The South American mega-pipeline project to transport natural gas from the
Caribbean to the River Plate, supplying a large part of Brazil en route, "has
cooled down because of attacks from within South America itself" and due to
attempts by the United States to delay the plans, complained Venezuelan
President Hugo Chávez.
The massive project was launched in Rio de Janeiro in April 2006 by Chávez and
Presidents Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil and Néstor Kirchner of Argentina.
The cost of laying 8,000 kilometres of pipeline to link their three countries as
well as Paraguay, Uruguay, Peru and Ecuador, is estimated at 25 billion dollars.
The pipeline would either cross Brazil’s Amazon region or skirt it on the
eastern side, and should be capable of carrying 150 million cubic metres a day,
equivalent to nearly half of Venezuela’s current consumption of natural gas,
from the northeast of Venezuela to the main urban and ...