Today, in the course of the 23rd World Gas Conference in Amsterdam, a working meeting took place between Mr. Alexey Miller, Chairman of The Executive Board of JSC “Gazprom”, and Mr. Marcel Kramer, Chairman of the Executive Board and CEO of the Dutch gas infrastructure company N.V. Nederlandse Gasunie.

They agreed to prepare for signing within a month a Memorandum of Understanding between JSC “Gazprom” and Gasunie that will serve as a basis towards reciprocal stakeholding in the North-European Gas Pipeline and the BBL, the new pipeline connecting the Netherlands to the UK. Both companies will also address other aspects of access to infrastructure that will enable additional flows of Russian gas to the North-West European market.

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N.V. Nederlandse Gasunie (Gasunie for short) is a gas infrastructure and transport company. An annual volume of over 95 billion cubic metres of gas transported across Europe makes it one of the largest gas transporters as regards throughput. The company owns one of the largest high-pressure networks in Europe, consisting of around 11,600 kilometres of pipeline. Gasunie’s mission is to supply safe and reliable gas transport to the Netherlands and Europe.

Gazprom regards the North-European Gas Pipeline as a new quality step of co-operation with European gas consumers. The pipeline will for the first time ensure the supply of Russian natural gas to Western Europe without passing the territories of transiting countries. NEGP will connect the Russian coast of Baltic Sea in the area of Vyborg with the German coast of the Baltic Sea. The area of Greifswald is preliminary considered as the landing point of the pipeline. The routing of the pipeline through the Baltic Sea will be specified upon the results of technical-economic analysis. The respective preliminary research of the structure of the seabed has already been conducted. The length of the pipeline will exceed 1,200 km.

On the 8th of September 2005 JSC “Gazprom”, BASF AG and E.On AG signed a principal Agreement on construction of the North European Gas Pipeline (NEGP).

The commissioning of the pipeline is intended for 2010. As a first stage the construction of one line with the capacity of 27.5 bcm per year is planned. The project regards the construction of another line of the pipeline that doubles the capacity of NEGP up to

55 bcm per year. The total investments required for NEGP project realization in the form of two lines (construction of the off-shore part) will exceed 4 billion Euro.