Panama Canal, Consortium Discuss New Financing Proposal

A worker walks at the construction site of the Panama Canal Expansion project on the Atlantic side on the outskirts of Colon City January 15, 2014. REUTERS/Carlos Jasso

By Lomi Kriel

PANAMA CITY, Jan 21 (Reuters) – The Panama Canal Authority said on Tuesday it was in talks over a new financing proposal with the Spanish-led consortium in charge of expanding the waterway and its insurer aimed at ensuring work continues on the project, which faces huge cost overruns.

Canal Administrator Jorge Quijano said the consortium, led by Spanish builder Sacyr and which had threatened to halt work on the project this week, had pushed back its deadline to the end of January.

Earlier this month, the consortium had vowed to stop work by Jan. 20 unless the Panama Canal agreed to foot the bill for an estimated $1.6 billion in unforeseen additional costs.

The canal is one of the world’s most important shipping routes and halting construction on the project would be a setback for companies eager to move larger ships through the waterway such as producers of liquefied natural gas (LNG), who want to ship exports from the U.S. Gulf Coast to Asian markets.

“There is a proposal on the table which the parties have put forward,” Quijano told reporters. “It could offer a pretty long-term solution so work can continue.”

He said the consortium had sent a letter advising the canal authority it would not halt work before at least Jan. 31.

A canal authority official said that work at the construction site was running at about 25 percent to 30 percent of capacity.

The Panama Canal Authority said this week it had turned down an offer by the European Commission to mediate the multibillion-dollar dispute.

The canal is one of the world’s most important shipping routes. The entire project was due to cost about $5.25 billion, but the overruns could bump that up to nearly $7 billion.

The canal authority said last week it might take over a key part of the waterway’s expansion if the consortium in charge of the project makes good on a threat to suspend work.

The consortium, which includes Italy’s Salini Impregilo , Belgium’s Jan De Nul and Panama’s Constructora Urbana, won a contract in 2009 to build a third set of locks, the main part of the project to double capacity of the near 50-mile (80 km) transoceanic cargo route.