“Alvora”: there was no ban on the use of metal of Russian origin in GIPL constructions, so there is no reason to change the details – Respublika.lt

According to Alvora, AmberGrid withheld this information from VERT due to quality and provenance requirements for pipeline components.

“We got acquainted with the publicly announced part of the decision of VERT, why the details of the gas pipeline need to be changed. We can clearly see that the decision was made after Amber Grid concealed part of the information about the requirements for the gas pipeline and its details from VERT. We are convinced that Amber Grid provided information to VERT in a biased, misleading way and to avoid its own responsibility, and Amber Grid’s statements directly contradict the actual circumstances and objective reality,” Alvora CEO Vaidas Kazlauskas said in a statement on Monday.

“AmberGrid” previously stated that the contractor “Alvora” is responsible for the replacement of non-compliant possibly Russian parts in the strategic Lithuanian gas pipeline, which has to replace the parts at its own expense.

On April 25, “Alvora” applied to the General Prosecutor’s Office, requesting to start a pre-trial investigation regarding the defamation, with which it accuses the Minister of Energy Dainiai Kreivis, the gas system operator “Amber Grid”, as well as representatives of VERT and “EPSO-G”.

According to Alvora, the company is suffering reputational damage due to untrue information spread by the energy authorities. As a result, the gas pipeline contractor claims to publish the Security Plan document, which, according to Alvora, did not require the company not to use metal of Russian origin for details.

“Circumstances beyond Alvora’s control led to the fact that the raw materials for the production of parts are of Russian origin, but this circumstance does not negate the fact that the parts are of high quality, and because of this there is no sense and necessity to change the same parts in the gas pipeline, on the contrary – completely high-quality parts that meet all standards.” the replacement may lead to a deterioration of the pipeline’s properties,” the company claims.

According to Alvora, the market regulator’s assessment that the suspected pipeline parts were made of substandard steel does not correspond to reality, because “the parts are made of higher quality steel than was required in the pipeline construction contract”.

The contractor also claims to have submitted detail certificates during construction, and later, at AmberGrid’s request, detailed raw material certificates.

“We understand that the customer does not like the origin of the raw materials of the parts, that it is not from the country that the customer expected, but it is a lie to say that the origin of the parts has not been determined and there is no data from which a direct connection can be established between the parts installed in the pipeline and the certificates provided”, – adds the manager of Alvora.

On April 23, the Vilnius District Court already annulled the decision regarding the 4.8 million awarded to the GIPL connection contractor “Alvora”. EUR funds and asset seizure.

The main gas pipeline started operating on May 1, 2022. Its installation cost a total of about 500 million. euros. About 60 percent of them funds were allocated by the European Commission, and Lithuania allocated about 116 million to this project. euros.