Gazprom Sells Huge Volumes to Europe in Late February
Russian giant Gazprom increased gas exports to countries outside the former Soviet Union (non-FSU) in February by 6.8% to 17.4bn m3 on year, it said March 1. This included a surge of sales in the last eight days of the month.
Gas exports to Germany increased by 8.5%, to Austria by 115.8%, Netherlands 146.8% last month. All three countries have large storage facilities, which the Russian gas helped keep topped up.
For eight consecutive days from February 21 to 28 Gazprom’s non-FSU exports reached new highs, culminating in a new absolute record export of 699mn m3/d on February 28.
Nonetheless, during the first two months of 2018, Gazprom’s exports to non-FSU markets declined by 2.1% overall to 34.7bn m3, as exports in January 2018 were 1.9bn m3 lower year on year at 17.2bn m3.
Gazprom increased its share in the European market from 33.1% in 2016 to 34.7% last year exporting 165bn standard m³ in 2017, or 193.9bn m³ if counted in m3 of Gazprom’s slightly lower calorific value for gas (the units also used in the preceding paragraphs).
Its report didn’t mention the gas sales to CIS countries, but in January 2018 it sold 30.5bn m3 to the domestic market.
Thee average Russian gas export price to Europe of $193.30/’000 m3 ($5.37/mn Btu) in January 2018 increased to $222.50/’000 m3 ($6.25/mn Btu) in February 2018, as European spot markets firmed. Although much of Gazprom’s sales to the west are still under long-term contracts indexed to oil, others now either partly or largely gas hub based.
Gazprom ups Blue Stream sales
The Russian giant also said that, 15 years after the commissioning of the Blue Stream gas pipeline, the subsea pipeline to Turkey reached its designed capacity – as Gazprom increased gas exports to Turkey via Blue Stream in 2017 to a record 15.8 bn m3. It brings to a cumulative figure of 158bn m3 the amount that has been transported via the pipeline during the past 15 years. “At present, Blue Stream accounts for more than 50% of Russian gas exports to the Turkish market,” noted Gazprom earlier this week.
According to Turkey’s own statistics, Gazprom increased Russian gas exports to the country by 17% to 28.6bn m3 in 2017.
The Blue Stream gas pipeline is 1,213 km long and has capacity to transport 16bn m3/yr; it started operations in February 2003.