OREANDA-NEWS. December 18, 2009. Nord Stream AG today received the permit to construct the 123 kilometer Russian section of its 1,223 kilometer natural gas pipeline through the Baltic Sea. The consortium had already received permits from Denmark and Sweden through whose waters the pipeline will pass, and the Finnish EEZ permit. The permitting process in Germany is also nearing completion.

“The granting of the permit sets a further important benchmark for implementing international projects in Russia,” said Nord Stream’s Managing Director Matthias Warnig. “The permit is the conclusion of an extensive process of environmental impact assessments by Russian federal authorities. Russia also actively participated in the nine-country deliberations under the United Nations Espoo Convention on the potential transboundary environmental impacts of the pipeline,” Warnig added.

The Russian offshore permit was granted by the Russian Federal Supervisory Natural Resources Management Service (Rosprirodnadzor). It followed an extensive national environmental impact assessment process and the active participation of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation in the international consultations between authorities from all nine countries bordering the Baltic Sea. The Ministry also ensured public access to the transboundary environmental report (‘Espoo Report’) in Russian and held a public hearing on 28 April 2009.

“We are firmly on schedule to start construction of the pipeline in spring 2010 and to start transporting gas in 2011,” said Warnig. “The permitting process in Germany is nearing completion and we are confident that the remaining permits will be granted within the next few weeks,” he added.