Earlier in the day, the Kommersant newspaper reported, citing sources from Gascade, that Gazprom will be unable to fully meet the European gas demand in 2020 without using Ukrainian gas transit infrastructure, because the European gas pipelines will not be ready to transit the entire gas volume planned for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline by that time.
"After its full completion at the end of 2020 the EUGAL pipeline will have a maximum transport capacity of 55 billion cubic meters per year," the representative said.
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According to the representative, the construction of the pipeline will start after all the necessary approval procedures are completed. It is planned that the first string of the pipeline will be built by the end of 2019. The transit capacity of the pipeline with one string will be up to 30 billion cubic meters per year.
"The second string will be built in subsections at the same time [in 2019]. However, the second string will only be fully completed around a year later and be able to start operating afterwards," the representative noted.
The Eugal pipeline is planned to be laid from the Baltic Sea to the border between Germany and the Czech Republic. Gascade, which is owned by Gazprom and Wintershall, will manage the process of the pipeline's construction and then will run its operations.
Nord Stream 2 is a joint venture of Russia’s Gazprom and five European companies, France's Engie, Austria’s OMV AG, UK-Dutch Royal Dutch Shell and Germany's Uniper and Wintershall. The pipeline aims to deliver 55 billion cubic meters of Russian natural gas a year to the European Union by transiting the Baltic Sea to Germany.
