Nabucco ‘confident’ of Shah Deniz gas

Nabucco Gas Pipeline International, the partnership that’s planning a 7.9 billion-euro ($11 billion) pipeline to Europe, is “confident” of getting enough fuel for the link, including gas from the Azeri Shah Deniz field.

“We are confident it is possible to fill the pipeline,” Christian Dolezal, a spokesman for Nabucco, said on Wednesday at a conference in Paris. “There is of course a lot of interest in gas also from other sides, but this doesn’t change anything.”

Nabucco aims to diversify gas supplies by bringing Caspian and Middle East gas to Austria via Turkey. The pipeline venture, led by Vienna-based OMV, is vying with Asian and Russian projects for access to Azeri, Turkmen, Iranian and Iraqi gas.

Nabucco, set to start operating in 2014, will get its first gas from Iraq and Azerbaijan, Dolezal said. Reinhard Mitschek, the project’s managing director, said earlier this month that 8 billion cubic meters of gas would come from Iraq in 2015, more than a quarter of the pipe’s total volume, and that Shah Deniz would provide the same amount.

The link, which will send as much as 31 billion cubic meters of Caspian-region gas a year to Europe, has been delayed by a lack of commitments from customers, suppliers and transit nations. First deliveries were originally planned for 2013.

“We needed a stable legal framework,” Dolezal said. “We now have this and we are confident we can start construction in 2011.”

Officials from transit countries Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Austria signed an accord in the Turkish capital Ankara in July. Turkey had previously held off signing a transit agreement as it sought approval to take 15 percent of the gas passing through the pipe at discounted prices for its own use.

“We are confident in the role of Turkey, in all the countries backing Nabucco,” Dolezal said.

Nabucco would bypass Russia and Ukraine, helping Europe find an alternative to Moscow-based Gazprom, which supplies about 25 percent of the region’s gas. Gas would flow into Turkey from three of four possible entry points: Georgia, Iran, Iraq and Syria, according to the European Union.

While Nabucco has been negotiating for gas deliveries with Azerbaijan, Iraq and Turkmenistan, Gazprom has signed supply contracts with Caspian producers, maintaining its monopoly on exports from former Soviet republics to Europe.

Nabucco’s partners, which also include Hungary’s Mol, Germany’s RWE, Transgaz of Romania, Bulgarian Energy Holding and Ankara-based Botaş, may bring in a further participant.

That could be GDF Suez, which says it’s interested in the “concept” of Nabucco. There are no longer political barriers to joining the project, Jean-Marie Dauger, the utility’s executive vice president of global gas, said on Wednesday in Paris, adding that Azeri gas won’t be sufficient for the pipe.

OMV and RWE said Oct. 13 that France is interested in joining the project, citing discussions between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his Turkish counterpart Abdullah Gül. “The consortium is open for a second partner,” Dolezal said. “As soon as the shareholders receive an offer we’ll discuss.”