The company „Vizor“ OOD, owned by the parents of politician Delyan Dobrev, received significant sums for possibly fictitious supplies of wood to „Thermal power plant (TPP) Maritsa 3“ JSC, associated with businessman Hristo Kovacki. This is clear from the video investigation of the Anti-Corruption Fund (ACF) published today, entitled „Pellegate“.
The investigation cites the results of an inspection of TPP Maritsa 3 JSC, carried out by the Regional Directorate of Forests-Kardzhali /RDF/ in December of last year.
According to the inspection report, to which ACF has access, the administration of TPP Maritsa 3 JSC provided the inspectors from RDF-Kardzhali with eight invoices for the supply of wood chips from the company „Vizor“ OOD, an average of about 3,000 tons per month, at a price from BGN 95 per ton. Transport tickets for the chips were not presented, and no wood was found on the territory of the TPP.
The owners and managers of „Vizor“ OOD, a leading producer of pellets in the country, are Alexander Danchev Dobrev and Zlatka Stoykova Dobreva. They are the parents of Delyan Dobrev – former minister of energy and chairman of the energy commission in several parliaments.
“The official documents cited by us show that in 2022 about BGN 285,000 per month – or about BGN 3 million per year – went from Maritsa 3 TPP JSC to the company of Dobrev’s parents”, says Lora Georgieva, coordinator of the ACF legal program.
“The question is, what was paid with that amount?“ As a great deal of evidence leads us to doubt that the wood alleged to have been supplied for this money actually existed.”
According to the statements of representatives of „Maritsa 3“ TPP and „Vizor“, quoted in the report of RDG-Kardjali, about 3,000 tons of wood chips supplied to „Maritsa 3“ TPP on average per month are bark and shavings – waste from the production process of pellets at Vizor. This information contradicts the official data presented on the „Visor“ website, according to which the company’s monthly pellet production amounts to only about 2,600 tons.
“It turns out that Visor, the leading producer of pellets on the market, produces more waste than pellets. Which is obviously not true. What’s more, the technology behind the pellets is that they are produced precisely from wood waste, and this production should not generate significant waste.”
A testimony of an employee of „Vizor“, recorded with a hidden camera during a visit by an AKF team to a workshop for the production of pellets near the village of Sushevo, reveals that „Vizor“ does not produce wood chips, or at least not in the volumes that are invoiced to „TPP Maritsa 3“ JSC. Moreover, the pellet production technology used does not allow the separation of large quantities of wood chips.
This information is also confirmed by a check of the incoming wood logbooks of the „Vizor“ factories, which show that about 11,000 tons of wood entered the company’s workshops last year – many times less than what was claimed as delivered to „TPP“ Maritsa 3″ AD quantity of wood chips.
“The comparison of these evidences raises serious doubts that the wood for which „Vizor“ received money from „TEC Maritsa 3“ JSC existed only on paper. Which begs the question – what was the money paid from TPP Maritsa 3 to Vizor for?”
TPP Maritsa 3 AD has repeatedly been a source of excessive sulfur dioxide pollution in recent years. It is publicly known that the businessman with interests in the energy business, Hristo Kovacki, is behind the plant. For several years, „Maritsa 3“ has been using a complex permit for burning waste, which gives it the right to replace part of the coal in the production of electricity with the burning of wood waste. Using biomass instead of coal allows the plant to significantly reduce the amount of carbon emissions payments it owes to the national and European budgets. For example, in the report on its annual emissions in 2022, TPP Maritsa 3 JSC declared almost twice as many emissions from biomass (80,888 tons) compared to fossil emissions (46,339 tons), for which it is required to purchase emission permits.
A 2021 investigation revealed that two other coal-fired plants linked to Hristo Kovacki had for years underreported carbon dioxide emissions from power generation, claiming they had introduced “innovative technologies” by “diversifying their energy mix” by burning biomass. This scheme has damaged the national and European budget by about BGN 60 million due to lower carbon quotas paid. It is precisely because of suspicions of the existence of a scheme to falsely measure lower carbon emissions that the European Prosecutor’s Office of Laura Koveshi ordered searches and investigative actions against thermal power plants of the Kovacki group.
In February of this year, the European Public Prosecutor’s Office carried out inspections of thermal power plants and announced that the amounts of carbon dioxide reported by the plants, for which they owed payment of carbon emission permits, had been certified by a verification company also connected to Kovacki, which knowingly submitted false data on greenhouse gas emissions in order to understate the amount of emissions they produced under the European CO2 trading scheme.
According to official data of the Executive Agency for the Environment, the same verification company – „GMI Verify“ (GMI Verify) has also verified the quantities of carbon emissions of „Maritsa TPP 3“ JSC for 2022.
“In the presence of serious doubts that Maritsa 3 TPP used biomass and that the declared carbon emissions were objectively verified, the question arises: Does the plant fulfill its environmental program, has its operation become more environmentally friendly, and have the dues actually been paid carbon allowance amounts? Or is it again about harming the health of those living in the area and damaging the national and European budget with millions?”
The information published today in the investigation also raises the question of how much the documented serious economic relationships between „Vizor“ and „TPP Maritsa 3“ JSC influence the publicly stated positions of Delyan Dobrev regarding the future of coal plants.
In his capacity as an MP and chairman of the energy committee, he is one of the driving forces pushing for a renegotiation of the Sustainability and Recovery Plan in order to extend the life of coal plants until 2038. His public positions are known, in which he states that it is better not to implement the Recovery and Resilience Plan, but to preserve the coal plants.
A simple calculation shows that if the deliveries documented in 2022 from “Vizor” to “Maritsa 3 TPP” continue with the same frequency for the next 13 years – Delyan Dobrev’s proposed extension of the life of coal plants – his parents’ company would receive approx. BGN 44,460,000 from Maritsa 3 TPP JSC.
