Energy Blast – Nov 18, 2010

Pipeline maker Transneft is facing serious corruption claims after a leaked document suggested that the company may have embezzled $4 billion during the construction of a pipeline to China.  The Independent’s Shaun Walker looks at plans to try to allow farmers to grow crops on the contaminated countryside surrounding Chernobyl.  President Medvedev is reportedly likely to up the pressure on Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to return to the nuclear negotiating table at an upcoming meeting between the two presidents in Baku.  600 km, or half of the first part of the Nord Stream pipeline has been completed, the consortium behind the project has announced.  According to Bloomberg, Russia and Nigeria are continuing discussions about building a nuclear power plant in the African country.  In Poland, winter gas crises could be a thing of the past: according to geologists, the country could become the largest gas supplier in Europe after Norway and Russia, thanks to shale gas reserves.  Lithuanian Prime Minister Andrius Kubilius has said that Russian officials strategically attempted to persuade European companies not to invest in Lithuania’s new nuclear power plant.