Union and Cesp reach agreement on compensation for Três Irmãos

The federal government and the Energy Company of São Paulo (Cesp) signed, this Wednesday (7), a judicial agreement that puts an end to a dispute that dragged on for almost 10 years in court. According to the Ministry of Mines and Energy (MME), the company accepted to receive R$ 1.717 billion as compensation for non-amortized assets, that is, non-compensated, that the company delivered to the Union after the concession contract for Cesp operated the Três Irmãos Hydroelectric Power Plant, on the Tietê River, in Pereira Barreto (SP), it was no longer renewed in 2012. The combined figure is well below the R$ 4.7 billion that the company was asking for in 2019, but it is equivalent to the exact amount that the Union was willing to pay since 2012. In 2014, the federal government published an inter-ministerial ordinance defining at R$ 1.717 billion the amount of compensation to be paid to Cesp. The company, however, appealed to the courts for disagreeing with the criteria that the federal government had used to assess the accumulated depreciation and amortization between the start of operation of the facilities, in November 1993 and March 31, 2013. In a note, the MME informed that, by accepting to receive R$ 1.717 billion, Cesp, which is currently controlled by the Auren group, waives any other lawsuit related to the operation of the Três Irmãos plant. The ministry’s legal consultant Ana Carolina Laferté commented on the matter during an event this morning (8). “We were able to conclude an agreement with Cesp, which agreed to pay what the ministry had already recognized administratively in 2014. [Com isso] We removed one more relevant action from the litigation”, he said. The agreement still needs to be ratified by the 17th Federal Court of the Judiciary Section of the Federal District. According to the ministry, among the terms negotiated with the participation of the Advocacy General of the Union (AGU) are the forecast of updating the value agreed by the rate of the Special System of Settlement and Custody (Selic) and amortized, from October 2023, according to the Constant Amortization System (SAC), within a period of 7 years. “This is a great achievement for the MME, both for the resolution of the legal challenge, involving massive resources, and for the way it was defined, since the amounts due for the reversal of the plant will be paid through the Global Reversion Reserve (RGR ), created for this purpose,” said the ministry. The so-called Global Reversion Reserve is made up of charges paid by energy generators, transmitters and distributors. It is administered by the Electric Energy Trading Chamber (CCEE). The amount is paid monthly and resources are reserved to help improve and expand the energy sector, in reversion indemnity (as in the case of the agreement), quotas and project financing. Agência Brasil contacted Cesp and Auren to comment on the agreement and is awaiting a response.

Agência Brasil