EDU II files appeal today with Czech Supreme Administrative Court over Dukovany injunction

Elektrárna Dukovany II (EDU II), the company responsible for the nuclear tender, today filed a cassation appeal against the injunction by which the Regional Court in Brno blocked the signing of the final agreement to build nuclear units at Dukovany. It says the court incorrectly assessed the public interest in the project. EDU II informed the Czech News Agency (CTK) of the appeal today. The Supreme Administrative Court will hear the case. South Korea’s KHNP also plans to file its own appeal against the injunction.

The final agreement with KHNP was originally due to be signed on 7 May, but the Regional Court in Brno blocked the signing with a preliminary injunction the previous day. The court acted on a motion by French company EDF, which challenged in court a decision by the Office for the Protection of Competition (ÚOHS). The office had ruled that the tender was conducted properly. The court has yet to rule on EDF’s lawsuit.

“EDU II believes that the Regional Court primarily misjudged whether the public interest in signing a contract after a transparent competition lasting several years outweighs the claimant’s (EDF’s) theoretical possibility of winning the contract,” EDU II said today.

The company also said it would respect the court’s decision, but that the outcome of the entire tender would not change as a result. “Whatever the outcome of the judicial review, it can never result in a court ruling turning a less competitive bid into a better one. Even if the court were to find flaws in the procedure, that cannot change the ranking of the bids,” the company said in a statement today.

The government decided last July to build two new nuclear reactors. It chose South Korea’s KHNP over France’s EDF. Another bidder, Westinghouse, had already been excluded from the competition. EDF and Westinghouse challenged the tender with the competition authority, which considered the matter for several months. It ultimately dismissed their objections, and its chairman, Petr Mlsna, also rejected the companies’ appeals on 24 April.

The construction of new nuclear units in Czechia is set to be the largest domestic contract ever. At current prices, the cost of the currently preferred plan to build two reactors at Dukovany stands at 407 billion crowns.