Nabucco West Project Member-States Adopt Joint Declaration

Business » ENERGY | May 21, 2013, Tuesday // 16:19
Bulgaria: Nabucco West Project Member-States Adopt Joint Declaration A general view of the Nabucco Committee meeting in Bucharest, Romania, 21 May 2013. Photo by EPA/BGNES

The governments of Austria, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey adopted Tuesday a joint declaration stressing the potential of Nabucco to supply the energy markets of the Western Balkans and the Visegrad group countries (Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary) at the fifth Nabucco Committee meeting in Bucharest.

The committee meeting was hosted by the Government of Romania, according to reports of Nabucco Gas Pipeline International GmbH.

The governments further expressed their commitment to engage in developing the necessary gas interconnections to ensure that Nabucco can also supply the countries in the Southern and Central-North dimension of Europe.

"The State Parties call on the European Council, which will meet on 22 May to address the completion of the Internal Energy Market, to note the wider potential of Nabucco to provide access to new sources of gas for promoting growth and competition at the European level", the report said.

The State Parties also approached the European Commission to continue to provide the project with the necessary regulatory and technical assistance.

The participants at the Committee Meeting also welcomed the progress of the project since the previous committee meeting was held in Budapest in April, and the work done by the authorities in the transit countries to ensure the successful implementation of the project.

In particular they highlighted the efforts of the Nabucco Tax Subcommittee to align taxation issues under the Nabucco Intergovernmental Agreement and its detailed recommendation regarding the application of the tax provisions under the Agreement.

States Parties now have an expert basis from within the Nabucco Committee to complete the necessary tax instruments or agreements under their domestic legal order.

The declaration also highlights the complementarity of the Nabucco and TANAP (Trans Anatolian Pipeline) projects, and welcomed the progress made in the realization of TANAP by the Turkish and Azerbaijani authorities. Delegations from both countries were also present at the meeting.

"We have reached several milestones since the Budapest Nabucco committee meeting: Bulgaria became the second country to grant Nabucco the environmental permit to construct, we launched the registration phase of the Open Season to levels of interest that surpassed expectations. The national regulators also granted Nabucco a prolongation of the exemption from EU legislation on Third Party Access, in alignment with the delivery timelines of Shah Deniz gas. Nabucco is the shortest route to the markets of South Eastern Europe, and remains the best option to open the Southern Gas Corridor", said Reinhard Mitschek, CEO of NABUCCO Gas Pipeline International GmbH.

Nabucco West is a downsized version of the Nabucco project, which provides for construction of a 1300km gas pipeline from the Turkish-Bulgarian border to Austria.

Nabucco West project's current shareholders are the Bulgarian Energy Holding, Romanian Transgaz, Turkish Botas, Austrian OMV and Hungary's FGSZ.

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Tags: Nabucco Gas Pipeline International GmbH, Nabucco Gas Pipeline, Nabucco, Nabucco West

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