The Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK), Poland’s antitrust agency, has fined Gazprom PLN29bn (€6.5bn) for building the 55 bcm/year Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline without its consent. In addition, the UOKiK imposed a penalty of PLN234m (€52m) on Engie, Uniper, OMV, Shell and Wintershall, which are each owning 10% in the project (50% Gazprom).
Gazprom, Uniper, Shell, OMV, Wintershall, and Engie are developing the 1,230 km-long Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. The project, which will double the throughput of the current Nord Stream pipeline, is causing controversy as Germany would increase its dependence on Russian gas while bypassing Ukraine. In January 2020, Russia postponed the commissioning of Nord Stream 2 from mid-2020 to the end of 2020 or early 2021, due to US sanctions against the gas pipeline that could delay the projects by several months. Earlier in October 2020, the Danish Energy Agency granted an operations permit to Nord Stream 2 for laying the Nord Stream 2 pipeline on the Danish continental shelf on a number of conditions to ensure a safe operation of the project.
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