Georgia is keen on implementing the AGRI project, an alternative to the Nabucco natural gas pipeline, which will deliver natural gas from the Caspian region by sea and bypass Russia, Georgian Foreign Minister Grigol Vashadze said in an interview with he Dzerkalo Tyzhnia Ukraine (Mirror Weekly) newspaper (ZN.UA).
AGRI is much cheaper and can be implemented significantly faster, the
minister said. “All the states participating in this project not only
remain keen but also determined. Not only Georgia and Azerbaijan, but
first and foremost European consumers who need an alternative source and
route of obtaining energy resources,” Vashadze said.
The Nabucco project is very important, the minister said. “But it is
unclear whether the project will succeed at all because everyone keeps
saying, yes, ‘Nabucco will be there,’ but its implementation is being
postponed every year,” he said. The Georgian government believes transit
of liquefied Caspian gas across the Black Sea will be much cheaper than
construction of the Nabucco gas pipeline.
So far the AGRI project involves Romania and Hungary. “But we hope it
will be joined by other European countries, too. We shall see what
happens at the AGRI summit due later this year,” he said.
Asked which deposit field the AGRI project is looking at, the
minister could not answer saying only that the gas will definitely be
delivered not only from the Caspian region but also Central Asia.
The AGRI (Azerbaijan-Georgia-Romania Interconnector) project aims to
supply Caspian gas bypassing Russia. A political declaration to build
the pipeline in September 2012 was signed by the presidents of
Azerbaijan, Georgia and Romania and the Hungarian prime minister. The
project is designed to provide an alternative route to Russia’s to
deliver Azeri gas to Europe. It is expected that the “blue fuel” will be
transported from Azerbaijan on the Georgian Black Sea coast. There, gas
will be liquefied and delivered by sea tankers to the Romanian port of
Constanta. Then the fuel will be “brought back” into its gaseous state
and sent from Romania to Hungary and onward to Western Europe.
