The northern latitudinal passage does not go out in any way

As it became known to Kommersant, the construction of the railway Northern Latitudinal Railway can be postponed again – to 2027-2031. The reason is the lack of funds, including the government has not yet decided to allocate the requested 150 billion rubles. from the FNB for the construction of a bridge across the Ob. In general, the project has been fully developed, and its cost, provided that it starts in 2024, will amount to 650 billion rubles. If the deadline is postponed to 2027, the price could rise to 730 billion rubles.

Kommersant got acquainted with the draft report sent by the Ministry of Transport to the government to the president, according to which the construction of the Northern Latitudinal Railway (NLRT) can be postponed to 2027-2031.

The reason is that the sources of funding have not been identified, and the decision to allocate funds from the NWF for the construction of a bridge across the Ob (a key part of the project) has not been made.

The investment program of Russian Railways for 2023 and the draft investment program for 2024-2026 do not include the necessary funds for the SSH. In this regard, Russian Railways proposed to postpone the project to 2027-2031, the Ministry of Transport writes.

Russian Railways and the ministry did not comment. A Kommersant source familiar with the project confirms that “there are no decisions to finance the bridge across the Ob”, but the postponement has not been approved either. Another interlocutor of Kommersant says that the Ministry of Transport “was forced to agree with the transfer, since there is no understanding on the source of funds.”

The SSH is a railway corridor project in the Arctic, which should pass 23.9 million tons of cargo per year. For this, the infrastructure of the Northern and Sverdlovsk railways must be developed and a link between them 700 km long from Salekhard to Nadym with a bridge across the Ob must be built. In 2016, a concession company OOO SShKh was created for the project, which was initially controlled by Yury Reilyan, the largest contractor of JSC Russian Railways Spetstransstroy at that time, but eventually became the property of a monopoly.

In 2018, the government signed a decree on concluding a concession agreement with SSHH LLC. In April 2022, Vladimir Putin instructed to begin construction of the SSH within a year, addressing the government, Russian Railways and Gazprom as contractors (see “Kommersant” dated April 13, 2022). However, in November 2022, Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin stated that the government had suspended this project (see “Kommersant” dated November 15, 2022).

The SSH project consists of three sections. The first is the new section Obskaya-Salekhard-Nadym, which was originally to be built under a concession (the concedent on behalf of the Russian Federation is Roszheldor). The second and third are the reconstruction of the adjacent sections of the Northern and Sverdlovsk railways at the expense of Russian Railways and the Nadym-Pangody line at the expense of Gazprom.

According to the new version of the project, the Obskaya-Salekhard section with the most capital-intensive facility – the bridge across the Ob River – is proposed to be excluded from the concession and built as part of the investment program of Russian Railways with the involvement of funds from the National Welfare Fund.

This was done in order to preserve the investment attractiveness of the concession in the rest for investors and banks, says the interlocutor of Kommersant, who is familiar with the project. Although the concessionaire is now owned by Russian Railways, he clarifies that it is possible to attract a non-state partner to the capital, including a controlling stake.

The cargo base, confirmed by shippers, according to the interlocutor of Kommersant, provides a return on investment for all its participants. All the largest banks express their readiness to finance the concession in the new structure, provided that the bridge across the Ob will be financed from the National Welfare Fund, and sources of financing for the SSH will be determined in the investment program of Russian Railways.

Funds from the National Welfare Fund are needed in the amount of 150 billion rubles if the bridge across the Ob is being built in 2024–2028. When the construction period is postponed to 2027–2031, the need for financing the bridge increases to 180 billion rubles. The entire SSH project will rise in price from about 650 billion to 730 billion rubles.

The interlocutor of Kommersant, who is familiar with the situation, says that as soon as funds are allocated from the National Welfare Fund, and the reconstruction of the Northern and Sverdlovsk railways is included in the investment program of Russian Railways, the project can be started: the model has been fully developed, design estimates (PSD) on the bridge across the Ob passed state expertise, agreements in principle with banks were reached.

If the project is postponed, then it will noticeably rise in price, the already developed design and estimate documentation may require adjustments, and there will be no additional route that unloads the Eastern landfill for a long time.

The Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Finance did not respond to a request from Kommersant about the fate of the SSH. In August 2022, the head of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, Denis Manturov, said that 70 billion rubles had been provisionally approved for the SSH. from the NWF, but this is not enough, and additional sources of funding are being sought.

The head of Infoline-Analytics, Mikhail Burmistrov, notes that given the current “hard budget constraints”, non-priority infrastructure projects – not only railway ones – are being shifted to 2026 and beyond. Also, against the backdrop of a decrease in the influx of migrants, the shortage of labor is growing, including due to its involvement in military service and projects in the “new territories”.

As a result, parallel implementation of such large projects as the modernization of the Eastern test site and the construction of the SSH, “becomes impossible, it is necessary to set priorities.” At the same time, for the unloading of the Eastern landfill, the NSH is “not so critical,” the expert notes, given that Elsie is building the Pacific Railway, and China plans to build the Uzbekistan-Kyrgyzstan-PRC railway bypassing Russia.

Natalya Skorlygina