BUCHAREST, Romania, July 22 (UPI) -- There is no competition with Bulgaria on hosting a leg of the South Stream natural gas pipeline from Russia, the Romanian government announced Thursday.
South Stream would carry around 2.2 trillion cubic feet of gas per year through southern European countries by 2015.
The Bulgarian government reassessed the profit potential for the South Stream project and agreed to host a section of the pipeline in early July. Several possible routes of the onshore section of South Stream are under consideration.
Romanian Economics Minister Adriean Videanu said his country wasn't competing with Bulgaria for the project.
"I would like to say that Romania is not in competition with Bulgaria," he was quoted by the Sofia News Agency as saying. "To the contrary, Romania considers partnership with Bulgaria on all energy projects to be very useful."
His comments followed a decision by the Bulgarian government Wednesday to host a section of the Nabucco pipeline.
Europe aims to build the Nabucco pipeline using non-Russia gas suppliers in an effort to bring diversity to the regional energy sector, though the consortium managing the project is slow to attract formal supply commitments.
