The European Commission gave a green light to EUR2.30 billion to finance energy projects in Europe as part of a wider EUR3.98 billion plan to boost the energy sector, it said Thursday.
"Investing in key infrastructure will not only give a push to the economy and employment, but it will also help ensuring that citizens' homes will have heating and electricity, even in the event of supply disruptions," the commission's President Jose Manuel Barroso said in a statement.
Thursday's decision grants 12 electricity network projects a total of EUR910 million and EUR1.39 billion to 31 gas pipeline projects.
The Nabucco pipeline projects, which is supposed to carry Caspian gas to Austria, is receiving EUR200 million, while its potential competitor ITGI--which would carry the gas to Italy--will get EUR100 million.
Other gas and electricity infrastructure projects connecting different European Union markets, or making it possible to reverse the gas flow in the pipelines--a measure aimed at increasing security of supply within the EU--were also granted millions of euros.
The 27 EU governments agreed almost a year ago to commit EUR3.98 billion for energy projects, including gas and electricity grids, wind and carbon capture and storage projects.