Greece-Italy pipeline

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The Greece-Italy pipeline is a planned natural gas pipeline for transportation of natural gas from Caspian region via Turkey and Greece to Italy. The length of Greece-Italy pipeline will be more than 800 kilometres, of which 600 will be built in Greece and 200-300 will be laid on the seabed of Ionian Sea. The pipeline will be connected to the Greek gas system outside Thessaloniki. The offshore section (also known as Poseidon pipeline) will be built between Igoumenitsa and Otranto in Apulia region.

Greek gas company DEPA is responsible for the construction of Greek section. For the construction of offshore section, a joint company of DEPA SA and Italian Edison S.p.A. will be incorporated.

The intergovernmental agreement for the construction of pipeline was signed on 4 November 2006 in Rome by Italian Minister for Productive Activities Claudio Scaiola and Greek Development Minister Dimitris Sioufas. Also Turkish Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Mehmet Guler was present at the ceremony. On 26 July 2007, the additional protocol on construction was signed in Rome. The construction will start in mid of 2008 and the pipeline is expected to become operational in 2011. The total cost of this project will be 950 million EUR, of which 600 million will be spent for Greek section. The capacity of pipeline is planned 8-10 bcm of natural gas annually.