Mumbai: Gas Authority of India Ltd (GAIL) has signed a joint venture agreement with Oil & Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (ONGC) for transporting, processing and marketing gas from ONGC''s production sites in the KG and Mahanadi basins on the east coast.

The joint venture will also enable production, processing, transportation, distribution and marketing of gas from new sources to identified markets.

GAIL, the country''s largest gas transmission and marketing company, said it is also keen on joining the $13-billion trans-Saharan gas pipeline that will supply gas from Africa to the European market.

"We have envisaged interest and are keen to participate in the project," GAIL chairman and managing director U D Choubey said.

Once built, the 4,300-km line would transport gas from the Niger Delta in southern Nigeria through Niger and into Algeria and Europe.

Nigeria , Algeria, and Niger hope to start gas exports via the proposed 18-25 billion cubic meters a year Trans-Sahara gas pipeline (TSGP) in 2015.

TSGP would comprise a 48-56-inch pipeline from Nigeria to Algeria''s Mediterranean coast at Beni Saf and subsea pipelines of 20-inch between Beni Saf and Spain, according to the feasibility report published by engineering company Penspen Consulting.

The pipeline has been on the drawing board for at least 20 years but hey said the project is feasible. Europe expects to import 500 billion cubic meters of gas in 2020.