New treatment plants under Tula for 221 million rubles accused of unsuitability

In August 2026, a litigation began in the Arbitration Court of the Tula region between Soyuzpromtorg LLC and the administration of the Arsenyevsky district. The company wanted to recover from the authorities of the district more than 79.4 million rubles.

We are talking about the recovery of the withheld amount of penalties in the amount of 73.2 million rubles under the contract dated July 11, 2022, interest for the use of other people’s funds in the amount of 6.2 million rubles. A new meeting is scheduled for November.

The contract for the construction of treatment facilities in the village of Arsenyevo was signed between Soyuzpromtorg LLC and the administration of the Arsenyevsky district on July 11, 2022. The contract price amounted to 221.8 million rubles, including VAT of 20% - 36.88 million rubles.

The deadline for completion of the work was originally determined on June 1, 2023. The contract provided for an advance of 6.77% of the price of each stage. Payment was to be made in stages for actually performed and accepted work.

From the contract document, it followed that the contractor assumed obligations to perform the entire complex of construction and installation works in accordance with the design documentation, ensure the commissioning of the facility, obtain the conclusion of the state construction supervision body on the compliance of the KOS with the requirements of the project documentation, obtain permission for the commissioning of treatment facilities.

In addition, in July 2022, the administration of the Arsenyevsky district and Soyuzpromtorg LLC signed a contract for the provision of services for author’s supervision of the construction of treatment facilities. The price of the contract for copyright supervision amounted to 442.5 thousand rubles.

In November 2022, an additional agreement was signed to the agreement on providing subsidies for the modernization and development of water disposal systems in the Arsenyevsky district. It was concluded between the Ministry of Housing and Communal Services of the Tula region and the district administration.

According to him, the amount of subsidies from the budget of the Tula region for these purposes was determined within the following limits, in 2022 - no more than 11.48 million rubles, in 2023 - no more than 217 million rubles.

The period of purification in operation was constantly postponed. From June 1, 2023, the commissioning period was postponed to May 2024, then the deadline was postponed to June 14, but even then they did not meet the deadline.

At the end of 2024, information appeared that the company did not complete the construction of wastewater treatment plants on time and was fined 5.5 million rubles by the prosecutor's office of the Arsenyevsky district for this.

According to some reports, the treatment plants were put into operation in December 2025, but from February 2026 there could be problems.

The fact that the version with problems during construction has the right to exist is also evidenced by another lawsuit, which has been going on since June 2024 in the Arbitration Court of the Tula region between the companies Losbel and Energia for 123.6 million rubles, and third parties represented regional and district structures.

It follows from the court documents that the company Losbel LLC filed a lawsuit against Energia LLC in June 2024 to recover a debt of 123.69 million rubles from it. The debt arose under the equipment supply agreement in the amount of 64.68 million rubles.

Also, representatives of the company intended to recover a penalty in the amount of 19.5 million rubles with further penalty until the actual payment of the debt, losses in the amount of 39.46 million rubles, as well as court costs for the payment of state duty in the amount of 200 thousand rubles.

Third parties in the trial declared the administration of the Arsenyevsky district, the company "Soyuzpromtorg", GUKS "Tulobluks". Plus, the process wanted to involve LLC “Ecology”, and FBU “Prioksky CSM”. As part of the same process, a counterclaim is being considered by NPK Energia LLC against Losbel LLC to recover 12.3 million rubles of unjust enrichment.

This process concerned the construction of treatment plants in the village of Arsenyevo and the supply of equipment for them. In particular, representatives of LLC "Losbel" at one of the courts asked to attach to the materials of the case the protocol of the meeting on the issue of acceptance of treatment facilities in the village and the certificate of registration of the notification of the occurrence of a pledge of movable property.

During the consideration of the case, Losbel LLC asked to seize the supplied and installed equipment, prohibit the defendant from carrying out any installation, commissioning and changes to the equipment, as well as arrest funds in the accounts of the defendant within the amount of the claim.

