Energy Solutions Calls for Caspian Oil

The US company Energy Solutions declared the best option in terms of efficiency in the Odessa-Brody oil pipeline is in the direction of Brody and using the Prydniprovskyy oil pipelines to transport Russian oil to the Yuzhnyy oil terminal (in Odessa), Ukrainian Fuel and Energy Minister Serhiy Yermilov said today. (The Odessa-Brody pipeline was originally built to transport Caspian oil from the Black Sea to Europe, but Russian companies want Ukraine to reverse the pipeline and pump Russian oil to Odessa.)

"There is an option to reverse the pipeline, but it is not the top one," he said. The ministry will submit its final proposals on using the pipeline to the Ukrainian government on Friday (30 January), he said. Participants in the meeting of the interdepartmental working group, which was held on Tuesday (27 January), took two days to study the information, Yermilov added. The working group includes representatives of Ukrainian ministries and departments, the Russian oil companies TNK-British Petroleum and Transneft, and the Belarusian pipeline operator Druzhba.