'Nabucco West’s cost to be less than $7.9 bln'

The cost of Nabucco West gas pipeline will be less than $7.9 billion that was projected for the original conception of the project, Managing Director of the Nabucco Gas Pipeline GmbH Reinhard Mitschek told in an interview with Bloomberg.

According to Mitschek, the proposed pipeline route is now shorter than it was originally planned.

"It is a shorter line with 1,315 kilometers (817 miles) and we expect it to be less than the original," Mitschek said. "It would be logical to think there will be a proportional reduction."

Nabucco West is a short-cut version of Nabucco project, which envisages construction of the pipeline from the Turkish-Bulgarian border to Austria.

In June the consortium of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz gas field development chose Nabucco West as the single pipeline option for the potential export of Shah Deniz Stage 2 gas to Central Europe.

The project's current shareholders are Bulgarian Energy Holding, Romanian Transgaz, Turkish Botas, Austrian OMV, German RWE and Hungary's FGSZ, and each of them holds a 16.67-percent share.

Currently, the Shah Deniz consortium considers two options to supply gas to Europe - Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) and Nabucco West. The final decision on the pipeline route will be made in 2013.


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