In support of its claim, Losbel indicated that after the filing of the claim, the defendant limited the access of its representatives to the construction site. In addition, according to the district administration, in July 2024, work began on the installation of equipment of unknown origin in the bioreactor.

According to the plaintiff, this may prevent the confirmation of the quality of the supplied equipment and further complicate the execution of the court decision. However, the court assessed the plaintiff's arguments as presumptive and not supported by sufficient evidence and refused to satisfy the petition.

After the publication of the material in October last year, one of the subcontractors of the construction came out to the editorial office of MK in Tula - the owner of Losbel LLC Alexei Lashkov. His company equipped cleaning equipment in many regions of Russia. But what happened in Arsenyevo for the first time.

According to him, the company "Losbel" was not engaged in general construction work at the facility. The usual practice in the construction of sewage treatment plants, when there was a local general contractor in the region for general construction work, and Losbel subcontracted to develop the technology, manufacture equipment, install and run sewage treatment plants.

Soyuzpromtorg LLC was chosen as the general contractor for the construction of the KOS in Arsenyevo, and the person making all decisions was Sergey Shishikin. True, the contract itself was signed by Losbel LLC with NPC Energia.

- The general contract was signed by Soyuzpromtorg LLC, but in fact it is managed by Sergey Shishikin, - says Alexey Lashkov - he is the owner and director of NPC Energia LLC. That is, in fact, it is one whole. When we signed the contract, we were going to sign with the general contractor, and he decided to put the layer in the form of his other company, where he owns. We looked and signed up because Soyuzpromtorg was a relatively weak company at the time, with no assets, no funds – in fact, an empty space. There were some volumes of work and references, but then it turned out that the references are bad. Energia suited us because it had property, working capital, real estate – it was more financially stable.

According to the owner of Losbel, the problems began immediately. Having signed a municipal contract in July 2022, Soyuzpromtog came to the construction site only in early October 2022, having missed the rest of the construction season with good weather conditions.

At the same time, according to Lashkov, initially the construction of treatment plants in Arsenyevo was planned until the end of December 2022. In accordance with this schedule, Losbel fully produced and prepared the equipment for delivery and installation, investing its funds in August-October 2022.

As Lashkov explained, it was necessary to supply equipment to the Losbel company as the construction site was ready. The construction schedule for two years before the end of the municipal contract on May 15, 2024 was constantly shifted and continued to shift after the end of the contract for another year and a half - until December 2025. In addition, there were constant delays in payment for the work performed.

In 2023, it was necessary to do normal construction work. There was a specific subcontractor who in 2022 made the foundations, – continues Alexey Lashkov, – he had to continue, and by the end of the summer of 2023, the object could be commissioned. But Shishikin did not want to work with him - he said that it was too expensive. The services cost 30 million rubles. It was cheaper to find jobs on the market, but complex jobs (vertical walls, responsibility) could not hire unskilled workers. He refused. A month or two later, he came and said, “No contractor, find it.” He's already got other volumes. We found a contractor from Belarus - 32 million rubles, the terms are normal. They almost signed a contract – again “dear”. Found a local, Basic 71. Started building in the spring of 2023. Built crooked, oblique, long. By the end of September, even half of the volumes were not made and abandoned. The facility is gone for 2024. In the winter of 2023-2024, the facility began to build on its own, pour concrete with technology violation. In the cold, the lily - concrete flowed, frozen, cracks appeared. The base plate and the walls - the walls hung in the air. They hired Uzbek brigades. When the expert was invited to examine our equipment, he said: the equipment is good, and the construction volumes do not correspond at all, it is necessary to break and build again. Nevertheless, volumes were accepted. Later, on April 7-8, 2024, a meeting was held with the Minister of Housing and Utilities. Questions - what prevents the completion of the construction. We said: we need to finish the concrete work on the bioreactor, we will do it in a month, we will launch the rest. They need to finish the construction volumes, we need to take the site and install the equipment. And solve the financial issue of payment. We offered: ensure that when we build and deliver – you will pay (bank guarantees, guarantees of individuals, etc.). They agreed.

