The Commission's stance on the Northern Gas Pipeline

1.9.2009

WRITTEN QUESTION P-4296/09
by Konrad Szymański (ECR)
to the Commission

On 16 July 2009, in a meeting with Matthias Warnig, the managing director of Nord Stream AG, Commissioner Andris Piebalgs said that ‘the European Commission has always been favourable to Nord Stream’. In the Energy Commissioner’s opinion, Nord Stream, together with the Nabucco project, has a key role to play in assuring Europe’s energy security. A press release from the Nord Stream press office states that ‘these projects have the full support of the European Commission’.

The European Parliament has on many occasions expressed doubts about the construction of the Northern Gas Pipeline.

In its resolution of 16 November 2006 Parliament called for an independent environmental impact assessment of the Northern Gas Pipeline, to be carried out by an institution appointed by all the states of the Baltic region.

That call was repeated in Marcin Libicki’s report of 8 July 2008 on the environmental impact of the planned gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea.

Furthermore, in that report Parliament also called for other assessments of the legal, economic and strategic aspects of the Nord Stream project.

On what basis did Commissioner Andris Piebalgs express unconditional support for the Northern Gas Pipeline to the managing director of Nord Stream?

How is the Commission responding to the call, set out in paragraph 15 of the European Parliament’s report of 8 July 2008 (P6_TA(2008)0336), for an assessment of whether the Nord Stream project is in keeping with Community and international law?

How is the Commission responding to the call for an analysis of compensation for damage caused by the construction of the gas pipeline and for any failure (paragraph 28 of the report)?

What measures has the Commission taken in response to the call for it to make a commitment to analysing the environmental impact of the Nord Stream project (paragraphs 12 and 21 of the report)?

OJ C 10 E, 14/01/2011