Maghreb-Europe Gas Pipeline: Algeria Says No to Any Reopening via Morocco

Algeria has rejected these Spanish and international proposals aimed at diversifying the routes for transporting Algerian gas to Europe, sources told the specialized platform Attaqa, stressing that the reopening of the Maghreb-Europe (GME) gas pipeline would have contributed to a normalization of relations with Morocco. The agreement would have allowed Morocco to obtain a portion of the gas for its domestic needs at a price about $4 to $5 lower per million British thermal units than the current cost of its imports. But for Algeria, this file is "completely closed" due to the conflict in the Sahara.

Faced with this situation, Morocco has found an innovative solution. It has signed a partnership with Spain to transport liquefied natural gas purchased on the international market to its territory via the pipeline in the reverse direction, after regasification in Spanish plants. Before the closure of the GME, Morocco received about one billion cubic meters of gas per year, in addition to financial royalties for the transit of the pipeline, which has a capacity of 12 billion cubic meters per year. To strengthen its energy security, Morocco signed an agreement with the company Shell in July 2023 to import 500 million cubic meters of liquefied gas per year.

The latest data shows a significant increase in Moroccan gas imports in 2025. The total volume of imports during the first eight months of 2025 reached about 6.73 terawatt-hours, compared to 6.29 terawatt-hours over the same period in 2024. Moroccan imports have increased since the beginning of the year, before stabilizing at 992 gigawatt-hours during the months of July and August 2025. In detail, Morocco imported 672 gigawatt-hours of gas in January, 700 in February, 956 in March, 738 in April, 823 in May and 858 in June this year.