Ukraine is offering guaranteed extra transit capacity for Russian gas to Europe at 15 million cubic metres (mcm) per day for October, the head of the country’s gas pipelines operator told Reuters on Thursday.
Sergiy Makogon said that Ukraine is ready to provide an additional 9.8 mcm per day in extra capacity at the Sudzha crossing point and another 5.2 mcm/day at Sokhranivka point on the Russian-Ukrainian border.
“If all 100% of the guaranteed capacity is distributed, it will be possible to book additional intermittent capacity for the same period,” said Makogon.
Russian and Ukrainian gas companies signed a five-year deal at the end of 2019 to safeguard the transit of Russian gas to Europe via Ukraine. The agreement assumes an annual volume of transit at 40 bcm in 2021-2024, which is about 110 mcm per day.
Russia’s Gazprom GAZP.MM has the right to book extra guaranteed transit capacity in addition to already agreed volumes.
Ukraine, whose gas pipelines are capable of providing an annual transit of about 146 bcm of gas to Europe, regularly offers additional capacities at auctions to speed up filling storage facilities in Europe and reduce the gas deficit, but Gazprom has declined such offers.
Gazprom booked only 650,000 mcm from a proposed volume of 15 mcm for September, and Makogon said the Ukrainian operator would continue to offer the remaining 14.35 mcm for September at daily auctions.
Analysts have said that Gazprom has not booked larger volumes in a move to push for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which is almost complete.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Natalia Zinets; Editing by Susan Fenton)