As the project developer, Nord Stream has provided the Baltic Sea countries with the transboundary environmental report (the Espoo Report) in nine languages, and English. According to the United Nations Espoo Convention, countries under whose jurisdiction a proposed activity is envisaged to take place must inform their neighbouring countries about potential transboundary environmental impacts. The report is also available online at www.nord-stream.com/eia-permitting.html. The company has also filed its national Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA) documentation in Finland and Denmark, together with its applications for national permits to lay and operate the pipeline in the waters of these two countries. The national permit applications have already been filed in Sweden, Germany, and Russia. "The Nord Stream consortium has spent more than 100 million Euros on environmental impact studies and environmental planning to ensure that the design and routeing of the pipeline through the Baltic Sea will be environmentally sound and safe," says Dirk von Ameln, Nord Stream's permitting director. "We have also been in intensive dialogue with the authorities throughout the region in order to understand and take account of their concerns. This public participation phase marks an important milestone for Nord Stream, and confirms that we are on schedule to start transporting gas from Russia to Europe in 2011. "We believe that completion of the public participation phase will enable any outstanding issues arising to be resolved in the summer, so that we will receive the five national permits later this year, in time to start construction in early 2010," he continued. Since 2006, Nord Steam has made significant decisions about the routeing of the pipeline after considering environmental factors. Based on three criteria – environmental, socio-economic and technical – the company considered five main routeing options: North or south of Gogland, in Russian waters North or south of Kalbadagrund, in Finnish waters East or west of Gotland and around Hoburgs Bank, in Swedish waters Around Bornholm, in Danish and German waters Bringing the pipeline ashore at Lubeck, Rostock or Greifswald in Germany. The company's detailed surveys and research into potential environmental and socio-economic impacts are part of a process dating back to 1997. Nord Stream has conducted 40,000km of seabed surveys along possible routes. Starting with a 2-km wide corridor and were progressively narrowing to a corridor of 15m width, these surveys have enabled the company to propose a safe and environmentally-sound route avoiding, wherever possible, environmentally-sensitive sites, and sites containing cultural heritage and munitions, and to agree with the authorities the best way to deal with such obstacles where it would not be possible to avoid them. Nord Stream will eventually be able to supply 55bn cum/yr of gas, the current equivalent of 25% of the additional imported gas that Europe is expected to require due to increased demand and depleting resources in the North Sea.