The gas pipeline interconnecting Romania and Bulgaria, between the cities of Giurgiu and Ruse, is expected to be ready by the end of this year, Kiril Temelkov, the director of Bulgarian Bulgartansgaz, said on Tuesday, according to Bulgarian news agency Focus.

“The trend is to establish Bulgartansgaz EAD and to provide services based on a regional principle. We expect soon will have foreign companies interested in using the storage services in Bulgaria,” said Telmenkov.

Works on the pipeline began in 2012. Initially, the inter-connector should have been finished in 2013, but its release was postponed to January 2014, and then the deadline was extended again due to technical difficulties.

The pipeline between Giurgiu and Ruse will have a total length of about 25 km – 15.4 km in Bulgaria, 5.2 km on the Romanian territory and 4.14 km in underground crossing of the Danube River. In addition, two stations will be built for measuring the gas technical parameters.

The pipeline will have a transport capacity of 1.5 billion cubic meters of gas per year from Bulgaria to Romania, while from Romania to Bulgaria the transport capacity will reach 500 million cubic meters per year.

The total value of the project is estimated at 24 million euros. 8.9 million euros is provided by the European Commission, Bulgarian Bulgartansgaz company funding amounts to 14 million euros and the Romanian TRANSGAZ company participates with 10 million euro.