The project company for the
abandoned South Stream gas pipeline project has valuable assets which Bulgaria
can use in view of plans to build a gas hub on its territory, Energy Minister Temenuzhka
Petkova has said.
"This joint-stock
company owns assets: documents related to the environmental
impactassessment, a detailed territorial plan, a technical project that
has been prepared for the most part,” Petkova said onNova TV channel on
Friday in response to a query by a member of parliament about expenditures at
the project company.
Nastimir Ananiev, a MP from
the Reformist Bloc, has argued thatestimatedexpenditure of about
BGN 400,000 permonth was "staggering" for a project company
that used Bulgarian state funding but has had no activity whatsoever
sinceRussia dropped the pipeline project inDecember 2014 over
objections from the European Commission.
"It may be useful to Bulgaria
in view of our concept to build a gas distribution center in Bulgaria because
the routes, which can be used to transport gas are not different from those
which we had already considered and approved,” Petkova added, calling for
pragmatic approach.
Bulgaria’s Deputy Prime
Minister Tomislav Donchev said in late March that the project for building a
natural gas hub on the country’s Black Sea coast was expected to be finalized
in a month and a half. The project was being drafted together with the European
Commission in great detail from a technical, legal and economic point of view
in order to make sure that the development model will be sustainable and there
would be no risk to launch an infringement procedure over it, Donchev said at
the time.
State-owned Bulgarian
Energy Holding (BEH) could sell its assets in South Streamprojectcompany
it owns equally with Russia’s Gazprom, or they can be very useful for Bulgaria
in other ways, Petkova said without elaborating.
BEH has already cut the
salaries of the remaining four Bulgarian employees on the JV’s payroll and
currently they are close to the average levels in Bulgaria’s energy sector,
Petkova added, addressing the core concern voiced by Ananiev in his query.
"At present, six employees
work in the project company: two on the Russian side and four on the Bulgarian
one,” Petkova said. She added that the Bulgarian government had moved fast to
cut expenditure at South Stream project company.
The companyhad 34
employees as of 31 December2014, 30 days after Gazprom abandoned the
project designed to carry Russian gas to Europe beneath the Black Sea with the
pipline coming ashore in Bulgaria. The Bulgarian side had moved to cut costs in
the new circumstances, reducing the number of Bulgarian employees in the
company to 19 as of September 2015.
(www.novinite.com, May 20,
2016)