You're reading: Only Russia knows aim of South Stream’s construction

Only Russia knows the aim of the construction of the South Stream pipeline, Special Envoy of the United States Secretary of State for Eurasian Energy Richard Morningstar said in his speech during a conference entitled "Natural Gas and Energy Future of Ukraine" in Kyiv on Thursday, according to a participant of the conference.

"As for the so-called South Stream, the Russians have all the same taken to building the South Stream Pipeline, although they are the only ones who know why," Morningstar said.

According to him, implementation of the project will influence Russia-Ukraine relations.

As reported, in late December 2011 Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller said that the parameters of the South Stream project would depend on Ukraine’s negotiating position, considering that Turkey gave Russia its consent to the latter laying the South Stream gas pipeline along the Black Sea floor.

At the same time, asked about a possible decrease in South Stream’s capacity if agreement is reached with Ukraine on participating in its gas transport system, Miller said: "South Stream is already at the construction stage, a consolidated feasibility study has been approved, there is an offshore section, and there is an overland section.

The design capacity has been approved at 63 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas per year, and the gas pipeline involves constructing four threads of 15.5 bcm each. In December 2015, the first thread will be launched, and in the future we will gradually increase to the stated capacity of 63 bcm of gas per year."

As of today, Ukraine is the main transporter of Russian gas to Europe. In January 2006 and 2009, disputes between Ukraine and Russia led to a halt in Russian gas transit to Europe. Gazprom has claimed multiple times that it was impossible to control gas transit volumes through Ukraine – it said that the country picks off as much as it can from the transit flow, rather than as stipulated under its gas supply contract.

The design capacity of the two new gas pipelines – Nord Stream (55 bcm) and South Stream (63 bcm) – equals the amount of Russian gas transit to Europe.