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Weekly Lists
November 23, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 24
bne:
Infrastructure
Milestone Russian banking syndication could finance Arctic railway mega-project
Ukraine seeks to channel $3bn of investments in sea ports over five years
A syndicate of five Russian banks could finance the Northern Latitude Way (SSH) railways project in the Yamal peninsula, Vedomosti daily said on November 18 citing unnamed sources close to the project.
Reportedly a syndicate including Russia's largest banks Sberbank, VTB and Gazprombank, as well as the Eurasian Development Bank and state development bank Vnesheconombank (VEB) will finance the major Arctic infrastructure project co-owned by SHH (50.1%) which is con- trolled by Yury Reylyan and Viktor Pigin, and Russian Railways (49.9%).
VEB, which has recently been revamped as the main hub of state infrastructure spending, has approved a new financing model with the Kremlin under which it will rely on syndications with large com- mercial banks.
Ukraine is going to invest at least $3bn in the country's port industry over the next five years, according to the nation's Infrastructure Minister Volodymyr Omelyan. The minister also said that Kyiv intends to introduce a new approach on concessions.
"The law on concession has passed its first reading in the Verkhovna Rada, [Ukraine's parliament]," UNIAN news agency quoted Omelyan as saying on November 15. "We hope it will be adopted. It is seaports that will become the first facilities for concession."
These seaports will remain in state ownership, but will be conceded to international companies for 10, 25, and 49 years. "This will double or triple budget revenues compared with the existing lease system," the minister added.
Montenegro and Italy will put into operation their submarine power link at the beginning of 2019, broadcaster RTCG reported, quotingDraganKujovic,executivedirectorofMontenegrinpower grid operator CGES.
The project to build the interconnector is being jointly implement- ed by CGES and Italy’s Terna. The total investment was estimated at around €1bn.
Initially, the project was supposed to be completed by the end
of 2018, but has been delayed until 2019. Meanwhile, the two countries decided to halve the capacity of the link to 500 MW due to the slower than expected pace of construction of renewable energy projects in the Balkans.
Montenegro, Italy to launch submarine powerlinkinearly2019