Will leading global train manufactures enter the bid for supply in Bulgaria?

The first open procedure part of the Recovery and Resilience Plan is already underway. It is connected to the renewal of the railways of the Bulgarian State Railways. About one billion leva from the Recovery and Resilience Plan are allocated for this purpose, plus an additional 700 million leva co-financing for the projects from the state budget, as well as maintenance funding for the trains and engines for the next 15 years.

The European Commission approved Bulgaria’s plan in April. The start of the implementation was announced by the Ministry of Transport with the open consultancy procedures for the purchase and maintenance of new trains, engines and bord equipment. This way for the first time the ministry sent a clear message that the bidding will be done in a different way, in plain sight and without hidden agendas. Up till now the market consultations were publicly announced but the candidates with whom the government negotiated remained unknown.

The other new development is that these market consultations will serve as the basis for developing the rules for the auction procedure. This is to eliminate the accusations that the requirements and specifications are being tailored to fit a particular candidate.

Apart from this, all the big train and engine manufacturers have been invited to take part in the procedure. The intrigue lies in whether they will take part in an open procedure given the fact that for some of them the procurements in question are small relative to the billions-worth contracts they have with other railways.

One of the invited candidates – Alstom – for example signed a 2,5-billion-euro contract recently to supply 130 regional trains to the German province Baden Württemberg and maintenance for 30 years.

In Bulgaria, the Romanian pision of Alstom for now is failing to handle the renovation of the trains. In December 2019 the "BSR Passenger Transportation" and Alstnom signed a five-year contract for renovation and maintenance of 46 electric and diesel locomotives and Siemens for almost 137 million leva. To date, however, not a single renovation activity has been made, and the case even reached the Prosecutor’s Office. Alstom has refused to comment on the case.

Siemens have also been invited to take part in the procedure to source trains to BSR. In contrast to the French Alstom, the German company fulfilled the procurement for supplying 15 new "smart" locomotives valued at 100 million leva for the Bulgarian railways, ahead of the deadline.

Among the other invited candidates is Bombardie. In September 2020, the company opened an office in Sofia and announced its plans to mark a serious presence the Bulgarian market. In reality, this did not happen. In the last years, the Canadian company has had serious financial issues.

In total, 15 companies have been invited to apply for the supply and maintenance of seven double decker and 35 single decker electric trains, as well as 20 push-pull train sets. The Japanese company Hitachi Rail is also among them, as is the South Korean Hyundai Rotem.

The invited manufacturers:

ABB

Alstom SA

Bombardier Transportation

CAF

FPS Poznan Fabryka Pojazdow Szynowysh

Hitachi Rail

Hyndai Rotem

Koncar Electric vihecles Inc.

Newag SA

PESA Bydgoszsz

Siemens Mobility

Stadler Rail

Skoda Transportation

Talgo

ZOS Vrutky

Source: Ministry of Transport and Messaging

All these companies must submit their indicative proposals by June 16. In it the candidates may include all materials they deem necessary, like brochures, catalogues, technical prospects, certificates, and others. The quote may be confidential if it involves trade secrets.

In any case, the indicative price cannot be kept secret, as the price in the quote for the public procurement will be part of the complex evaluation of the candidates, the Transport Ministry has said.

All proposals in the market research will be published on the website of the registry for public procurement, including the price offers, Nikolay Sabev’s ministry has promised.

The plans are for the actual procurement to be announced before the end of the year, and for the finalist to be announced in May 2023. According to this timeline the first trains and locomotives can arrive in the country by the summer of 2024, while all of them should be here by the end of 2026, in line with the requirements of the Recovery and Resilience Plan.

These public procurements could attract potential bidders because the winner of the contract would also have to maintain all trains and engines in the next 15 years. The money allocated for this are 200 million leva for each of the contracts.

