Finland not in need of add'l Russian gas - Finnish foreign minister
MOSCOW. Sept 9 (Interfax) - Finland will be developing nuclear power, making additional supplies of Russian gas unnecessary, Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja said during an interview with Interfax.
"The Finnish government last year adopted a very ambitious program for significantly increasing the proportion of renewable sources in our energy structure. And the plan is to increase the proportion of atomic energy," Tuomioja said. "All this will leave a small place for additional supplies of gas to Finland for the foreseeable future," he said.
The Finns are not interested in connecting to the gas infrastructure the Russians intend to develop in regions bordering Finland - Murmansk Region and Karelia, Tuomioja said.
"Northern Finland is very thinly populated and the distance between populated areas is great. So to build a gas network in Northern Finland is not economically expedient," the foreign minister said.