Controversies
Building the Blue Stream pipeline was intended to be the foundation for a strategic partnership between Russia and Turkey, with joint participation in energy and transport projects. The existing gas transit route to Turkey went through Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, and Bulgaria. This land route made the gas substantially more expensive, and there were continual accusations of gas being illicitly siphoned off while being transported through Ukraine and Moldova. Russia considered that these problems could be solved by building a pipeline across the Black Sea floor.
One of the political goals of the Blue Stream project was to block the path of rival countries aiming to use the territory of Turkey to bring gas from the Caspian area to Europe. In November 1999, the presidents of Turkmenistan, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Georgia signed a four-party inter-governmental agreement on building a rival Trans-Caspian gas pipeline. Within a few months, major oil and engineering companies—General Electric, Bechtel, Royal Dutch Shell—had established a joint venture to work on the competing project. By spring 2000, however, an argument had arisen among the Trans-Caspian participant nations over allocating quotas for Azerbaijan's use of the pipeline; as a result, all construction work was halted.
The construction of Blue Stream was accompanied by environmentalist protests; but these had no significant effect, since the official environmental impact assessment found no transgressions. Meanwhile, some Russian economic analysts objected that building a pipeline to Ankara meant tying Russia to a monopolist consumer, and Turkey was not a reliable partner. In the lead-up to Blue Stream's opening ceremony, the United States publicly criticized the pipeline, calling on Europe to avoid becoming any more dependent on Russia for energy.
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