/ world today news/ On Tuesday (May 17), the construction of the Transatlantic Gas Pipeline (TAP), through which Azerbaijani gas will arrive in Europe via Greece, officially began in Greece, writes “Vzglyad”.
The Vice President of the European Commission (EC) Maros Šefović described the day as historic and stated that the realization of the project is of great importance, as the pipe means greater energy security for Europe.
“We expect supplies of natural gas from the Caspian Sea region to begin arriving in Europe in 2020. But the “Southern Gas Corridor” can be expanded and transport more than 10 million cubic meters of gas per year both from the Caspian Sea, as well as from Central Asia and from countries such as Turkmenistan,” he added.
Greece, Bulgaria, Albania and Italy will benefit from TAP, Vzglyad notes. But most of all, of course, Greece will gain: of the 880 km total length of the pipe, 540 km will pass through its territory. It is no coincidence that Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has declared that TAP means a new era for his country. Athens will not only gain access to the Caspian gas reserves – thanks to the facility, it will become an energy hub in the region. Tsipras expects that 1.5 billion euros will be invested in his country thanks to the project. For crisis-stricken Greece, this is a huge sum and will have a beneficial impact on local industry. Construction activities are expected to create 8,000 jobs.
This project is also enjoyed by Bulgaria, which has already built the first phase of the “Greece-Bulgaria” interconnector. “One of the main priorities of the Bulgarian government is to diversify the sources and routes for the supply of natural gas. For Bulgaria, the construction of the interconnector with Greece is of priority importance,” said Bulgarian Energy Minister Temenuzka Petrova.
The technical capacity of the Interconnector Greece-Bulgaria (IGB) was expected to be between 3 and 5 billion cubic meters of gas per year. Now there is already talk of it being increased to 10 billion. According to the plan, the facility should enter commercial operation in 2018.
Albania, which has been isolated from the EU energy network until now, will also benefit, but thanks to TAP it will gain influence. Not to mention that it will be able to gain nearly 1 billion euros in the form of foreign direct investment, new jobs and additional taxes. And finally, Tirana will be able to supply gas to the energy network of the Western Balkans.
But, no matter how much Maros Šefčovič brags, even with this pipe and Azerbaijani gas, Europe will not be able to give up Russian gas, “Vzglyad” states.
To begin with, the dates for the appearance of Azerbaijani blue fuel in southern Italy are constantly being postponed. First it was 2018, now it’s 2019. In fact, everything can be delayed by another two years. One of the reasons is that the development of the Shah Deniz field has been delayed quite a bit.
In addition, only 10 billion cubic meters of gas will come to Europe under TAP, of which 80% will remain in Italy. Thus, only 2 billion cubic meters remain for Greece and Bulgaria. Essentially, for the EU, the meaning of this gas pipeline was to diversify gas supplies. But what kind of diversification could we be talking about? The Italian market is diversified anyway, unlike the markets in Bulgaria and Greece. The Italians buy blue fuel from many sources: from Algeria, Qatar, Norway, the Netherlands, Libya and finally from Russia.
Therefore, it cannot be said that in 4-5 years, when Italy will finally receive 8 billion cubic meters of gas from Azerbaijan, it will immediately stop buying gas from Gazprom. Even if Azerbaijani gas is (which is doubtful) cheaper than Russian gas. For Italy, it will be more profitable to give up, say, the more expensive blue fuel from Qatar or Algeria, which are traditionally inferior in price to the Russian one.
So Gazprom may not lose market share in Italy at all. It all depends on the pricing policy. In addition, in 2015, Russia delivered nearly 160 billion cubic meters of gas to Europe. Therefore, 10 billion cubic meters of Azerbaijani gas cannot have a serious impact either on Gazprom’s positions or on the distribution of the European market in general.
The American trail
Not only EU representatives, but also high-ranking officials from Greece, Turkey, Albania, Italy and Bulgaria participated in the TAP construction opening ceremony. It did not go without the USA, which at first glance has no commercial relationship with the project. On their side, the special representative of the State Department, Amos Hochschei, was present. The same one who literally a week ago was brainwashing the EU because of the Russian pipeline: the US would not want the EU to put money into the construction of Nord Stream 2.
And now a project that is a competitor to the Russian pipelines in southern Europe has been approved by the US, so they will build it, regardless of all the nuances. For example, the fact that it violates the norms of the third energy package of the EU. This argument was enough to stop South Stream. But when it came to TAP, all those transgressions became irrelevant.
For comparison: “Gazprom” was a shareholder of half of the land part of “Gazprom” on European territory, i.e. he was both a producer and a transporter of natural gas, which formally violates the norms of the third energy package. In TAP, the situation is the same, only slightly veiled. Formally, the companies developing the field and the TAP shareholders are different. But if we look closely, it becomes clear that this is not the case: the development is in the hands of a consortium led by BP Azerbaijan and the Azerbaijani state company SOCAR, and the largest shareholder in TAP is the same those BP and SOCAR (they each hold 20% of the pipe).
Another example of double standards: the EC allowed Azerbaijan’s SOCAR to fill TAP entirely with its own gas. However, according to European energy standards, the gas pipeline must provide access to all competitors on European territory. TAP, by law, must be treated the same way as “OPAL” (OPAL – the continuation of “Nord Stream” on European territory). Gazprom was allowed to pump gas through OPAL at only 50% of the pipeline’s capacity. The remaining half was left for some “other suppliers, as the rules of the third energy package so require”. But the EC solved this problem for TAP by allowing an exception to the rules.
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