Caspian Report - Issue: 07 - Spring 2014

On April 17 th 2014, the TAP consortium
handed an updated, 1,200 page version
of the Environmental and Social Impact
Assessment of the Italian section of
the TAP project, as required by Italian
authorities.
Italy is probably the most difficult
place on earth to build new industrial
infrastructures, at least judging
from the troubles encountered by
any proposed energy project over
the last several decades. In Italy almost
all new producing plants or infrastructures
are likely to face some
opposition, and this is even more so
for projects involving energy. Things
are especially difficult in some areas,
notably southern regions like Apulia,
where TAP should come ashore.
In order to get an idea of the highly
complex environment faced by companies,
it is helpful to begin with a
brief summary of the lengthy and
tortuous permissions process. Let’s
start with the endpoint: on April 17 th
2014, the TAP consortium handed
the Italian Ministry of Environment
(MATTM) and the Italian Ministry of
Cultural Heritage (MINBAC) an updated,
1,200 page version of the Environmental
and Social Impact Assessment
of the Italian section of the TAP
project, as required by Italian authorities.
After evaluating 12 alternative
routes for the pipeline, as requested
by MATTM and MINBAC in March,
the document confirms that the
one coming ashore near San Foca is
the best solution in environmental,
technical and socio-economic terms.
The TAP consortium restated that
the pipeline will be ready for operation
in 2019.
This was the last step in a very complex
path towards attaining the
relevant environmental authorisations
for the project, as the 5.6 GB
of publically available documents
produced by the consortium stand
to testify. The Environmental Impact
Assessment (EIA) is a technical-administrative
procedure that,
according to Legislative Decree no.
152/2006, is normally carried out
by an ad hoc decision making process
by competent agencies (Conferenza
dei Servizi). The Conferenza
dei Servizi review the decisions of
all governmental agencies involved
in the EIA procedure, including central
and local governments. This
type of coordination is designed to
guarantee that all stakeholder interests
are taken into consideration,
while enabling the EIA to comply
with its schedule, which should not
exceed 150 days.
For the TAP, as for any natural gas
pipeline of that relevance, Legislative
Decree no. 152/2006 requires an
EIA procedure, in order to carefully
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CASPIAN REPORT, SPRING 2014