Bulgaria signs Saudi group Arkad for €1.1bn TurkStream extension
The contract was signed by representatives of Bulgartransgaz and Arkad, in the presence of Bulgaria's Minister of Energy, Temenuzhka Petkova (second left) and Prime Minister Boiko Borissov (second right).
Bulgaria's state-owned gas provider, Bulgartransgaz EAD, has awarded a €1.1-billion contract to Saudi-led group Arkad to construct an extension to the TurkStream gas pipeline, which will carry Russian natural gas into Europe.
Sofia is now hurrying to build the 474 km pipeline connecting its southern border with Turkey to its border with Serbia in the west in order to secure its own link to the Russian TurkStream pipeline to Austria, Hungary and Serbia.
TurkStream is sponsored by Russia's state-owned gas company, Gazprom. The pipeline is being built in order to bypass Ukraine. Its first leg runs from the Russkaya compressor station to the south of Anapa, underneath the Black Sea, where it resurfaces in Thrace, the European part of Turkey.
Last month, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak announced that the second leg of the pipeline, which has a total annual capacity of 15.75 billion cubic metres, would go through Bulgaria on its journey to central Europe.
"This is the so-called Balkan Stream,” said Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov at the contract signing by Bulgartransgaz.
“We will win from transit fees, this pipeline will remain Bulgarian once it is paid off and mainly our neighbours from North Macedonia, Serbia and Hungary will have alternative gas.”
The Prime Minister said that 90% of the pipes needed for the project had already been delivered and that Sofia wants to have the first 308 km completed by January 2020, despite warnings by industry experts that this timetable would be incredibly hard to achieve.
Borissov said that the TurkStream pipeline, as well as a gas interconnector with Greece which was launched in May, will firmly assert his country's place on the European gas map.
The signing of the contract with the Arkad-led group comes a day before a meeting of representatives of Russia, the EU and Ukraine to discuss the future of Russian gas transit to Europe via the Ukraine when the ten-year contract expires in January.
The Arkad contract only became possible after a Bulgarian court removed legal obstacles and ended a dispute between the Saudi engineering and construction firm and a consortium of Italy's Bonatti, Germany's Max Streicher and the Luxembourg-based unit of Russian pipe maker TMK.
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