Brussels, 05/11/2009 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 5 November, the governments of Finland and Sweden gave their green light to allowing the North Stream gas pipeline to pass through their exclusive economic zones of the Baltic Sea, EUROPE was told by Sebastian Sass, head of the representation in Brussels of the Swiss-based consortium North Stream AG, which is responsible for the construction of the project piloted by the Russian gas company Gazprom, together with the German energy companies Wintershall and E.ON Ruhrgas, and the Netherlands' Gasunie. "This is another important step for the natural gas pipeline project through the Baltic Sea after many years of extensive environmental studies and close dialogue with authorities”, said Mr Sass. The pipeline, which will be 1223 km long under the Baltic Sea, will go through 506 km and 374 km of Swedish and Finnish waters respectively. Denmark is the first country whose waters will be crossed by the project to give its approval, which it did at the end of October (EUROPE 10006). North Stream still needs to obtain authorisation, which is expected to do by the end of this year, from the Finnish ecological authorities, before it can be built in Finnish waters. The authorisation process is also still underway in the two main stakeholder countries to the project, Germany and Russia, which are likely very soon to give their approval, anticipated by the end of the year. North Stream hopes to start construction of the project in the first half of 2010. The first section is likely to be in place by autumn 2010, when deliveries of gas to Europe are due to start, with a second section to be complete by 2012. These two sections of pipeline will bring 55 billion m3 of Russian gas to the EU every year. (E.H./transl.fl)