Gazprom to start supplies to Austria via S Stream late ’16

VIENNA, June 24 (Itar-Tass) -- Gazprom has signed a contract defining the rules of laying and operation of the South Stream pipeline in Austria on Tuesday and it will start supplies to Austria via the pipeline in late 2016. “We expect that gas will start coming to a distribution depot in Baumgarten in late 2016 or the beginning of 2017,” a representative of Gapzrom’s Austrian client OMV Robert Lechner said. OMV has suggested Gazprom buy a stake in Austria’s gas exchange but this proposal will not be part of the South Stream agreement, OMV CEO Gerhard Roiss said. In 2008, the Austrian company offered to sell a 50% stake in Central European Gas Hub located in Austria to Gazprom and to cut OMV’s stake to 30%, but the E.U. prohibited the deal. On June 20, the European Commission said that the laying of South Stream must be suspended until the project is fully adjusted to the E.U. legislation, but Austria said that the contract to lay the South Stream pipeline across Austria will be signed anyway. The Austrian segment with the destination point in the city of Baumgarten will have a capacity of 32 billion cubic meters annually, which will be reached in January 2018. Austria initially planned to cooperate with Gazprom on the South Stream, but later decided in favor of the Nabucco pipeline, pushing Gazprom to plan the South Stream route through neighboring Slovenia. Russia and Austria restarted their talks on the issue when the Nabucco West project lost Shah Deniz gas pumping rights to the Trans-Adriatic pipeline. Learn more on itar-tass.com