Resumen del autor, extraído del trabajo. Present gas demand of some 500 Bcm will continue to grow substantially in Western and Central Europe, in Eastern Mediterranean countries and in North Africa. Demand from the power sector will grow faster than demand in other sectors. The residential and commercial sector will also contribute significantly to overall gas demand growth particularly in the European region. One of the reasons for the expected increase in demand is that gas involves environmental advantages compared with the other fossil fuels. On the supply front, outlooks related to domestic production in Europe will be analysed. On these bases, special attention will be paid to the additional contributions of gas that might be necessary from traditional importing areas, such as North Africa and the Former Soviet Union, and possibly from other nearby areas, as the Middle East. In this scenario, more cooperation between exporters and importers will be desirable in all the different phases of the projects and the construction of the necessary infrastructures, whether these are pipelines or LNG chains.