez from Madrid. Posted by Marco Aquino, edited by Vicki Allen)