The Río Turbio Thermal Power Plant
is off and will remain that way for a long time.
Without generating the energy promised by Kirchnerism, a company was hired to do the maintenance and, in the last few months, paint the Plant.
He was paid 300 million pesos per month.
Furthermore, despite having 110 assigned workers,
another firm was hired - for 700 million per month - to operate it.
The problem is that every time it was turned on, it lost
30 million pesos per day.
The work was put out to tender 17 years ago and was never finished: today it would cost more than 200 million dollars to complete.
The 109-meter-high chimney that can be seen in the distance without any competition is one of the most concrete examples of a
failed civil work
and an energy promise that never materialized.
It became a kind of
“white elephant” in the mining heart of Santa Cruz.
The enormous contract to build the power plant located between Río Turbio and 28 de Noviembre was - and continues to be -
plagued by suspicions and complaints
.
To begin with, it was awarded to a joint venture led by the Spanish company Isolux Corsán for $857,341,128.
“However, as a consequence of the variations and subsequent contracts awarded to the company within the framework of the same bidding process, the new contract value
amounted to 1,726,251,982 dollars
,” explained an official expert report incorporated into the judicial case that investigated Julio. From Vido, to the former head of YCRT and other former officials and participants in that process.
That figure would also fall short: during the period in which
Aníbal Fernández was auditor,
among other tenders and work plans,
more than 1.9 billion dollars were spent,
and there is still what will be invested in finishing it.
In 2022
Clarín
made a request for access to information to the mining firm.
When asked about how much it will cost to finish the Plant, it was pointed out that it will require just over 70 million dollars.
Conclusion: by then, the plant
will have cost between two and three times more than what was originally budgeted.
At the official exchange rate and with the deterioration that some parts of the Thermal Power Plant show, the current cost would be around 200 million dollars to finish the civil works and get it started.
Money that Javier Milei's government does not have.
Contracts under the magnifying glass
All the numbers surrounding this energy complex
are scandalous
.
The current intervention of Yacimientos Carboniferos Río Turbio (YCRT), on which the Plant depends, was found with three very striking contracts.
The first of them responds to a company called
Lares Del Sur SA
, contracted for technical assistance for the Plant despite its lack of experience in the energy field.
The information under analysis of the current intervention by Thierry Decoud maintains that
he had hired her to “paint a Plant that was not operational every month.”
The YCRT documentation states that only in eight tenders Lares del Sur benefited 868,432,177.80 pesos.
The documents talk about “training and technical assistance for the Plant personnel.”
In practice, she was hired to
maintain the inactive work and in recent months, she carried out painting tasks.
It was not the only thing that the intervention designated by the La Libertad Avanza government encountered.
A little more than 700 million pesos were allocated
per month to the firm Prosetec SRL for the operation of the Plant.
In fact, the company claims a debt from the previous management.
This firm was hired to carry out the general operation and maintenance, not of the infrastructure, but of the turbine itself, the only one that would eventually be put into operation.
“The operation of the Plant was outsourced despite having 110 designated YCRT operators
,” official sources explained to
Clarín,
and
They add another piece of information: even with that decision,
the Thermal Power Plant did not have continuous activity
because it presented “problems in its civil works.”
Given this panorama, in itself, unfavorable for the Central that was intended to generate 240 MW, a third tender awarded to
a catering firm
was detected to guarantee services to subcontracted personnel,
for more than one hundred million pesos per month.
With the Plant turned off, the authorities estimate that this generates savings of over 1,000 million pesos, if the detailed contracts plus the daily loss generated by turning it on under current conditions are taken into account.
Cristina Kirchner on one of her visits to the Río Turbio Power Plant.
Business plan K
Until last year, Alberto Fernández's government included funds destined for the Power Plant in the national budget.
Among the company's objectives was the completion of Module I and Module II of the 240MW Río Turbio “14 Mineros” Thermoelectric Power Plant for the provision of energy to the country.
By 2023, it intended to reach one hundred percent (100%) in the energy generation
of the 21MW plant, “consolidating its value and achieving sufficient energy autonomy to cover the consumption demand of the Río Turbio Carboniferous Deposits (mainly in the activities of the General Exploitation Management), as well as the demand from the towns of Río Turbio, 28 de Noviembre and Julia Dufour.”
That didn't happen.
The power plant that burns coal
YCRT is responsible for feeding its coal to the Thermal Power Plant.
In January 2022, it produced 2,346 tons of coal, and the maximum extraction recorded until last year (2023) did not exceed 6,300 tons.
This production is absolutely far from the
112,320 tons per month that must be extracted
to feed the Plant that this management promises to complete.
Just 5%.
The current state is even more bleak.
The controller Coud found himself with a company without production.
Just now,
they are removing 550 tons
of coal per day.
The thermal power plant that also presents
technical problems in its construction
that
make its viability difficult, every time it is turned on it generates “a loss of 30 million pesos a day,”
official sources explained to
Clarín .
The few economic resources we have will be used in the coal mine, to increase its coal extraction in order to export it through the port of Punta Loyola (300 kilometers from Río Turbio).
Suspicions of corruption
The work design proposes the operation of
two boilers supplied by coal
extracted from YCRT.
But during De Vido's administration, a change was made to install a gas line to the Power Plant:
it was feared that the coal from Río Turbio would not be enough
to light both boilers and generate the energy demanded.
The government of Mauricio Macri described this work as
an “emblem of corruption.”
Even the AFIP ended up denouncing Isolux Corsán for
apocryphal invoices.
The company moved forward with a bankruptcy petition in Spain, where it has its headquarters and the name of the work and the firm, soon appeared in
the Cuadernos de las Bribes scandal.
The plant was put out to tender by Cristina Kirchner's government in 2007 and it was she herself who in 2015 - in the middle of the electoral campaign - launched the first of the two boilers.
That grandly announced action
lasted only 24 hours: the boiler broke
and years later the construction company authorities admitted that it was not ready to be turned on.
The repair cost the State more money.
As Clarín
already said
at the time, the total energy generation that the plant will provide will not be as promised either.
On paper, the work will produce around 240 megawatts, but the truth is that it needs about 40 MV for its own operation.
At the end of the day, when it reaches its maximum production
it will be able to contribute 200 MW to the Interconnected System.
See also
See also
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See also
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The fight against corruption, a pending challenge for Argentina