Casablanca – Algeria, Nigeria, and Niger have signed, on Thursday, July 18, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to build the $13 billion Trans-Saharan Gas Pipeline (TSGP).
The signing ceremony comes after spending four decades considering the project that would connect the three African nations’ gas links across the Sahara Desert.
The MoU was signed in Algeria by Algerian Minister of Energy and Mines Mohamed Arkab, Timipre Sylva, the Nigerian Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, and Niger’s Minister of Energy and Renewable Energies Mahamane Sani Mahamadou.
The agreement was signed over a month after the Algerian Minister of Energy and Mines Mohamed Arkab admitted that the Trans-Saharan pipeline project had not yet completed the technical studies phase.
Last September, Algeria announced that the feasibility study for the trans-Saharan gas pipeline was completed.
With a $13 billion budget, the Trans-Saharan Gas Pipeline is a mega gas-transport project linking the three countries with a pipeline spanning more than 4,000 km. It is projected to transport up to 30 billion cubic meters of supply to Europe via Algeria every year.
The planned pipeline will transport natural gas from Nigeria to Niger and then on to Algeria.
It is intended to begin in Warri, Nigeria, and end in Hassi R’Mel, Algeria, where it will link to existing pipelines that lead to Europe.
The pipeline idea was initially suggested by the three African countries more than 40 years ago.
In 2009, Nigeria, Niger, and Algeria finally inked an agreement to develop the Trans-Saharan gas pipeline, with the goal of completing it in 2015.
However, the concept has yet to be realized, owing to a variety of factors, including security concerns.
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