E.ON discussing role in South Stream - sources
MOSCOW. April 11 (Interfax) - E.ON Ruhrgas has joined BASF/Wintershall in thinking of a role in the South Stream gas pipeline project, gas industry sources told Interfax.
Gazprom said last week that its chief executive, Alexei Miller, held a meeting with Johannes Teyssen, his counterpart at E.ON, at which "the prospects for the development of the European gas market" were discussed, among other issues. "A unanimous opinion was expressed that Europe's demand for Russian gas supplies would steadily increase in the future," Gazprom said.
E.ON and Wintershall are the longest-standing foreign shareholders in the Nord Stream gas pipeline, the first strand of which should enter service this year.
Gazprom owns 50% of South Stream AG, which is designing a pipeline to be routed across the Black Sea bed. The remaining interest could be distributed among foreign companies, with Eni, EDF and Wintershall so far officially mentioned.
A year ago, E.ON Ruhrgas joined another pipeline project in Europe which could be integrated with South Stream: it bought 15% of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline project to build a 520-kilometer pipeline from Greece to southern Italy via Albania and across the Adriatic Sea. Other project participants are Norway's Statoil and Switzerland's EGL. The pipeline could carry between 10 and 20 billion cubic meters of gas per year.