BAKU, Azerbaijan, March 28. The US supports the implementation of a Vertical Gas Corridor project, said US Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources Geoffrey Pyatt at a briefing, Trend reports.
"The US expresses support for Vertical Corridor, which is designed to bring non-Russian gas up into Central Europe, including to markets like Hungary, Austria, and Slovakia that remain dependent on Russian gas. This will be especially important in the context of what we expect will be the end of transit through Ukraine at the end of this year when the transit contract expires," he said.
According to Pyatt, there’s an important potential role for Türkiye there as well as an entry point for non-Russian gas into that Vertical Corridor, which would go up through Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, and Ukraine, leveraging the gas storage that Ukraine has available in western Ukraine.
The assistant secretary also noted that Türkiye's role in the Southern Gas Corridor project is highly noteworthy.
"Türkiye has played a very important role as the host of the Southern Gas Corridor, in helping to diversify European energy supplies and European gas supplies away from dependence on Russia; as the host of multiple LNG liquefaction facilities, which have received a lot of American LNG over the past two years since the beginning of the war in Ukraine," Pyatt added.
The idea of constructing the Vertical Gas Corridor originated in the EU in 2014.
Ukraine, Moldova, and Slovakia joined the memorandum on its construction in January 2024. The corridor originates in Greece, then goes to Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, and Ukraine, branching off to Slovenia, and Slovakia.
Vladimir Malinov, executive director of Bulgargartransgaz, said in February 2024 that the company was considering options for supplying liquefied natural gas from Greece and Türkiye via the Bulgargartransgaz network to Ukraine via the Vertical Corridor, and from there via the Romanian and Moldovan networks.
This project is an alternative to the non-EU-backed "Ring of Solidarity" project initiated in 2022.