A spokeswoman for Georgia's Environment Ministry said that from Thursday work on the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline could resume at a controversial section near Georgia's Borjomi valley.

Spokeswoman Tamara Pirveli said pipeline consortium BTC Co. had satisfied her ministry that the pipeline was being built in line with environmental safety standards.

"After studying materials presented by (the consortium) over the past two weeks, the ministry ... has allowed BTC Co. to continue its construction work," Pirveli told AFP by telephone from Georgia's capital, Tbilisi.

When completed, the BTC pipeline will pump up to one million barrels of oil a day from the Caspian Sea, through Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey to a tanker terminal at the Mediterranean port of Ceyhan.

The project will cost around three billion dollars (2.48 billion euros) to complete and is being led by British oil giant BP, with backing from the US government.

The order from Georgia's government to down tools on the 17.6 kilometremile) Borjomi section came as construction crews were racing to meet their deadline to deliver the first oil to Ceyhan by the second half of next year.

The stoppage again focussed attention on concerns expressed by environmental lobby groups that the pipeline is an ecological risk.

Those groups say an oil spill where the pipeline runs near the Borjomi valley, the site of world-renowned mineral water springs, could have disastrous consequences.

BP insists that the pipeline meets internationally-accepted safety standards and points to extra safeguards built in at the Borjomi section.

Pirveli said the pipeline had been given the green light on condition that BTC Co., within the next two weeks, allows independent experts to inspect the area and submits technical specifications on the pipeline valves it plans to use.

A BP spokeswoman in Azerbaijan's capital, Baku, said she had yet to receive confirmation of the Georgian Environment Ministry's decision.

TERRA.WIRE