Morocco has no gas. So how did it sell the world a $25bn gas pipeline?
Morocco has pulled off a remarkable media coup with its African Atlantic Gas Pipeline (AAGP) project, formerly known as the Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline, intended to supply Europe with gas after crossing a dozen West African and Sahelian countries.
Two factors attest to the ingenuity of Morocco's achievement: the country has negligible gas resources of its own and no tradition of hydrocarbon exploitation or trade.
Despite this, it was able to present a project worth tens of billions of dollars, with significant geopolitical implications, and position it as a rival, or even an alternative, to the Trans-Saharan Gas Pipeline (TSGP) linking Nigeria to Algeria via Niger.
Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine had sent Europe scrambling for alternative supplies, and Moscow's share of the bloc's pipeline gas - around 40 percent before the war - was nosediving as the EU moved to ban Russian imports by 2027.
Algeria was already filling much of that gap, supplying nearly a fifth of the EU's pipeline gas, second only to Norway. Morocco had no gas of its own, but it could offer a route, and its energy ministry sold the pipeline as a way to make the kingdom "a major corridor linking Europe, Africa and the Atlantic basin".
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Moroccan authorities invested heavily in the project, which they presented as "the new energy backbone of the continent".
For years, the matter was taken seriously, with official and unofficial diplomacy, businesspeople and lobbyists working together to attract investors and clients.
Morocco went so far as to announce "the finalisation of the gas pipeline route" and, in July 2025, to report a package of contracts and agreements related to the project.
"Agreements signed, advanced technical studies, investors mobilised, and the first Moroccan section soon to be launched: the colossal gas pipeline project linking Nigeria to Morocco has reached a decisive milestone," a triumphant Moroccan media outlet predicted.
According to Moroccan officials and news outlets, the deal was done. Yet economic logic, technical data, geography, geopolitics and common sense all showed that the Moroccan project could not compete with the Trans-Saharan pipeline, which would carry the same Nigerian gas to Algeria via Niger and on to Europe through pipelines Algeria already operates.
More than a campaign
A skilful communications campaign and networks of influence are not sufficient assets for a project of this scale, with such significant economic and geopolitical interests.
Ali Aissaoui, an emeritus researcher at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, outlined the prerequisites for a gas pipeline of this magnitude to Middle East Eye.
Its realisation, he explained, is "subject to four factors": first, the availability of resources, which he considers potentially abundant, provided they are developed in a timely and synchronised manner; second, relatively favourable market prospects; third, economic viability, which will depend on the volumes actually transported, infrastructure costs and anticipated prices; and finally, perhaps most importantly, the existence of a stable and cooperative political and diplomatic environment among all the countries involved.
A signed agreement, however, is not a finished pipeline, and none of the project's underlying weaknesses has gone away
Weighed against those conditions, the anticipated conflict between the AAGP and the TSGP is unlikely to materialise.
Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune signalled as much on 16 February, announcing - while receiving his Nigerien counterpart Abdourahamane Tchiani - that work on the Trans-Saharan pipeline would begin after Ramadan.
With the project gaining pace, the energy ministers of Algeria, Nigeria and Niger met in Algiers on 3 June for the fifth meeting of the project's steering committee.
The following day, construction of the Algerian section was formally launched in the southern province of Adrar, with the same three ministers and the heads of their national energy companies in attendance. For the Moroccan project, it effectively sounded the death knell.
None of this has deterred Morocco, which has been seeking US financing for the project. It is still expected to sign an intergovernmental agreement with Nigeria on the pipeline in the final quarter of 2026, to be concluded by President Bola Tinubu and King Mohammed VI.
A signed agreement, however, is not a finished pipeline, and none of the project's underlying weaknesses has gone away.
The harder route
The AAGP was designed to start in Nigeria, follow the Atlantic coast west to Liberia, then turn north and end in Morocco.
In all, the project is now billed as spanning 13 countries along the West African coast - not to mention the disputed territory of Western Sahara - over a hybrid offshore-onshore route of some 6,900km. This entire part of Africa was expected to benefit from the pipeline's economic impact.
By comparison, the TSGP, linking Nigeria directly to Algeria via Niger, would be just over 4,000km long, with approximately 1,000km in Nigeria, 800km in Niger and 2,300km in Algeria.
It would cross only three countries, simplifying negotiations over the distribution of production and royalties and avoiding complex dealings with some of the world's poorest and most unstable states.
Another advantage of the Trans-Saharan pipeline over the AAGP is its cost.
The former is expected to cost between $10bn and $13bn, drawing on existing gas infrastructure in Algeria and Nigeria. The cross-border sections, however, are still largely to be built: Algeria's section is only now under construction, while Niger's is due to start in early 2027.
This compares with the roughly $25bn needed to finance the AAGP, making it about twice as expensive as the Trans-Saharan pipeline.
Furthermore, the AAGP is unlikely to be operational for at least 10 years - not before 2040, given the project's complexity - according to an expert consulted by MEE.
Another argument put forward by Morocco is that the AAGP could supply the populations of a dozen countries before reaching Morocco, demonstrating the kingdom's commitment to developing a vast area of West Africa and the Sahel that remains plagued by endemic poverty.
Yet if each of these countries consumes some of the gas piped from Nigeria, how much would remain at the end of the line, given that Morocco itself would also draw on it?
Nigeria's interest in such a vast investment would obviously be to send large quantities of gas, around 30 billion cubic metres a year, to the European market, which risks being permanently cut off from Russian gas by next year and forced to rely on much more expensive liquefied natural gas.
It will therefore ultimately be up to Nigeria to decide, based solely on its own interests.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.
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