Double decker trains for the Sofia-Pernik-Radomir track

The projected value for the supply of the seven double decker and 35 single decker electric trains is 532,5 million leva. 372,6 million leva of those will come from the Recovery and Resilience Plan while the rest take the form of co-financing from the state budget. Additionally, maintaining the trains will cost 200 million leva.

The plan is for those to be used for the most popular routes near Sofia and Plovp.

The seven double decker and four single decker trains will be deployed in the heaviest route Sofia-Pernik-Radomir. The other lines are Sofia-Lakatnik, Dragoman-Elin Pelin, Bankya-Elin Pelin, Karlovo-Plovp-Asenovgrad, Pazardzhik-Dimitrovgrad and Plovp-Belozem.

The trains will be able to move at a speed of up to 160 km/h

Intercity trains for 467 million leva

The projected price for 20 fast intercity trains is 467,5 million leva. 271,5 of those will be covered by the Recovery and Resilience Plan, the rest are co-financing from the state budget. The full price of the maintenance for the trains in the next 15 years will cost 215 million leva.

This project also foresees buying single decker electric push-pull trains that are compatible and equipped with the ERTMS (European Rail Traffic Management System). The push-pull trains will include one locomotive and five cars, one of which will be a command car. The minimum number of seats per composition is 300.

They will travel in the 14 main routes in the country and will be able to accelerate to 200 km/h. The aim is to better customer service of the passengers. The main routes in question are Sofia-Svilengrad, Sofia-Gorna Oryahovitsa-Varna, Sofia-Burgas via Karlovo, Sofia-Rousse, Rousse-Dimitrovgrad-Plovp, Sofia-Blagoevgrad and Sofia-Vidin.

Shunting locomotives that will be operated remotely

The other procurement is for the supply and maintenance of 18 electric battery shunting locomotives. 21,8 million leva are planned for those, and the entire sum will be covered by the Recovery and Resilience Plan.

The new locomotives will replace the old diesel shunting locomotives that are used for maneuver activities at the moment. This way harmful emissions will be reduced in the area of the depos.

This will also greatly contribute to the digitalization of shunting activities because the locomotives will be able to be operated remotely. All the information about any given shunting action will be digitalized by recording the data on the board device of the locomotive.

The old locomotives series 52 and 55 that are used for shunting at the moment are more than 50 years old and, according to BSR, can no longer be maintained.

The depos in which the electric shunting locomotives will be delivered are in Sofia (8), Plovp (3), Gorna Oryahovitsa (3), Varna (2) and Mezdra (2).

Four companies have been invited to apply for the contract. Those are:

Bemo Rail

Clayton Equipment

Express Service

Unilok

Board equipment

The last public procurement concerns the supply and maintenance of at least 108 ETCS kits for board equipment for the trins. Nine companies have been invited to bid for this contract. Those are:

ABB

Alstom SA

AZD Praha

CAF

Elettromeccanica CM

Hitachi Rail

MER MEC S.p.A

Siemens Mobility

Thales

ETCS (European Traffic Control System) is part of the European system for train operation – ERTMS (European Rail Traffic Management System), which was developed by the European Union Agency for Railways. It can be installed as an additional (or back up to) the existing signaling system, as well as a stand-alone system for a new infrastructure, using radio signal.

In order to have the ERTMS working both the lines and the vehicle fleet need to be equipped with the appropriate devices to allow operation. The line and board devices communicate which allows continuous control of the maximum permitted speed and provides the driver the whole information needed to operate the signaling in the cabin.

The two main components of the ERTMS are the ETCS – which is installed on the rails – and the Global System for Mobile Communications – Railway (GSM-R) – which is a radio communication system that allows the train to exchange data with the railway track.

Whether this ambitious plan which should be realized in a very short period of time

Will happen, remains to be seen. The internal risks involve appealing the public procurement procedures, which is a given in these cases, judging from other similar situations, the old infrastructure that unfortunately cannot bear the fastest trains. The global risks have to do with supply chain failures, on the one hand, and the war in Ukraine, on the other.

The Bulgarian version of this text can be found here

mediapool.bg