Romania, Georgia, Azerbaijan Sign LNG Transit MoU

The document was signed by Romania’s Economy Minister Adriean Videanu, Azeri Minister of Industry and Energy, Natig Aliyev, and Georgia’s Energy Minister, Alexander Khetaguri.

The natural gas produced by Azerbaijan will transit Georgia via Romania and will be delivered afterwards to consumers in the European Union.

According to the memorandum signed Tuesday, a company headquartered in Bucharest will be set up in the following months to draw up the feasibility study, Videanu said.

State secretary within the Romanian Economy Ministry Tudor Serban said the project is evaluated at EUR2-4 billion. However, according to the previous statements of the Economy Ministry, the project was estimated at EUR4 – 6 billion.

Moreover, Videanu said AGRI might be developed sooner than the Nabucco gas pipeline project, adding that the Azerbaijan-Georgia-Romania Interconnection is the fastest and the most efficient project within the European southern corridor.

AGRI aims at transporting energy resources from the Caspian Sea towards the EU countries, while Nabucco, linking Turkey to Central Europe via Romania, aims to supply natural gas from the Caspian Sea to Central Europe via Turkey and Romania, bypassing Russia.

According to Videanu, part of the natural gas transported via AGRI will be used by Romania.

The project’s capacity might be of 7 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year, of which Romania might receive 2 billion cubic meters annually.

Discussions between the three states as regards the AGRI project had been started a year ago.

„It is an important project for all the states in the Black Sea region,” Aliyev said.

Romania’s annual gas consumption is of around 15-16 billion cubic meters, of which around 11 billion cubic meters come from the local gas production.