Blue Stream is a major trans-

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

gas

pipeline A pipeline is a system of Pipe (fluid conveyance), pipes for long-distance transportation of a liquid or gas, typically to a market area for consumption. The latest data from 2014 gives a total of slightly less than of pipeline in 120 countries ...

that carries natural gas to Turkey from

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

. The pipeline has been constructed by the Blue Stream Pipeline B.V., the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

based joint venture of

Gazprom PJSC Gazprom ( rus, Газпром, , ɡɐsˈprom) is a Russian State-owned enterprise, majority state-owned multinational Energy industry, energy corporation headquartered in the Lakhta Center in Saint Petersburg. The Gazprom name is a contract ...

and

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

Eni Eni is an Italian oil and gas corporation. Eni or ENI may refer to: Businesses and organisations * Escuela Nacional de Inteligencia, the Argentine intelligence academy * Groupe des écoles nationales d’ingénieurs (Groupe ENI), a French engi ...

. The Blue Stream Pipeline B.V. is an owner of the subsea section of pipeline, including Beregovaya compressor station, while Gazprom owns and operates the Russian land section of the pipeline and the Turkish land section is owned and operated by the Turkish energy company

BOTAŞ BOTAŞ Petroleum Pipeline Corporation (BOTAS) is the state-owned crude oil and natural gas pipelines and trading company in Turkey. The company was established in 1974 as a subsidiary of TPAO. Since 1995, BOTAS is a wholly state-owned company. ...

. According to

the pipeline was built with the intent of diversifying Russian gas delivery routes to Turkey and avoiding third countries.

History

Preparations of the pipeline project started in 1997. In 1997, Gazprom and BOTAŞ signed a 25-year gas sale contract. One of the political goals of the Blue Stream project was to block the path of rival countries aiming to use the territory of Turkey to bring gas from the Caspian area to

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

. The construction of the Russian land section took place in 2001–2002 and the offshore section in 2001–2002. The offshore section of the pipeline was built by Italian constructor Saipem and the Russian onshore section by Stroytransgaz, a subsidiary of Gazprom. The offshore pipe was laid by the pipe-laying vessel

Saipem 7000 ''Saipem 7000'' is the world's third largest semi-submersible crane vessel, after the and the . It is owned by the Italian oil and gas industry contractor Saipem S.p.A. History Construction The vessel was designed by Gusto Engineering during ...

. Gas flows from Russia to Turkey started in February 2003. However, because of the price dispute between Russia and Turkey, the official inauguration ceremony at the Durusu gas metering station took place only on 17 November 2005. Attending the inauguration were Russian President

Vladimir Putin Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who has served as President of Russia since 2012, having previously served from 2000 to 2008. Putin also served as Prime Minister of Ru ...

, Turkish Prime Minister

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician who is the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as the 25th prime minister of Turkey, prime minister from 2003 to 2014 as part of the Jus ...

and Italian Prime Minister

Silvio Berlusconi Silvio Berlusconi ( ; ; 29 September 193612 June 2023) was an Italian Media proprietor, media tycoon and politician who served as the prime minister of Italy in three governments from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006 and 2008 to 2011. He was a mem ...

Technical features

Blue Stream full capacity is 16 billion cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas per year. Total length of the pipeline is . The Russia's land section is long from the Izobilnoye gas plant, Stavropol Krai, up to

Arkhipo-Osipovka Arkhipo-Osipovka () is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, rural locality (a ''village#Russia, selo'') and a Black Sea resort under the jurisdiction of the City of federal subject significance, Town of Gelendzhik in Krasnodar Krai, Russi ...

Krasnodar Krai Krasnodar Krai (, ) is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of Russia (a krai), located in the North Caucasus region in Southern Russia and is administratively a part of the Southern Federal District. Its administrative center is the t ...

. The land section consists of the Stavropolskaya and Krasnodarskaya compressor stations. The offshore section is long laying from the Beregovaya compressor station in Arkhipo-Osipovka to the Durusu terminal locating from

Samsun Samsun is a List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, city on the north coast of Turkey and a major Black Sea port. The urban area recorded a population of 738,692 in 2022. The city is the capital of Samsun Province which has a population of ...

