Introduction

A snapshot of the central Mediterranean region starting in the 1970s provides an ideal case for the analysis of decision making in cross-border natural gas-transport projects. During this period the massive size of Algeria's gas reserves were well known and the Société Nationale pour le Transport et la Commercialisation des Hydrocarbures (Sonatrach), Algeria's state-owned oil and gas company, actively sought to monetize this gas through exports. Across the Mediterranean, both Italy and Spain were seeking to expand natural gas consumption. Projects to import gas from Algeria were proposed, studied, and discussed at the highest levels of government and in state-owned energy companies. Starting in the early 1970s, Ente Nazionale Idrocarburi (ENI), Italy's state-owned energy company, began to pursue a sub-sea pipeline to bring Algerian gas across the Mediterranean. The option of using ships to bring LNG from Algeria was also discussed, but the parties ultimately decided in favor of the “Transmed” pipeline and deliveries finally began in 1983. Spain also discussed numerous proposals for a gas pipeline under the Mediterranean with Sonatrach and potential French partners. However, by the mid-1980s two LNG import projects to bring gas to Spain from Algeria and Libya had been attempted and largely aborted. Only in 1996 did the Gaz Maghreb Europe pipeline transport Algerian gas under the Mediterranean to Spain (see the map in Figure 3.1).