... still comes to them via Ukraine.
The main obstacle to rapid construction of the Turkish Stream, however, is the expense of the project, especially given the difficult market conditions in Russia. The cost of the total complex of works to construct South Stream
has been approaching 40 billion dollars
.
Gazprom has decided to hand over most of the construction of the gas transport system in Europe to national governments in order to comply with the EU’s Third Energy Package, and to reduce its own expenditure on the project to a defined limit. A number of states, however, were
offered extremely favourable state ...
... by Joe Biden. Not to mention that the conditions of the economy in European area were already worrying to begin with, even without the “independent decisions” of the EU authorities, just to re-quote Ms. Mogherini's intervention.
Gas at All Costs
Another crucial aspect, which the EU is failing to address, concerns its energy policy, considering that no alternatives have been found to the partnership with Russia, especially on the delicate point of natural gas. To be fair, other ...
... debt. The European Union might be trying to put obstacles to the South Stream project in order to grant concessions for Ukraine, most likely in view of its association with the EU. This is quite evidently a dangerous bargaining position. On one side South Stream aims to assure a steady provision of gas to the EU itself, which should have clear interests in this accomplishment, in the absence of alternatives to Russian supplies. On the other side, the issue of the unpaid bills is an internal matter for Russia and Ukraine. Therefore Europe's involvement ...
... Russo-European relationship has soured creating an anti-Russian stance. Has this occurred due to European attempts to lower gas import prices, or more serious underlining issues? Europe’s potential alternative pipeline has even been called “Nabucco” ... ... reckless. Continued austerity for the next decade and perhaps longer will probably end any remaining hopes for both Nabucco and South Stream.
But the energy battle between the EU and Russia over Nabucco and South Stream is a proxy conflict in a wider war ...
... model has altered with population becoming less concentrated requiring an additional infrastructure, thus expenditure. In fact, Gazprom has reduced prices by pursuing its own strategy of spreading costs by building more pipelines and supplying more gas; South Stream pipeline introduction resulted in lower prices for European consumers.
That said, Europe still does not agree, wishing to fit a North American Model where long-term contracts are near absent as purely basic economic principles of supply ...
