Shipping sector developing offshore wind farm interest

The shipping industry, domestic and foreign, is expressing growing investment interest for offshore wind farms and is awaiting the emerging sector’s regulatory framework to develop such projects in Greek sea territory, energypress sources have informed.

Though plans are still nascent, a considerable number of shipping companies and shipowners are already in talks with consultants for related feasibility studies.

Conditions for shipping industry players are favorable. Their earnings have skyrocketed amid abnormal market conditions, worldwide, ever since the outbreak of the pandemic in early 2020. These higher earnings have generated additional capital for investment, prompting shipowners to consider the potential of offshore wind farms.

Anticipating strong growth in this emerging sector, metals production group Viohalco plans to proceed with an investment estimated to be worth 70 and 100 million euros, which, through subsidiary Cenergy Holdings, will merge the knowhow of group members Hellenic Cables and Corinth Pipeworks for the establishment of the world’s first industrialized unit for floating wind turbines.

Norway’s Equinor, the world’s biggest developer of offshore wind farms, has already expressed interest to develop projects in Greece, proposing an area between the Cyclades islands of Tinos, Syros and Mykonos.

In addition, TERNA Energy has reached an agreement with Ocean Winds, a partnership between EDP Renewables and Engie, for co-development of offshore wind farms offering a 1.5-GW capacity. Also, Mytilineos has reached an agreement with Denmark’s Copenhagen Offshore Partners. Hellenic Petroleum (ELPE) is currently engaged in talks with a major foreign company and Motor Oil has signed an agreement with Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company (Masdar).

Power utility PPC is currently involved in talks with at least five foreign companies, including Australia’s Macquarie, which recently acquired a 49 percent stake in PPC subsidiary DEDDIE/HEDNO, Greece’s distribution network operator. PPC is also believed to be in talks with American fund Quadum.

The Copelouzos group has joined forces with RF Energy to establish Aegean Offshore Wind Farms, a company planning to develop offshore parks offering an 850-MW capacity.

Greek shipowners own 5,514 ships, controlling 32 percent of the world’s tankers, 25 percent of bulk carriers and 22 percent of LNG carriers, the latter category being crucial for Europe’s effort to end its reliance on Russian natural gas.

 

IGB tenders, moving fast, aim for winning bidders by May

Procedures leading to pipeline procurement and construction contracts through a tender concerning the Greek-Bulgarian IGB gas grid interconnector are progressing rapidly, the aim of the project’s officials being to announce the winning bidders by May and give the go-ahead for work to commence in June.

The project’s tenders are being staged amid a period of heightened geopolitical interest and activity in the Balkans, which has spurred hopes of the IGB’s completion and launch within the first half of 2020.

Greek energy minister Giorgos Stathakis and his Bulgarian counterpart Temenuzhka Petkova are expected to acknowledge the swift progress being made at a meeting in Sofia next Monday. They may even announce an even swifter schedule for the project’s completion.

ICGB, the IGB project’s consortium, is a joint venture involving YAFA Poseidon – a Greek gas utility DEPA half-owned subsidiary – and the state-controlled Bulgarian Energy Holding (BEH).

Two of five candidates submitted bids just days ago to the second phase of a tender concerning the design, procurement and construction of the gas pipeline, a 182-km stretch budgeted at 145 million euros.

Greece’s J&P Avax and a rival consortium comprising Italy’s Bonatti and two Bulgarian firms, DZZD (IGB-2018), were the two bidding formations. Their technical proposals will now be assessed and offers unveiled in the effort to declare a winning bidder next month.

A pipeline supply tender budgeted at 60 million euros has also reached an advanced stage. Greece’s Corinth Pipeworks has entered this procedure and is up against a Turkish-Bulgarian consortium.

A preceding third tender for the role of project manager, to monitor the project on behalf of shareholders, has already produced a winning bidder, a consortium named TIBEI, whose 5.57 million-euro offer secured this contract.

TIBEI is comprised of Belgium’s Tractebel Engineering SA, Italy’s Tractebel Engineering SRL, Austria-based INTBER GMBH, as well as two Bulgarian firms, Ipsilon Consult OOD and Engineering EAD.

 

 

Cenergy approves Corinth Pipeworks, Hellenic Cables absorption

Cenergy Holdings SA, a Belgian public limited liability company, has announced that a cross-border merger by absorption by Cenergy Holdings SA of the Greek listed companies Corinth Pipeworks Holdings S.A. and Hellenic Cables S.A. Holdings Société Anonyme, has been approved by the shareholders’ meeting of Cenergy Holdings SA on December 7, 2016 and by the shareholders’ meetings of the two absorbed companies on December 8, 2016.

As a result of the cross-border merger, all assets and liabilities of Corinth Pipeworks Holdings S.A. and Hellenic Cables S.A. Holdings Société Anonyme, will be transferred to Cenergy Holdings SA and all operations of the absorbed companies carried out from August 1,  2016 will be considered, for accounting and tax purposes, as carried out for the account of Cenergy Holdings SA.

