Bulgaria, Hungary urge faster work on Nabucco

The European Union has made the €7.9 billion ($12.43 billion) pipeline a priority but senior Bulgarian and Hungarian officials said stronger commitment was needed for the plan to materialize. “We believe there is a certain slowdown in the activities on the project. It is very important to spur political support for it,” Bulgarian Economy and Energy Minister Petar Dimitrov said after meeting Hungarian coordinator for Nabucco Mihály Bayer.

The pipeline is due to bring 30 billion cubic meters of Caspian or Middle Eastern gas annually from Turkey to an Austrian gas hub via Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary, and become operational in 2013. But the project faces a number of serious challenges -- securing supplies, with only Azerbaijan committed, Russia’s South Stream rival route and US hostility to sourcing Iranian gas, although Washington backs the project.

Dimitrov said the European Commission should play a more active role and proposed a high-level meeting between gas supplying, transiting and consuming nations in Sofia to pave out differences and speed up work on Nabucco. “The problems Nabucco faces are not purely economic and they could not be solved only by the companies that are participating,” he said. A consortium made up of Austria’s OMV, Germany’s RWE, Hungary’s MOL, Turkey’s Botas, Bulgaria’s Bulgargaz and Romania’s Transgaz will build and operate the 3,300 km pipeline. Among potential suppliers are Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Egypt and Iraq. (Reuters)