Tuesday 2 December 2014

Turkey steps in on Russia’s Black Sea pipe switch

Russian energy firm Gazprom is forging new ties with Turkey, with plans to build a pipe under the Black Sea linking the countries.

It’s in the place of another project which was routed through Eastern Europe called the South Stream. Ending in Italy after snaking through Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary and Slovenia, the project had been under pressure from EU competition regulators.

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the earlier pipe plan was scrapped yesterday at a summit in Istanbul. He joined Turkey’s President Recep Erdogan to see a provisional deal signed between energy companies Gazprom and Turkey’s BOTAŞ on the submarine pipeline.

Carrying 63 billion cubic meters (bcm) under the sea, roughly 14bcm will be for Turkish consumers and the rest will be made available to Europe via a gas pipe on the Greek-Turkey border, said Gazprom.

Turkey already gets gas under the Black Sea via the Blue Stream pipeline, as well as the Trans-Balkan gas pipelines and it is Gazprom's second largest sales market behind Germany.

Last year Gazprom supplied Turkey with 26.7 billion cubic meters of gas.