As a part of its incessant attempts to consolidate its presence in the energy sector of Central Asia, on January 17, the board of executives of the Russian company, Lukoil, endorsed the purchase by its daughter company, Lukoil Overseas, of 6.6 percent of shares in... MORE

Confidence in the viability of the Nabucco project – at least in its version envisaged from 2004 to 2011 – seems to be fading all around. On January 25, the Nabucco consortium’s management disclosed that it has submitted “amended” proposals to the Shah Deniz gas... MORE

Croatia has become the newest member of the European Union, with a national referendum on January 22 capping the accession process. The government-controlled JANAF (Jadranski Naftovod – Adriatic Oil Transportation) enterprise, however, has marked the country’s EU accession in its own way. It has opened... MORE

The Bulgarian Parliament has indefinitely suspended shale gas exploration and extraction in the country under public pressure from environmentalist groups. The moratorium will affect shale gas and oil exploration on the entire territory of Bulgaria and along its Black Sea shore (Bulgarian National Television, January... MORE

The energy company DTEK has increased its shares in Ukraine’s four key regional power companies to controlling stakes during the past three months. Along with being the main buyer in the energy privatization campaign launched by the government late last year, DTEK has also almost... MORE

President Viktor Yanukovych and his government are setting the stage, politically and legislatively, for transferring Ukrainian pipelines to Russian control, in a package deal with Gazprom. The president and government wavered and agonized at times, but are now actively preparing Ukrainian public opinion for an... MORE

Kyiv’s hopes for cheaper Russian gas from January 1, have failed to materialize. However, gas talks are continuing and there are signs that Moscow will agree to cut the price of gas in exchange for a share in a consortium to be set up to... MORE

Moscow has confirmed that Turkey will allow Gazprom’s South Stream pipeline to be built through Turkey’s Black Sea exclusive economic zone, en route to central Europe (“Turkey Gains Little, Ukraine Has Much to Lose in Turkish OK to Russian South Stream,” EDM, January 9). Beyond... MORE

On December 30, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Gazprom CEO Aleksei Miller announced that Turkey has authorized the construction of Gazprom’s South Stream pipeline through Turkey’s Black Sea exclusive economic zone, bypassing Ukraine en route to central Europe (Russian TV, Interfax, December 30; Russian... MORE

Timing, route, and parameters make Azerbaijan’s Trans-Anatolia Gas Pipeline a game-changing project. Planned to run from the Georgian-Turkish to the Turkish-Bulgarian border, with a capacity of 16 bcm annually, and scalable to 24 bcm, the line would cost $5 billion to $6 billion to build... MORE