Bulgaria builds gas link to end full reliance on Russian gas
22/05/2019 11:59
By Tsvetelia Tsolova
KIRKOVO, Bulgaria, May 22 (Reuters) - Bulgaria has started
building a 240 million euro ($268 million) gas pipeline with
Greece that will end the Balkan country's total dependence on
Russian gas and help diversify supplies in southeastern Europe.
Sofia, which at present meets all of its gas needs from
Russia via one route, pledged to start building gas links with
its neighbours and diversify its suppliers in 2009, when a price
dispute between Moscow and Kiev left hundreds of Bulgarians
without heating in the middle of winter.
After years of delays, a 182-km interconnector link between
Bulgaria and Greece with an initial annual capacity of three
billion cubic metres is now expected to ready by the end of 2020
and transport mainly Azeri gas to Bulgaria.
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and Bulgarian Prime
Minister Boyko Borissov announced on Wednesday the symbolic
start of the construction works near the village of Kirkovo,
some 15 km north of border with Greece.
"The project is of strategic importance not only for our two
countries, but for the whole of Europe, including the countries
in the Western Balkans," Borissov said. "It will lead to real
diversification of gas supplies."
Earlier this month the project company for the pipeline,
ICGB, picked Greek gas contractor J&P AVAX AVAr.AT to build
the link between the southern Bulgarian city of Stara Zagora to
the Greek city of Komotini in northeast Greece. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL5N22Q2UY
ICGB is 50% owned by Bulgaria's state-held BEH energy
holding company. The remaining shares are held by Greece's DEPA
and Italy's Edison EDNn.MI .
Along with its hopes to build a gas hub and secure gas
supplies from different sources, including liquefied natural gas
from the United States, Bulgaria is eager to keep Russian
natural gas flowing through its territory to central Europe.
It has picked a Saudi-led consortium to build a more than
450 km pipeline from its southern border with Turkey to its
western border with Serbia, aiming to secure a link to the
Russia-backed TurkStream twin pipeline to central Europe.
urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL8N21L1ZG
(Reporting by Tsvetelia Tsolova; Editing by Mark Potter)
((tsvetelia.tsolova@thomsonreuters.com; +359-2-93-99-731;))