This week, Algeria, Niger, and Nigeria held discussions over the revival of a long-ago project to pipe gas across the Sahara, offering Europe a potential chance to diversify its gas suppliers while Russia's conflict in Ukraine rages on.
Following a two-day conference in Abuja, the capital of Nigeria, the three nations established a task group for the project and appointed an organization to update a feasibility study, according to a statement from Niger's oil ministry on Wednesday.
An estimated $13 billion project, the Trans-Saharan gas pipeline may provide Europe with up to 30 billion cubic meters of gas annually. Progress halted after the proposal was initially put up more than 40 years ago and after the countries signed an agreement in 2009.
The revitalization discussions take place at a pivotal moment as the European Union looks for alternate sources of energy as it attempts to wean itself off Russian gas in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine.
According to the announcement, "(the pipeline) should enable Europe to diversify its natural gas supply sources while also enabling a number of African states to tap this high-value energy source." The pipeline would extend 4,128 kilometers (2,565 miles) from Warri, Nigeria, to Hassi R'Mel, Algeria, where it would join other pipelines that already go to Europe.
This month, Nigeria also made progress on another eagerly anticipated pipeline that would travel across West Africa and Morocco to reach Europe.The three nations' energy ministers will get together once more in Algiers at the end of July to approve the recommendations of the newly established task team, according to a statement from Niger.
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