MOSCOW, April 5 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's environmental and technological regulator said it had approved a five-year state feasibility study for more investment in the Gazprom-controlled Nord Stream gas pipeline, aimed at doubling its annual capacity.
The capacity of the $10.5-billion pipeline, which will pump gas directly from Russia to Germany across the Baltic seabed, will be increased from 28 to 55 billion cubic meters with the help of a second leg of the pipeline.
The Nord Stream project includes two parallel legs measuring 750 miles each. The second leg involves a land section from the Vologda Region about 250 miles northeast of Moscow to the Portovaya Bay in the Gulf of Finland near St. Petersburg, and a sea section in Russian territorial waters. According to the feasibility study, the pipeline will start pumping gas in 2010, and will reach projected capacity by 2013.
The construction of the first leg from Vologda into the Baltic waters of Russia, Finland, Sweden, Denmark and to a terminal in Greifswald, northeast Germany, began in December 2005. The leg is to come on stream in 2010.
The project, led by Russian state gas giant Gazprom [RTS: GAZP], is designed to transport natural gas from the massive Shtokman gas field in the Barents Sea in north Russia and from gas deposits in West Siberia. Germany's BASF AG and E.ON AG hold 24.5% each in the project aimed to reduce Russia's dependence on transit countries and ensure reliable supplies to Western Europe.
Baltic littoral states have expressed concerns over the environmental impact of the project on the sea and called for revising the pipeline route. The German-Russian consortium building the pipeline said they would reconsider the route.
