Azerbaijan, Romania discuss AGRI project

"Important steps are being taken as part of energy cooperation to implement the AGRI project, designed to supply Azerbaijani gas to Europe via Azerbaijan-Georgia-Romania-Hungary route,” Minister Aliyev said.

The ambassador, in turn, noted that the diversification policy is relevant in the present circumstances.

"The AGRI project ensures energy security, and Azerbaijan is an important country for Romania in the field of energy cooperation," Iancu added.

Aside from the AGRI project, the sides also held discussions on the Azerbaijan-Romania relations, during which Aliyev said these relations are developing based on the strategic partnership.

AGRI project envisages transportation of Azerbaijani gas to the Black Sea coast of Georgia via gas pipelines. Azerbaijani gas delivered to Georgia's Black Sea coast will be liquefied at a special terminal and following this, it will be delivered in tankers to a terminal at the Romanian port of Constanta.

Further, it will be brought to the gaseous state and sent via Romanian gas infrastructure for meeting the demands of Romania and other European countries.

The cost of the project will vary from 1.2 billion euros to 4.5 billion euros, according to the preliminary estimations.

The participants of the AGRI project are the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR), Georgia's Oil and Gas Corporation, as well as MVM (Hungary) and Romgaz (Romania).

The parties established the SC AGRI LNG Project Company SRL in February 2011 for the implementation of the project.