State-run company Hidro Tarniţa SA has three bidders left in the race for the construction of a 1 GW hydro pumped storage facility Tarnița – Lăpuștești on Someșul Cald river in Cluj county in Romania’s northwest, Economica.net reported. The plant project, which has been stalled for the last three decades, is worth over EUR 1 billion. Preliminary bids in January were filed by five potential investors, all from China. The project is for four turbines of 250 MW and envisages the creation of a 10 million cubic metre reservoir linked to Tarniţa lake. The facility will take five to seven years to complete.
China Gezhouba Group and Wuling Power Corporation are one of the remaining consortiums. Both are big dam builders, and Gezhouba’s portfolio includes the Three Gorges Water Conservancy Project, world’s largest hydroelectric facility. The second group is made of China Huadian Corporation companies China Huadian Engineering and Guizhou Wujiang Hydropower Development, which control dams along Wu river in China. The third consortium comprises Huaneng Lancang River Hydropower and Hydrolancang International Energy.
Hidro Tarniţa counts on more than 4,000 job openings for the hydro plant.