Bulgarian Parliament Considers Changes to the Energy Act Due to South Stream’s Statute

New articles in the Energy Act work towards South Stream's exemption from 3rd party access rules of the EU

Bulgaria’s parliament passed with ten votes in support against nine abstained a number of draft changes to the Energy Act, proposed by Socialist Party MPs Yavor Kumiumdzhiev and Tasko Ermenkov, both of the members of the parliamentary Energy Committee, Capital Daily wrote. The changes, which are mainly related to the planned construction of South Stream gas pipeline, are yet to pass a second reading.

According to its authors, the text aims to create legal ground for easier construction of energy infrastructure bringing gas to the EU from countries outside the Union.  

As of Article 1 the draft introduces the term “sea pipeline”, not included in the Energy Act until now. This formulation is not present within the European directive on gas markets, so it should not comply with the rules of 3rd party access. What, the definition of an interconnector pipeline is modified to describe “a gas transport pipeline which traverses the border or lies on the territories of two EU member-countries with the sole purpose to connect their gas transport systems”. If the changes pass second reading, South Stream will have a similar statute as gas interconnectors, exempting it from 3rd party access rules of the EU.

This draft document strongly clashes with the fact that earlier Bulgaria gave its consent for the European Commission to handle the talks with Russia’s Gazprom on the exemption of South Stream. The European Commission has declined to comment so far, Capital Daily reported.

This article originally appeared on Publics.bg, a Natural Gas Europe Media Partner