(Turkey). Turkey's land section is long up to

Ankara Ankara is the capital city of Turkey and List of national capitals by area, the largest capital by area in the world. Located in the Central Anatolia Region, central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5,290,822 in its urban center ( ...

. The pipeline uses pipes with different diameters: mainland section , mountainous section and submarine section . The gas pressure in submarine section is . Being laid in depths as low as , it is considered among the deepest subsea pipelines of this diameter.

Operations

Gas from Blue Stream started to flow in February 2003, and the pipeline delivered 1.3 bcm to

in 2003. Gas flows have progressively increased towards the pipeline's capacity of 16 bcm per year. From 2010 to 2014, supplies averaged 14.1 bcm per year, with a high point of 14.7 bcm in 2012.

Contracts

The contract signed in 1997 was for 365 bcm total. A BOTAŞ contract for 5.75 bcm a year expires at the end of 2025, thus all 16 bcm expires end 2025.

Blue Stream 2

Blue Stream 2 was first proposed in 2002. In 2005, Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan discussed building a second line, and an expansion of the Blue Stream by the Samsun- Ceyhan link and by branch to

southeast Europe Southeast Europe or Southeastern Europe is a geographical sub-region of Europe, consisting primarily of the region of the Balkans, as well as adjacent regions and Archipelago, archipelagos. There are overlapping and conflicting definitions of t ...

. This second pipeline, and extension of it up through

Bulgaria Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern portion of the Balkans directly south of the Danube river and west of the Black Sea. Bulgaria is bordered by Greece and Turkey t ...

Serbia , image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg , national_motto = , image_coat = Coat of arms of Serbia.svg , national_anthem = () , image_map = , map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...

and

Croatia Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country in Central Europe, Central and Southeast Europe, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. It borders Slovenia to the northwest, Hungary to the northeast, Serbia to the east, Bosnia and Herze ...

to western

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

was suggested after five countries planned to construct the

Nabucco Pipeline The Nabucco pipeline (also referred as Turkey–Austria gas pipeline) was a failed natural gas pipeline project from Erzurum, Turkey, to Baumgarten an der March, Austria to diversify natural gas suppliers and delivery routes for Europe. The p ...

from Turkey to Central and Western Europe. However, this expansion was replaced by the

South Stream South Stream (; ; ; ; ; ) is a canceled pipeline project to transport natural gas of the Russian Federation through the Black Sea to Bulgaria and through Serbia, Hungary and Slovenia further to Austria. It was never finished. The project was f ...

project, which proposed laying subsea pipeline directly from Russia to Bulgaria, which in turn was later replaced by

TurkStream TurkStream ( or ''Türk Akımı'', ; former name: Turkish Stream) is a natural gas pipeline running from Russia to Natural gas in Turkey, Turkey. It starts from Russkaya compressor station near Anapa in Russia's Krasnodar Krai, Krasnodar Region, c ...

. In 2009, Russian prime minister Putin proposed a line parallel to Blue Stream 1 under the Black Sea, and further from Samsun to Ceyhan. From Ceyhan natural gas would have been transported to

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

Lebanon Lebanon, officially the Republic of Lebanon, is a country in the Levant region of West Asia. Situated at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian Peninsula, it is bordered by Syria to the north and east, Israel to the south ...

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

, and

Cyprus Cyprus (), officially the Republic of Cyprus, is an island country in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Situated in West Asia, its cultural identity and geopolitical orientation are overwhelmingly Southeast European. Cyprus is the List of isl ...

. The export to Israel would have been through the proposed Ceyhan-

Ashkelon Ashkelon ( ; , ; ) or Ashqelon, is a coastal city in the Southern District (Israel), Southern District of Israel on the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean coast, south of Tel Aviv, and north of the border with the Gaza Strip. The modern city i ...

subsea pipeline.

References

External links

Gazprom website
Blue Stream
on Global Energy Monitor {{Black Sea Energy Buildings and structures completed in 2005 Eni Pipelines under the Black Sea Natural gas pipelines in Russia Natural gas pipelines in Turkey Gazprom pipelines Russia–Turkey relations Black Sea energy 2005 establishments in Russia 2005 establishments in Turkey