The first natural gas supply that would be transported by Nabucco gas pipeline would come from Azerbaijan, Bulgargaz Executive Director Kiril Gegov told, Trend reports quoting to Bulgaria's newspaper Banker Weekly.
The Nabucco gas pipeline will be 3300km long and will guarantee the supply of about 30 billion cubic metres of gas a year to Central Europe by 2015. The pipeline is considered an alternative to the Russian gas supply to Europe.
Bulgargaz, Turkey's Botas, Romania's Transgaz, Hungary's MOL, and Austria's OMV set up the Nabucco Company Pipeline Study Group to research the project.
According to Gegov, Egypt and Iran were also probable gas suppliers for the pipeline.
According to the information of Banker Weekly, The Nabucco Company Pipeline Study would apply for another grant loan of 3.4 to 3.5 million euros from the European Commission (CE) to speed up the project, Banker said. The company already received two million euros from the EC for the initial research.
The first gas production from the Shah Deniz field is intended to commence December of this year. According to the statements, the gas reserves in the field equal 1 to trillion cubic meters.
The contract for the development of Shah Deniz field was signed on July 4 , 1996 in Baku. The parties to the Shah Deniz Production Sharing Agreement are: BP (operator 25.5%), Statoil (25.5%), the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR - 10%), LUKoil (10%), NICO (10%), Total (10%), and TPAO (9%).