Azerbaijan, Baku, Feb. 15 / Trend A.Badalova /
Nabucco West gas pipeline project presents the best possible option to open the Southern Gas Corridor, CEO of Nabucco Gas Pipeline International GmbH Reinhard Mitschek said in an interview with Natural Gas Europe.
According to Mitschek, Nabucco's role in the European natural gas market is extremely important.
"The 48" diameter, 1320 km long pipeline will link its transit countries as well as Turkey to a liquid market at Baumgarten, and via Baumgarten to other gas hubs across Europe," Mitschek said. According to him, additionally, infrastructure already exists for gas from Nabucco to reach Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Slovenia, and Italy, and with the construction of a few, short interconnectors, Montenegro, Greece and Albania.
"Furthermore, from Baumgarten, capacity exists to transport the gas further into Western Europe, Germany, the Czech Republic, Italy, France, and further," Mitschek said.
He also stressed that the capacity of Nabucco West could be scaled up from 10 to 23 billion cubic metres in the future in a tailor made way to meet increasing demand.
According to Mitschek, the cooperation between Nabucco West and the consortium of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz field development "is ongoing, transparent and very successful."
He mentioned that in January Nabucco West signed a Cooperation Agreement and an Equity Option and Funding Agreement with the Shah Deniz partners.
"The Cooperation Agreement in particular emphasizes alignment of project schedules between the Shah Deniz Consortium and the Nabucco project," Mitschek said.
"This is what we are focusing on currently, as we work towards ensuring that Nabucco will be ready to transport gas when the Shah Deniz gas field is ready to deliver it," he added.
Nabucco West is a short-cut version of Nabucco project, which envisages construction of the pipeline from the Turkish-Bulgarian border to Austria. Gas to be produced within the second phase of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz gas condensate field development is considered as the main source for the project.
The project's current shareholders are Bulgarian Energy Holding, Romanian Transgaz, Turkish Botas, Austrian OMV, German RWE and Hungary's FGSZ.
In June, 2012 the consortium of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz gas field development chose Nabucco West as the single pipeline option for the potential export of Shah Deniz Stage 2 gas to Central Europe. The final decision on the pipeline route to transport Azerbaijani gas to Europe will be made in June, 2013.