Azernews.Az

By Sabina Idayatova

Georgia made a decision on postponing of the construction of the Khudoni Hydropower Plant (HPP).

Georgian Energy Minister Kakha Kaladze said that the date of issuing a permit for the Khudoni HPP construction was postponed to March 1, 2014.

"The first thing we did was the prolongation of three-month moratorium until March 1, 2014," Kaladze said while commenting on the amendments made to the agreement between the Georgian government and Trans Electric Construction Company.

He said the decision is related with the recommendations of NGOs and experts, who gave negative opinion because of environmental impacts of the HPP construction.

"This is the moratorium, which was announced by us and the Environmental Protection Ministry and formalized in 2011 for studying the agreement to determine its positive and negative sides. The group working on the issue made its comments. We submitted all of these comments to the company, and they will be considered in the new agreement. The company should prepare an assessment on the environmental impact, which will be submitted to the Environmental Protection Ministry and then the ministry will give either a positive or a negative response," Kaladze noted.

Khudoni HPP creates a unique investment opportunity in hydro-power sector and is implemented in Samegrelo - Zemo Svaneti region on Inguri River. The Khudoni Hydro project is about 34 km upstream of operational Inguri Arch Dam (1,320 MW) and comprises diversion tunnel, coffer dams, water intake and penstocks, underground powerhouse, tailrace tunnels, and other associated works. Khudoni HPP`s installed capacity is 702 MW with annual power generation reaching 1,539 billion KWh. The project envisages construction of an arch dam at crest with columns, with a height of 200.5 meters and costs $1.125 billion.

The construction of the Khudoni plant began in the 1990s, but was stopped under pressure of the national liberation movements and the "green" parties. Later, Mikheil Saakashvili's government made a decision to continue the construction, whilst the project was anew suspended after the Georgian Dream coalition's coming to power.