Nord Stream Completes Underwater Work

Nord Stream AG has completed underwater work on the first pipeline, the company said in a statement.

All three sections of the first of Nord Stream's twin 1,224 kilometre natural gas pipelines have now been joined together underwater by hyperbaric tie-ins. The completed pipeline through the Baltic Sea will now be prepared for connection to the landfalls in Russia and Germany later in the summer.

The connection by hyperbaric tie-in of these three pipeline sections was successfully carried out at the two offshore locations. The connection of the Gulf of Finland and central sections took place off the coast of Finland at a sea depth of approximately 80 metres, and the connection of the central and south western sections off the Swedish island of Gotland at a depth of approximately 110 metres.

Nord Stream's twin pipelines each consist of 101,000 12-metre long 48-inch diameter concrete-weight coated steel pipes each weighing about 23 tonnes. The pipes of the first line were welded together on board special pipelay vessels and laid on the seabed along a precisely defined route which had been agreed with the authorities of the five countries through whose waters the pipeline passes: Russia, Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Germany.

Nord Stream said that work on the second pipeline is progressing at the rate of about six kilometres a day, and more than 230 kilometres have already been laid in the Baltic Sea, 124 kilometres of which are in Russian waters. The two main pipelay vessels used for the first line,
Saipem's Castoro Sei and Allseas' Solitaire, are currently laying the second pipeline in the Gulf of Finland.

When both lines are fully operational by the end of 2012, the Nord Stream Pipeline will be capable of transporting 55 billion cubic metres (bcm) of gas a year to Europe.

Source: Nord Stream