Poland's decision on June 13 to cancel the contract with Chinese Overseas Engineering Group (COVEC), a subsidiary of the state-owned China Railway Engineering Corp., to build a 50-km (31-mile) stretch of the key east-west A2 Highway has dealt a blow to Chinese ambitions to break into the lucrative European construction market. Web photo Polish government says it will seek to restart work this summer on Chinese-abandoned highway, but finding a contractor to take on the project could be challenging. Related Links: Oman, Egypt Lead Middle Eastern Push To Upgrade Airports Norway Firm Clinches Tanzania Power Contract Hong Kong's Tuen Mun

One month after announcing ambitious plans to dig a 50-km-long shipping canal 100 km west of the Bosphorus Strait, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s scheme is being dismissed by some as election grandstanding designed to gain leverage for Turkey in talks with Russia to secure commitments of crude for the languishing Samsun-Ceyhan oil pipeline project. The proposed 50-km-long canal to bypass Turkey's Bosphorus would be wide enough to accomodate two tankers in either direction. The canal is located 100 km west of the Bosphorus Strait in Turkey and would connect the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. The grand canal scheme, which

A joint venture of two Spanish contractors, Obrascon Huarte Lain S.A. (OHL) and Dimetronic S.A., emerged May 17 as the low bidder for the Marmaray suburban rail upgrade project in Istanbul with a $1.5-billion bid. Related Links: Byzantine Port, Botched Buildings Put A Brake On Bosporus Link Japanese Team Goes Deep To Link Istanbul's Two Parts The project to upgrade the city’s 140-year-old suburban train lines will create an uninterrupted high-capacity commuter rail system of 76.3 kilometers between the suburbs of Gebze on the Asian side and Halkalı on the European side. It will include a line running through an

Brazil plans to open two megaports in the State of Rio de Janeiro in 2012, as EBX Group, owned by Brazilian mining billionaire Eike Batista, makes rapid progress on the Deepwater Sudeste and Acu Superports. The projects are an effort to speed trade in natural resources and new investment by other nations, particularly China, say published reports. LLX Logistica SA Inland from the port, a 90-sq-km industrial complex is under development. The new ports are designed to accommodate the new Chinamax line of vessels, which are 380 meters long. Claimed to be the largest investment in port infrastructure in the

Benefitting from lax German laws on hostile corporate takeovers as well as a lack of government resistance to foreign acquisitions, Spanish construction firm Actividades de Construccion y Servicios SA edged closer to taking majority control of Hochtief AG, Germany's largest construction group, before Hochtief's May 12 shareholder meeting. Herbert Luetkestratkoetter, CEO since 2007, will resign, a step he announced on April 11. CFO Burkhard Lohr will leave in October. Frank Stieler, a former Siemens executive who runs Hochtief's European business, is backed by ACS and will be Hochtief's new CEO. div id="articleExtrasA" div id="articleExtrasB" div id="articleExtras" ACS Chairman Florentino Pérez

Breaking ground on Feb. 28 in a ceremony attended by Turkey Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, a 5.4-kilometer twin-deck tunnel crossing beneath the Bosphorus’ seabed will join the European and Asian sides of Istanbul at a cost of $1.4 billion. Istanbul is the largest metropolitan city in Europe and third-largest city in the world, with a population of 13.2 million. The Istanbul Strait Road Tube Crossing, or the Eurasia Tunnel, will be designed, built, financed and operated by Avrasya Tüneli Isletme Insaat ve Yatirim Anonim Sirketi (ATAS), a partnership of Yap? Merkezi from Turkey and SK E&C, Kukdong, Samwhan Corp. and

The six companies planning the Nabucco pipeline to bring Caspian gas to Europe—RWE AG of Germany, OMV of Austria, Mol Nyrt of Hungary, Bulgargaz EAD of Bulgaria, Transgaz SA of Romania and Boru Hatlari ile Petrol Tasima AS of Turkey—will each need to arrange $2.3 billion in pre-completion guarantees for the project in addition to $559 million in equity, according to recent news reports. Related Links: Europe Moves, Russia Counters on Gas Lines The Nabucco pipeline will transport 31 billion cubic meters of gas from the Caspian basin to Austria. Bulgaria announced on Jan. 21 that it will borrow $1.7

Turkey is proposing a major dam-building program, proposing at least 18 new dams along its borders. The government claims the multiyear, multimillion-dollar infrastructure initiative would ease tensions over water-sharing, prevent flooding, irrigate farmland and generate electricity. On Feb. 6, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Syrian Premier Naji al-Otari broke ground for the Dostluk Baraji, or Friendship Dam, on the Orontes River, which flows from Lebanon into Syria and Turkey. The dam, 580 meters long and 14.5 m high, is designed to create a reservoir large enough to store 115 million cu m of water. At an estimated cost

Turkey has revived its nuclear energy program after four decades of canceled projects. A deal has been brokered with Russia to build Turkey’s first nuclear powerplant on the Mediterranean coast, and talks have started with Japan and France regarding a second nuclear facility on the Black Sea. In December, Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom signed an agreement to construct four 1,200 MW VVER reactors totalling 4,800 MW in Akkuyu in the province of Mersin on Turkey’s southern coast. The water-cooled, water-moderated energy reactors will be designed to withstand earthquakes of up to 6.5 on the Richter scale. The licensing process

Turkish State Railways’ (Turkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Demiryollari, or TCDD) plans to build a 6,000-kilometers network of high-speed track have received a major boost from China. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao signed an agreement in early October in Ankara to loan approximately $28 billion for construction of a 2,000-km high-speed Silk Road Railway. The route will connect Edirne, which is on Turkey’s western border with Bulgaria, and Kars, which is in the northeast near the closed border of Armenia. The Kars–Tbilisi–Baku conventional railway—which links Turkey, Georgia and Azerbaijan—has been under construction since 2007 and is scheduled for completion by 2012. + Image