05/06/2010 12:03
Turkey ratified Nabucco agreement process
The Turkish parliament on Friday ratified an agreement to construct the Nabucco gas pipeline to deliver Caspian gas to Europe, the Energy Tribune reports.
The 3,300-kilometer Nabucco pipeline construction project is estimated at $7.9 billion, and will transfer natural gas through Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and Austria, bypassing Russia. The pipeline is to pump 20-30 billion cubic meters of gas annually.
The gas pipeline will be exploited since august the first.
The EU-backed Nabucco pipeline is widely considered a rival to the South Stream project, which will pump 63 billion cubic meters of Russian natural gas annually to Bulgaria, Italy and Austria and is part of Russia's efforts to cut dependence on transit nations, particularly Ukraine and Turkey.