OREANDA-NEWS. April 7, 2009. The Gazprom Headquarters hosted today a working meeting of Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Company’s Management Committee, Paolo Scaroni, Chief Executive Officer of ENI and Fulvio Conti, Chief Executive Officer of Enel.

The parties deliberated on the issue of bilateral cooperation in the energy sector, paying special attention to the current activities within the pre-investment stage of the South Stream project and to the development of interaction through joint gas and power energy projects in Italy, Russia and third countries.

Background:

According to the provisional estimates, in 2008 Gazprom supplied Italy with more than 22 billion cubic meters of gas.

In November 2006 Gazprom and ENI entered into the Strategic Partnership Agreement providing Gazprom with the opportunity to directly supply Russian gas to the Italian market starting from 2007. Gas supply volumes will be gradually increased to 3 billion cubic meters per annum by 2010. Under the Agreement the existing contracts for Russian gas supplies to Italy have been extended till 2035.

On June 23, 2007 Gazprom and ENI concern inked the Memorandum of Understanding for the South Stream project implementation. The MoU sets the areas of cooperation between the two companies in designing, financing, constructing and managing the South Stream.

On January 18, 2008 South Stream AG, a special purpose company was registered in Switzerland. South Stream AG was incorporated by Gazprom and ENI on a parity basis.

Enel is the largest power generation company in Italy and the second-largest energy company in Europe in terms of installed capacity. The company is focused on generation, distribution and sale of electricity and gas in Europe, Northern and Latin America.