The 28-member EU agreed Wednesday to allocate 647 million euro to support key priority infrastructure projects. The bulk of the support goes to gas projects in the Baltic region as well as in Central Eastern and Southeastern Europe, said an EU statement.
The projects will increase Europe's energy security and help end the isolation of Member States from EU-wide energy networks. They will also contribute to the completion of a European energy market and the integration of renewables to the electricity grid, it noted.
EU Energy Commissioner Gunther Oettinger said: "I welcome today's decision, which will help us to quickly build the infrastructure we need to ensure Europe's energy security." Besides the construction of new pipelines, these gas projects also include terminals to ship liquefied natural gas in the Baltic region, Central Eastern and South Eastern Europe.
The EU has allocated a total of 5.85 billion euro to Trans-European energy infrastructure for the period of 2014-2020.