Energy Minister: Only 11% of Capacity Under 'Botas' Contract Utilised to Date

Only 11% of the capacity under the contract with Turkish company Botas has been used since it was signed, Bulgaria’s Energy Minister Zhecho Stankov on July 10 announced to journalists in Rome.

He further stated that on the previous day, officials from the Commission for Countering Corruption and Illegal Assets conducted a check in the Ministry of Energy and requested all documents related to the Botas agreement.

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“As the (former) chair of the parliamentary committee investigating the facts and circumstances surrounding the contract, I prepared a report spanning dozens of pages, which clearly shows that the Bulgarian state is paying over one million euros per day under this contract. Since the beginning of the year, this figure has exceeded 1.05 million euros daily, due to indexation,” Stankov said.

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Efforts are currently underway to explore all possible options to improve the contract terms, including purchasing cheaper gas in order to offset the high transmission fees, he added.

“That doesn’t make the contract more successful — quite the opposite. It’s a massive financial burden on the Bulgarian energy sector. To date, over 500 million euros have been invoiced to Bulgargaz, while the actual physical capacity used stands at just over 100 million euros,” Stankov concluded.