Coreper Ambassadors Approve Compromise Amendments to EU Gas Directive

Member states' ambassadors meeting in Coreper on Wednesday endorsed the provisional agreement between representatives of the Council of the European Union and the European Parliament on compromise amendments to the EU gas directive, the EU Council said.

Council of the European Union said in a post on its official press page on Twitter that the European Union gas market rules will apply to pipelines to and from third countries.

Previously, Council of the European Union said in a press release that the Romanian Presidency of the Council reached a provisional agreement with the European Parliament on an amendment to the gas directive, adding that the accord would be submitted to the Council's member states' representatives for endorsement.

"We just agreed new rules to ensure that pipelines with third countries comply with EU law — improving the functioning of the EU gas market and strengthening solidarity," EU Commissioner for Climate Action and Energy Miguel Arias Canete said on Twitter last week, confirming that representatives of the Council of the European Union and the European Parliament had reached agreement on amendments to the EU gas directive, dealing with sea sections of gas pipelines and, therefore, Russia's Nord Stream 2 project.

Earlier, Nord Stream 2 AG said that the amendments to the EU Gas Directive could create a potentially discriminatory regulatory regime for individual projects, adding that the planned revision of the document could also create "legislative uncertainty for investors".

READ MORE: Agreement on Amendments to EU Gas Directive Reached — Commissioner for Energy

The Nord Stream 2 is a joint venture between the Russian company Gazprom, Engie of France, OMV of Austria, the Anglo-Dutch company Royal Dutch Shell, and the Germany companies Uniper and Wintershall. It aims to deliver 55 billion cubic metres of Russian natural gas per year to the European Union via the Baltic Sea, bypassing Ukraine.