By Nicole Lundeen
VIENNA--Europe remains committed to plans to build a pipeline to
bring natural gas from the Caspian Sea region to Europe, European
Union energy chief Guenther Oettinger said Monday.
Mr. Oettinger spoke at a press conference ahead of a meeting in
Vienna today of representatives from the Azerbaijan gas consortium,
Shah Deniz II, and the Nabucco West pipeline consortium.
That pipeline would bring natural gas from the Caspian Sea
region via Austria. An alternative route for the so-called southern
corridor would be to run the pipeline through Italy.
"We are very determined that the corridor will be opened," the
EU energy commissioner said.
He said that both pipeline concepts were good and that no matter
which proposal succeeds, the pipeline will be European.
The EU currently gets about a quarter of its natural gas from
Russia, mostly through pipelines in Ukraine. In January 2009,
Russia cut off supplies through Ukraine in a dispute over the terms
of a new supply and transit contract. The disruption left millions
of European households without heat during 13 days of bitter cold
and forced thousands of schools and factories to close. It was not
the first time Russia had left Europeans stranded and it renewed
the EU's determination to open up a southern corridor.
The energy chief suggested he was optimistic about Nabucco's
chances, noting that the proposal had made it to the final
rounds.
Austrian oil and gas company OMV AG's (OMV.VI) chief executive
officer Gerhard Roiss said that the Nabucco consortium, which
includes OMV, remained open for more participants. He repeated
earlier comments that there were no indications that the Hungarian
partner MOL Nyrt. (MOL.BU) would withdraw from the Nabucco
consortium.
Write to Nicole Lundeen at nicole.lundeen@dowjones.com