Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov. 19
By Aygun Badalova - Trend:
The European Commission sees the connecting the EU energy market to the Caspian region, Central Asia and Eastern Mediterranean as one of the core objectives.
EC's Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič in its speech at the State of the Energy Union press conference stressed a need to speed up work on infrastructure projects.
He also said that the European Commission's second PCI (Project of Common Interests) list is more focused (reduced from 248 to 195 projects) and much better aligned to the core objectives of the Energy Union, such as:
- delivering on the 10 percent electricity interconnection target;
- providing additional sources of gas to Member States that are still exclusively or predominantly dependent on a single dominant supplier; or
- better connecting the EU energy market to the Caspian region, Central Asia and the Eastern Mediterranean
On November 18, the European Commission adopted a list of 195 key energy infrastructure projects, known as projects of common interest, which will enable the gradual build-up of the Energy Union by integrating the energy markets in Europe, by diversifying the energy sources and transport routes.
A budget of 5.35 billion euros has been allocated to trans-European energy infrastructure under the CEF from 2014-2020, helping projects of common interest to get implemented faster and making them more attractive to investors, the report said.
The Southern Gas Corridor, which envisages the transportation of gas from the Caspian region to the European markets, has been kept in the updated PCI list.
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