As a consideration for the transfer of the assets and liabilities of Corinth Pipeworks Holdings S.A. and Hellenic Cables S.A. Holdings Société Anonyme, the shareholders’ meeting decided to increase the share capital of Cenergy Holdings SA by the amount of EUR 117,830,672.38, in order to increase the total share capital from EUR 61,500 to EUR 117,892,172.38, through the issuance of 190,135,621 shares of Cenergy Holdings SAand bring the total number of shares to 190,162,681 shares.

According to the draft terms of cross-border merger, the exchange ratio of the shares of the companies involved in the cross-border merger, on the basis of the valuation of such companies adopted by the boards of directors of Cenergy Holdings SA, Corinth Pipeworks Holdings S.A. and Hellenic Cables S.A. Holdings Société Anonyme, corresponds to one Cenergy Holdings SA share for:

(i)         1 share ofCorinth Pipeworks Holdings S.A.; and

(ii)        0.447906797228002 share of Hellenic Cables S.A. Holdings Société Anonyme.

Timeline of the completion of the cross border merger

In accordance with the draft terms of cross-border merger, the shareholders of Corinth Pipeworks Holdings S.A. and Hellenic Cables S.A. Holdings Société Anonyme have an option to elect receiving their whole new shares in Cenergy Holdings SA through a custodian other than the Hellenic Central Securities Depository S.A. (AthexCSD), by submitting a special form of declaration. Cenergy Holdings SA announces that, as of the date of this announcement, such election form of declaration has been published on the website of Cenergy Holdings SA (www.cenergyholdings.com) and the absorbed companies (www.cpw.gr and www.cablel.com). The period for exercising the election right has been set as starting from December 8, 2016 and expiring on December 16, 2016.

 

New energy project giant Cenergy eyeing global prospects

Cenergy, a new Viohalko corporate group energy-sector company recently established through a merger deal involving Corinth Pipeworks and Hellenic Cables, faces the challenge of vying for and securing multi-million euro deals amid an extremely competitive environment that nevertheless offers considerable prospects.

The new company established by the merger is worth over 700 million euros in turnover and an operating profit of 63 million euros, based on financial data covering 2015.

The combined strength offered by this merger enables its participants to target major international energy-sector ventures being developed by energy giants. Companies of such stature demand top-grade financial guarantees, advanced technical knowhow and experience to entrust new suppliers.

Through their new partnership, Corinth Pipeworks and Hellenic Cables will be able to vie for larger projects which they would normally not be in a position to take on alone. Their access to better financing deals will also be made easier, while the partners stand as a more attractive and competitive business prospect for major international players.

The development prospects of international interconnection projects over the next few decades stood as a key incentive behind this merger decision. According to forecasts for 2050, the world’s population is expected to reach 9 billion; electricity production will double; demand for interconnection projects in Europe will rise as a result of the region’s energy security policy; while renewable energy and natural gas demand will rise as a result of the international climate change agreement reached in Paris late last year.

Cenergy will focus on projects in Europe, the Mediterranean, Africa and North America. The new company is expected to bid on prospective natural gas projects such as the IGB, TANAP, Turkish Stream, Nord Stream 2, BRUA and Eastmed.  In the electricity sector, projects being eyed by Cenergy include the Greek power grid operator IPTO’s interconnections for Crete and other Greek islands, North Sea interconnections, as well as network development in countries such as the Germany, Norway and the UK.

The two companies involved in the merger already employ 1,900 persons and are expected to hire more personnel.

 

Domestic pipelines to cover biggest part of local TAP route

Corinth Pipeworks has been awarded a major TAP (Trans Adriatic Pipeline) contract for the supply of 270,000 tons of pipeline to cover 485 kilometers of the project’s Greek segment, totaling 547 kilometers, the TAP consortium has announced.

The deal essentially means that a considerable part of the entire project, to run a total distance of 878 kiolometers through Greece, Albania, and Italy, following an Adratic Sea crossing, for Azeri natural gas supply to central Europe, will be developed by Greek firms.

A large number of companies took part in the tender held by the TAP consortium, which considered the Corinth Pipeworks bid as the most competitive.

“We want to congratulate Corinth Pipeworks and the company’s partner, Marubeni Itocho Steel, for the offer they submitted, which meets the industry’s high standards,” TAP Managing Director Ian Bradshaw declared. “Having selected Corinth Pipeworks as the biggest supplier of pipelines to be required for the TAP project in Greece, we hope to help ensure employment prospects and attract further long-term investments and benefits to Greece,” he added.

The Greek company announced its pipeline deliveries for the TAP project are expected to begin in 2016 and be completed within 2017.

Corinth Pipeworks noted the deal confirms its standing as a major pipeline supplier in the global energy industry. The agreement also significantly increases the company’s backlog of orders, which bolsters its prospects for the next few years, the company announced. Corinth Pipeworks also noted the deal highlights, in the most emphatic way, the company’s fulfillment of a medium-term objective to participate in major energy and infrastructure projects in the southeast Mediterranean.

Construction work on the TAP (Trans Adriatic Pipeline) project, the largest foreign investment to be made in Greece over the past few years, valued at over 1.5 billion euros, is expected to begin next April, consortium officials estimate.

BP, Azerbaijan’s Socar, and Norway’s Statoil each hold 20 percent stakes in the TAP consortium, Belgium’s Fluxys is represented with a 19 percent share, Spain’s Enagas has 16 percent, and Swiss company Axpo holds a five percent stake.