The Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline is “fully completed”, announced the chairman of the board of Gazprom, Russian Alexeï Millerle. The pipeline, which connects Russia to Germany, will double the amount of gas delivered to Europe each year passing under the Baltic Sea bypassing Ukraine..
The gas will be transported from Russia to Europe each year via the Baltic Sea despite a route strewn with geopolitical pitfalls. The pipeline deeply divided Europeans, leaving the United States to arbitrate. Long opposed to the project, the United States finally renounced the sanctions that blocked the pipeline’s completion.
9,5 milliards d’euros est le coût total, financé à moitié par Gazprom. L’autre moitié est financée par cinq groupes énergétiques européens : le français Engie, les allemands Uniper et Wintershall, l’autrichien OMV et l’anglo-néerlandais Shell. Chaque groupe européen a financé la construction du gazoduc à hauteur de 950 millions d’euros, mais l’actionnariat du pipeline est 100% russe.
The annual gas supply capacity of Nord Stream 2 is 55 billion cubic meters, Gazprom therefore now has the capacity to supply 110 billion cubic meters of gas per year via the Baltic Sea since the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline, completed in 2011, whose route is the same as the Nord Stream 2, also transports 55 billion cubic meters of gas per year.
In 2019, Gazprom supplied a total of 199 billion cubic meters of natural gas to Europe through various gas pipelines (pipelines that cross Eastern and Central Europe).
The Nord Stream 2 stretching over 1,230 kilometers to connect the Ust-Louga gas terminal, located in the region of Saint Petersburg in Russia, to Lubmin, a coastal town in northeastern Germany which is the point of arrival of the gas pipeline, the pipes of which are laid at a depth of about 100 meters.
Moscow said Thursday that Nord Stream 2 would only enter service after receiving the green light from the German regulator.
