DEPA

Greece's J&P AVAX has won the tender to build a gas pipeline between Greece and Bulgaria for 133.85 million euros ($150.46 million), project manager ICGB said on Tuesday.

Public Gas Corporation (DEPA) has sold natural gas to Bulgaria at a price 10 percent below the Bulgarian regulated rate and 16 percent below the rate offered to its major clients in Greece, thereby subsidizing industry in the neighboring country.

Greece will invite investors to submit expressions of interest for the commercial operations of its gas utility DEPA on April 8, DEPA's chief executive officer Dimitrios Tzortzis told reporters on Tuesday.

Greece's anti-money laundering authority has ordered a probe into the assets and bank accounts - both local and foreign - of all parties implicated in a scandal involving the Public Gas Corporation (DEPA) and Greek Fertilizers and Chemicals (ELFE), the latter of which is owned by disgraced businessman Lavrentis Lavrentiadis.

The Energy Ministry will table a bill in Parliament on Thursday aimed at closing all the crucial energy issues that remain open ahead of the Euro Working Group of this Friday.

The government will offer permanent jobs to 200 workers contracted to the Public Gas Corporation (DEPA) ahead of the utility's breakup and sale.

To sidestep the rule that only the civil servant hirings council (ASEP) can select DEPA staff, the Energy Ministry will make 200 staff from DEPA subsidiaries permanent.

Privatizations will speed up in the first half of the year, although we have entered an election period and the pace is expected to slow, Aris Xenofos, who heads the TAIPED sell-off fund, told the Athens Energy Forum on Monday.

An Athens prosecutor on Friday ordered a preliminary investigation into reports that a close associate of a government minister had tried to intervene so that a company owned by disgraced businessman Lavrentis Lavrentiadis could get out of paying more than 120 million euros in debts to the Public Gas Corporation (DEPA).

Energy authorities have been in emergency mode over the last few days to ensure a sufficient supply of electricity and natural gas to Greece, as a prolonged cold spell has shot demand up to record levels and the gas network is operating without reserves, despite the operation of the new depot on Revithoussa island.

Greece's state-controlled DEPA gas company has concluded the acquisition of Shell's 49 percent stake in a domestic gas supplier and in a gas distributor in Athens, becoming the sole stakeholder in the two companies, it said on Wednesday.