UPDATE 1 – Romania’s Eolica Dobrogea To Drop Legal Action Against Transelectrica

(re-leads with Eolica's plan to withdraw legal claims)

BUCHAREST (Romania), February 21 (SeeNews) – Romanian wind parks developer Eolica Dobrogea will withdraw a legal action filed against power grid operator Transelectrica [BSE:TEL], the developer's parent company said on Tuesday.

On Monday, Transelectrica said that Eolica Dobrogea has sued the company, its former director general Horia Hahaianu, deputy director general Cornel Ene and the country’s energy regulator, ANRE, for allegedly refusing to connect its Cogealac wind park to the national grid, causing the developer estimated damages of 118 million euro ($156 million) per year. Eolica Dobrogea had claimed Transelectrica rejected its request to sign a minute that was required in order to proceed with the wind park's connection to the grid.

The Swiss-based parent company of the Romanian developer, Eolica Dobrogea AG, said in a statement on Tuesday that the administrator of Eolica Dobrogea, Corneliu Dica, "decided in his own discretion and intention to initiate in the name of Eolica Dobrogea legal actions against several Romanian institutions, entities and persons, among other Transelectrica and ANRE."

The company has started the legal procedure required to replace the administrator. "Once this new management will be in place, one of the first actions and measures will be the immediate withdraw of the legal actions, litigations and court files initiated by the former administrator," it said.

The parent company, which owns 95% of the Romanian developer, also said that last Friday Transelectrica gave Eolica Dobrogea an extension of the deadline for fulfiling "the only small remaining condition precedent of our grid connection contract C63, which allows us to connect at Tariverde, Dobrogea, 600 MW of wind power to the national grid."

"Given this new development we withdraw our previous negative opinion on the news regarding the suit brought forward by Eolica Dobrogea against Transelectrica and we rerate the news as neutral," Raiffeisen Capital & Investment Research said in a note to investors.

Eolica Dobrogea is developing wind parks for Spain’s Iberdrola Renewables in the region of Dobrogea, in southeastern Romania.

Blue chip Transelectrica's shares were trading 0.29% up at 17.45 lei ($5.3/4.0 euro) by 1255 GMT on Tuesday.

(1 euro=4.357 Romanian lei)

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