Sao Paulo — China’s State Grid on Friday won the auction for the first and largest lot of Brazil’s power transmission line tender, a project that will require an 18 billion reais ($3.64 billion) investment and generate a discounted annual revenue of 1.94 billion reais.
In an auction held at stock exchange B3, the Chinese firm offered a discount of 39.90% on the lot’s maximum annual revenue to build more than 1,500 kilometers (932.06 miles) of lines across northeastern and center-western Brazil.
State Grid is already one of the largest groups in the Brazilian transmission sector, controlling 24 concessionaires, 19 of which are its own and 5 joint ventures.
In total, the company operates more than 16,000 kilometers of power lines in the country.
The batch, which is comprised of 1,100 km worth of power lines in the states of Goias, Minas Gerais and Sao Paulo, will require investments of nearly 2.6 billion reais.
The winning bid for the third lot, comprised of 388 kilometers across Minas Gerais state, came from Celeo Redes, which offered a 42.39% discount on the maximum permitted revenue, with an estimated investment of 1.03 billion reais.
