The European Commission has made a decision to co-finance business and feasibility studies for two gas interconnector projects: Poland-Slovakia and Poland-Czech Republic.
The interconnector expansion projects to connect the transmission systems in the respective countries are deemed to be of common interest, since they will increase natural gas transmission capacity to EU Member States.
The Poland-Slovakia project to be co-financed by the Commission comprises two activities: defining the business case for the project and carrying out a feasibility study. The beneficiaries of funds are GAZ-SYSTEM S.A. and Eustream, a.s., i.e. the Polish and Slovak transmission system operators, respectively.
As regards the Poland-Czech interconnector, the co-financing will support pre-investment analyses aimed at increasing the transmission capacity between the two countries. As part of the project, the Polish partner is to develop technical documentation and the EIA for the Zdzieszowice-Wrocław gas pipeline which is required for the Polish transmission system to handle the increased gas flows following the capacity expansion of the Poland-Czech Republic Interconnector.
The goal of the expansion is to achieve a substantial increase of the gas transmission capacity from the current level of 0.5bcm per year. Besides GAZ-SYSTEM S.A., the funding will be allocated to the Czech transmission system operator NET4GAS s.r.o., which is also involved in projects aimed at strengthening its domestic transmission capabilities.
The support for the pre-feasibility study and business case definition for the Poland -Slovakia interconnector amounts to EUR 210 thousand, of which EUR 105 thousand will go to GAZ-SYSTEM, while EUR 2.3 million was allocated by the Commission to the Polish-Czech project, with GAZ-SYSTEM due to receive approx. EUR 1.42 million. These funds will be sourced from the EU’s Trans-European Energy Network (TEN-E) programme.
GAZ-SYSTEM S.A. is actively involved in creating an integrated gas network in Central Europe and thus contributing to the development of the European gas sector. The transmission infrastructure development vision promoted by the company is consistent with the EU’s energy security improvement and natural gas supply diversification strategies.
The expansion of interconnectors and Poland’s national grid is a crucial component of the North-South gas corridor to connect the Świnoujście LNG Terminal with the planned LNG terminal in Croatia and the Southern Gas Corridor, through the internal transmission infrastructure of the Central European countries.
[mappress] LNG World News Staff, December 04, 2012; Image: GAZ-SYSTEM