Électricité de France

Bulgaria may have to bid its dreams about the South stream pipeline goodbye. This is almost certain after Gazprom received permission from Turkey for the construction of the Turkish Stream pipeline today.

BELGRADE - The US had no say in the decision on the South Stream gas pipeline, and for Serbia - whose only gas supply route runs through Ukraine - connecting to the Bulgarian pipeline is a priority, says US Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Mary Warlick.

BELGRADE - The US had no say in the decision on the South Stream gas pipeline, and for Serbia - whose only gas supply route runs through Ukraine - connecting to the Bulgarian pipeline is a priority, says US Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Mary Warlick.

The U.S. had no say in the decision on the South Stream gas pipeline, says U.S. Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Mary Warlick.

For Serbia - whose only gas supply route runs through Ukraine - connecting to the Bulgarian pipeline is a priority, she also told the Belgrade daily Politika.

Gazprom has received through diplomatic channels the first permits for the Turkish Stream project from the Turkish authorities after the decision to resume the project this year, it said in a written statement on Sept. 7.

A EU Commission official has said Brussels stands ready to get involved in any kind of negotiations over Sofia's gas hub project.

The joint venture building the natural gas pipeline between Bulgaria and Greece is seeking binding bids for the use of the gas link by the end of October, its chief executive said on Monday.

Interconnector Greece-Bulgaria (IGB), estimated to cost 220 million euros, has received nine expressions of interest to transport gas through it for a total capacity of 4.3 billion cubic meters.

Moscow hasn't given up on its plans to build a pipeline to carry Russian natural gas to southern Europe across the Black Sea, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has confirmed.

"The southern direction is not yet written off," Lavrov told sputniknews.com earlier this week.

Russian energy giant Gazprom has tabled a new option to revive the South Stream pipeline, local media report.

Alternative routes are being studied for South Stream and Nord Stream II which would possibly use private funding, instead of counting on EU support, Vesti Finance quotes Andrey Konoplyanik, adviser to the head of Gazprom Export, as saying.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak has made clear that Bulgaria's intentions to build a "gas hub" are not being discussed in Moscow.

He has told the Bulgarian National Radio that, while Moscow "has learned from the media of the idea of Bulgaria... to set up a gas hub", it has never been officially put forward, since there have been no such submissions to his ministry to date.