Gazprom says Turkish Stream pipeline project 80 percent complete

The Turkish Stream pipeline, due to supply Russian gas to Turkey via the Black Sea from next year, is already 80 percent complete, the CEO of the Russian gas giant Gazprom said Thursday.

"The realization of large-scale Gazprom export projects to Europe are continuing," CEO Alexei Miller said in comments carried by Russian news agencies.

"There is the Turkish Stream gas pipeline: 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) of pipe, around 80 percent of the line" has been assembled, he said during a meeting.

Over the first eight months of the year, Gazprom exported over 133 billion cubic meters of gas to Turkey and the EU — up 5.6 percent from the same period last year, Miller said.

The Russian giant continues to announce record export volumes to the region, where it generates a sizable portion of its profits.

On Wednesday, Gazprom announced an increase of 65 percent to its net profits in the first half of 2018, to 630.8 billion rubles ($9.2 billion, 7.9 billion euros).

Gazprom operating profits increased 55 percent to 878.2 billion rubles, while its turnover was up 24 percent to 3.97 billion rubles.

Putin announced the plan to build TurkStream in Ankara in December 2014, as a replacement for the South Stream pipeline that was to have been built in cooperation with EU countries.

South Stream was scrapped after years of planning, with Putin angrily blaming Brussels for its failure.

Gazprom is also planning to open the Nord Stream 2 pipeline by the end of next year, bypassing Ukraine by the Baltic Sea.