German companies BASF and E.ON are Gazprom's partners in the $10.5-billion NEGP project to supply Western Europe with gas via a pipeline leading from Russia to Germany across the floor of the Baltic Sea, but the involvement of another company has not been ruled out.
Eggert Voscherau, speaking at a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at his Black Sea residence in Sochi, said: "Agreements on the gas pipeline are being initialed today by the partners in the project, and will be signed in late August."
The vice president told at a news briefing after the meeting that the partners in the project would now be able to focus their efforts on building the pipeline.
The NEGP, which is to include two parallel legs measuring 750 miles each, will connect the Baltic seashore near the Russian city of Vyborg with the Greifswald region on the German coast.
The first leg of the pipeline is expected to have annual capacity of 27.5 billion cubic meters, and the second will double the capacity to 55 billion cu m.
