By its decision of 24 July this year, the Sofia Administrative Court annulled the refusal of the Bulgarian Energy Holding (BEH) to provide access to information for all studies, evaluations and reports of HSBC bank, on economic parameters associated with the construction of NPP Belene, it was announced last week.
The lawsuit was filed by the political party Simeon II National Movement after at the end of 2012 BEH declined to provide the analyzes of the British financial institution for the second nuclear on the grounds that it was not a public legal body within the meaning of the Law on Access to Public Information. As argument it was pointed out that the required data are confidential under the contract with the consultant.
Obviously the court did not think that is true. The decision of the judges explicitly states that the energy holding company is a responsible person within the meaning of the law and requested information was public in nature. Sofia Administrative Court also said: facts, information, decisions and data relating to the economic activities do not constitute a trade secret if keeping them secret is in the interest of the beneficiaries, but there is an overriding public interest in their disclosure. The requested information in this respect is undoubtedly related to public life in the Republic of Bulgaria.
The decision will certainly be appealed by BEH, but if the Court of Cassation upholds the arguments of their colleagues, the situation will become very interesting as the actual cost of the project for the second nuclear will come out. It was on the basis of the analysis of HSBC, that the government of Boyko Borissov had to make the final decision whether to build NPP Belene or not. The Cabinet, however, did not wait for the final findings of the experts and at the end of March 2012 decided to stop the project.
In late April 2012 the Ministry of Economy published a ratty 20 pages of the long-awaited analysis of HSBC, but in English, half of which were graphs and tables. They outlined several scenarios for the cost of the plant at different funding structures, various periods of repaying and the price of its electricity produced according to different possible policies pursued by governments up until 2050. But it did not become clear how these calculations were made.
Ex-rulers from GERB party claimed that the cost of the project is more than 10 billion euro, while the socialists insisted that it was about 6 billion euros and it would be a profitable undertaking to build a second NPP in Bulgaria. Who is right might become clear if we see the analysis of HSBC. At least for now the government of Mr. Oresharski avoided commenting on the Belene topic, probably for good reason. It should not be forgotten, however, that the judicial saga with the Russian contractor ASE for the already manufactured equipment is yet to come.
The BANKER
