Removal of Olive Trees for Pipeline to Resume

An Italian court has rejected an appeal against the uproot­ing of olive trees from an olive grove in Puglia to make way for the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP). The rul­ing revoked an order handed down ear­lier this month to halt work and gave TAP devel­op­ers the green light to remove and replant up to 10,000 olive trees.

Once works can safely resume, the remain­ing olive trees could be removed and replanted in a mat­ter of days.- Lisa Givert, TAP

TAP work­ers plan to resume remov­ing the olive trees in the next few days. Time is run­ning out for the com­pany which has to move the first batch of trees before their sea­sonal growth spurt begins at the end of April, or delay their uproot­ing until November.

Lisa Givert, TAP head of com­mu­ni­ca­tions told Olive oil Times, ​“Following today’s pos­i­tive deci­sion of the TAR (Tribunale Amministrativo Regionale) Lazio, TAP con­tin­ues to col­lab­o­rate with all the author­i­ties involved in the process to resume its activ­i­ties on the ground as soon as pos­si­ble in order to remain on sched­ule.”

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Pipeline works get the go-ahead again, but the incred­i­bly per­sis­tent & cre­ative local resis­tance con­tin­ues #NoTAPhttps://t.co/aUHY1tdUva

— 350.org Europe (@350Europe) April 21, 2017

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​“Once works can safely resume, the remain­ing olive trees could be removed and replanted in a mat­ter of days,” Givert said.

231 olive trees from the project’s micro-tun­nel area are marked to be uprooted and replanted dur­ing the ini­tial phase, includ­ing 16 ​“mon­u­men­tal olive trees.” Ulrike Andres, TAP com­mer­cial and exter­nal affairs direc­tor told Olive Oil Times, ​“TAP is work­ing closely with the rel­e­vant regional author­i­ties to estab­lish the best way (with the least envi­ron­men­tal impact) to move these 16 mon­u­men­tal olive trees.”

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No TAP pro­tes­tors cre­ate road­block as pipeline work resumes https://t.co/FrZZplV5o5#ItalianInsider#NOTAPpic.twitter.com/ZsDdmzS2pz

— The Italian Insider (@ItalianInsider1) April 21, 2017

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A fur­ther 2,000 olive trees will be removed from the pipeline’s 8km route from the micro-tun­nel to the pipeline receiv­ing ter­mi­nal. Up to 10,000 olive trees in total are listed for removal along the ​‘Snam’ sec­tion from the TAP pipeline to the receiv­ing ter­mi­nal at Brindisi.

Andres added, ​“It is impor­tant to high­light that the trees will be tem­porar­ily cared for in a nurs­ery area, and later replanted in their orig­i­nal loca­tions.”

Removal of the olive trees has already been delayed by more than a year due to oppo­si­tion from locals, the town coun­cil, and the regional gov­ern­ment. In March, work on uproot­ing the trees began but was halted by protests. The protests esca­lated into bat­tles between bot­tle throw­ing activists and the police.

Local author­i­ties have cam­paigned for the pipeline to be rerouted to an indus­trial area fur­ther north of the olive grove. Other loca­tions were con­sid­ered but rejected, but ear­lier this month Carlo Calenda, Italian indus­try min­is­ter told Reuters, ​“It’s not pos­si­ble to change land­fall of Trans Adriatic Pipeline that will bring Azeri gas into Italy. Changing it would mean not build­ing the pipeline.”

Work on the TAP was sched­uled to begin last year. Delays have short­ened the con­struc­tion timetable and could mean the fail­ure of the company’s goal to deliver the first gas to Italy in 2020.

The €4.5 bil­lion pipeline is the final leg of the $40 bil­lion Southern Gas Corridor, which will trans­port Asian gas to Europe.

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• Reuters