July 12 (SeeNews) - Romania and Hungary are in talks to increase the natural gas import capacity via Romania through an existing interconnector, Hungarian foreign minister Peter Szijjarto said on Tuesday.
"The interconnector can currently transport 2.6 billion cubic metres of gas per year to Romania and we are on the verge of signing agreements to increase transport capacity from Romania to Hungary from 1.7 billion cubic metres per year to 2.5 billion cubic metres per year initially, and subsequently to over 3 billion cubic metres per year," Szijjarto said on Tuesday during a press conference with his Romanian counterpart Bogdan Aurescu.
For his part, Romanian foreign minister Bogdan Aurescu stressed the need to continue to increase interconnection capacity between Romania and Hungary.
"We talked today about increasing the interconnection capacity of our bilateral gas interconnection project - we need to strengthen our storage capacity within the European Union. We also need to find alternative sources and focus on renewable energy, on nuclear energy, and here both Romania and Hungary think alike," Aurescu said.
The 109 km gas pipeline runs between Arad in western Romania and Szeged in Hungary. The pipeline was officially inaugurated in October 2010 and has an annual design capacity of 4.5 billion cubic metres, according to data posted on the website of Romanian gas pipeline operator Transgaz.
Hungary has limited fossil-fuel resources of its own, and its domestic production is declining, according to data posted on the website of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The country imports around 90% of its oil and natural gas, much of it from Russia.
Romania covers more than 70% of its natural gas consumption through internal production, while the rest of 30% is imported, mostly from Russia, data available on the energy ministry's website showed.