Tanzania and Uganda signed on May 26 an intergovernmental agreement for the construction of the world's longest electrically heated crude-oil export pipeline, which is being designed by Houston-based Gulf Interstate Engineering Co.

The 1,445-kilometer East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) project, which is being developed by France's Total SA, China's CNOOC and UK's Tullow Oil, would enable the commercialization of the estimated 6.5 billion barrels of crude-oil reserves in Uganda's Albertine basin. The line will run from Kabaale, in the Lake Albert region of Uganda, to Chongoleani, near the port city of Tanga on the east coast of Tanzania.