Apa Braşov will take out a 25-million-euro loan from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to cover its own contribution to a 1-billion-leu (approximately 200 million euros) EU-funded project it has secured, aimed at modernising several hundred kilometres of water supply and sewerage networks in the county.
The Brasov County Council approved the loan on Thursday, at an ordinary meeting, and authorised the president of the administrative body, Adrian Vestea, to sign the financing pre-agreement.
The loan is expected to have a 15-year repayment period, including a four-year grace period during which no loan instalments will be paid.
The European project includes the modernisation or extension of 310.45 kilometres of water supply networks and 213.01 kilometres of sewerage networks, the construction of nine drinking water reservoirs and five treatment plants, and the installation of 60 wastewater pumping stations.
The project is scheduled to be implemented over 84 months.
According to the documents attached to the draft decision adopted by the county councillors, Apa Brasov has secured non-reimbursable EU funding worth 1,026,443,765 lei through the Sustainable Development and Just Transition Programme 2021-2027, with its own contribution to the project amounting to 13.2 million euros.
This is not the first time the regional water operator has taken out a bank loan. In 2011, it contracted a 27-million-euro loan to co-finance another EU-funded project, worth 189 million euros, under the Environment Operational Programme. Repayment of the loan was completed in February this year.
