European Interest in Ukraine Gas Storage

Poland, Hungary, Italy, Germany and other European states are negotiating use of  Ukraine's underground gas storage facilities. This was announced by Ukraine's Minister of Energy and Coal Eduard Stavitsky at a press conference in Kyiv.

The Kyiv Post reported that the minister said Poland, for example, is considering using gas storage facilities so it can control the prices on the domestic natural gas market.

 The Wall Street Journal observed that EU member-states first showed their interest in Ukrainian gas storages in February 2013, for its gas transportation system (GTS) boasts the extensive underground storage facilities - 13 units with the total capacity of more than 31 billion cubic meters.

Next month Ukraine and the EU will hold a roundtable regarding further development of the Ukrainian gas market. The roundtable will be chaired by EU Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger and Stavitsky. The invitation to discuss the modernization of the Ukrainian GTS and the establishment of the Eastern European gas hub in Ukraine is due to involve other big players such as Gazprom of Russia, which recently sent Kyiv a bill for $7 billion (€5.3bn) of unused gas.

In March 2013, many private companies along with Ukraine's public company Naftogaz started supplying natural gas both from Europe and Russia to Ukraine.