Inter-ministry disputes hold up solar power plant

The plant will use advanced photo-voltaic technology.

8 April 08 11:46, Lior Baron

Sources inform ''Globes'' that a fresh row between the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of National Infrastructures is delaying the issue of a tender for the building of a an additional $70-100 million solar power plant using photo-voltaic technology. Representatives from the two ministries failed to reach agreement on the terms of the tender in recent meetings. The National Infrastructures Ministry wanted to move forward with a performance qualification (PQ) tender as determined by the government, but the Finance Ministry would not agree to anything more than a request for information (RFI) invitation at this point, and wishes to make the PQ stage conditional on the responses from interested bidders.

Last month, following a government decision on the issue, the National Infrastructures Ministry published PQ tender worth an estimated $600 million for the building of a 250 megawatt solar power plant using thermo-solar technology at Ashelim in the Negev region with a capacity of 250 megawatts. The publication of the tender was made possible following a compromise between the Finance Ministry and National Infrastructures Ministry on the issue of a tender for the building of a second power plant using the more costly photo-voltaic technology by the end of March.

Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 8, 2008

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