When Losbel had to put an extreme batch of equipment at the facility and start commissioning and launching treatment facilities, Energia suddenly refused to pay for the work and on May 20, 2024 sent a notice of unilateral termination of the supply contract. In response, the firm filed a claim and filed a lawsuit to protect its interests.

“At the end of July 2024, we learned that the equipment we installed in Arsenyevo is going to be dismantled and taken away from the construction site,” says Alexey Lashkov, “we are filing a lawsuit to impose interim measures on the equipment so that it is not dismantled and taken away, but the court refuses on formal grounds due to the lack of evidence of the defendant’s intention to dismantle and remove the equipment.” At the same time, Shishikin is negotiating with us on payment, on guarantees, so that we continue delivery and launch the facility. On the morning of August 6, 2024, the text of the guarantee is sent to us for approval, and by noon we accidentally learn about the beginning of dismantling the equipment on the site. We inform all interested parties about this.

The Losbel company managed to prevent the removal of equipment from the construction site, but some of the equipment was taken to an unknown destination. Appeals to the police about the investigation of the disappearance gave nothing.

According to Alexei Lashkov, the normal quality equipment supplied by Losbel was replaced by handicraft equipment: Czech high-quality air blowing equipment was replaced by Chinese, the automatic control unit of sewage treatment plants was completely excluded and replaced by manual control and so on throughout the list of equipment.

Most importantly, according to Lashkov, the concept corresponding to the technical specification of the customer about unmanned operation with minimal operating costs was violated. Cleaning in Arsenyevo, according to Lashkov, require the constant presence of qualified personnel, and due to poor-quality equipment requires repair and adjustment, which greatly increases the cost of the customer during operation.

However, in December 2025, according to Lashkov, the facility is handed over to the customer, and by the end of winter 2026, the first problems in operation begin.

In order to cover the story objectively and to understand what is happening, the editors of MK in Tula decided to send requests to the Ministry of Energy of the Tula region, as well as to the administration of the Arsenyevsky district. We were interested in the following questions:

We received the answer only from the Ministry of Energy of the Tula region.

Deputy Minister of Energy Lyudmila Semenova said that the construction of treatment facilities in the village of Arsenyevo was carried out by the contracting organization of Soyuzpromtorg LLC in accordance with the design documentation that passed the state examination.

A conclusion was received on the compliance of the constructed capital construction object with the requirements specified in part 16 of Article 54 of the Town Planning Code of the Russian Federation. Control over the use of budget funds for the facility in accordance with the approved budget allocations and limits of budget obligations was carried out by the Ministry of Energy of the Tula region. The object is owned by the administration of the municipality Arsenyevsky district. The administration has organized work on the transfer of the object to the operating organization to ensure its regulatory work, said Deputy Minister Lyudmila Semenova.

To comment on the response, the editorial staff of “MK in Tula” will not. The completeness and specificity of the answer will be appreciated by our readers.

Two requests sent to the post office of the administration of the Arsenyevsky district, addressed to the head of the administration Igor Makarov, remained unanswered. The head of the district and his colleagues preferred to ignore our requests.

Both treatment contractors, LLC NPK Energia and LLC Soyuzpromtorg, remained silent. Requests to their leaders Sergey Shishikin and Kirill Postnov were sent in late September. They did not want to answer the questions of the MK in Tula editorial office for some reason.

If the accusations and words of Alexei Lashkov are confirmed, the Tula region risks getting into a loud scandal. No less than after the inspection of State Duma deputy Zhanna Ryabtseva sewage treatment plants in the regions of the Volga region.

After all, federal funds could be used for the construction of sewage treatment plants in Arsenyevo, according to information on the website of the government of the Tula region. Including the national project “Infrastructure for life”.

If an object was erected on them, to which there are already claims, and its very appearance caused a lot of court disputes, then the competent authorities should intervene in the case. Understand everything to the end and publish the results of the work. In November, the Arbitration Court of the Tula region will hold regular hearings on claims that may give new food for thought.

Because while this whole story is already starting to smell worse than the wind blowing from the cleaners themselves.