Bulgaria To Quit Burgas-Alexandroupolis Oil Pipeline Project
The Bulgarian government said on Wednesday it has decided to pull out of an oil pipeline project it was developing jointly with Greece and Russia.
Bulgaria is proposing that the three partners abandon the Burgas-Alexandroupolis pipeline project by mutual consent or else it would bow out unilaterally in 12 months, the government in Sofia said in a statement.
According to an analysis conducted during the development phase of the project, it would not be possible to carry it out under the terms stipulated in the trilateral agreement signed in 2007, it added.
The Bulgarian government also said it has decided to increase the capital of Project Company Burgas - Alexandroupolis Oil Pipeline, the country's shareholder in the pipeline's international project company. The proceeds amounting to 12.8 million levs ($8.8 million/6.5 million euro) will be used to settle the company's obligations towards the other shareholders and towards the international project company itself.
The 258 kilometre pipeline was projected to link the Bulgarian Black Sea port of Burgas with the Greek Aegean port of Alexandroupolis overland. Tankers were planned to discharge the oil at an offshore terminal in Burgas where it can be fed into the pipeline for transportation to Alexandroupolis.