MOSCOW – Gazprom pumped 6.4 bcm of gas into underground gas storage facilities in the summer of 2018 after a peak indicator of 8.6 bcm in 2017, the gas major said in a memorandum to its eurobond prospectus.
This newly published data explains the twofold growth in the current year in transit of Russian gas via Ukraine’s Uzhgorod transport corridor compared with the previous year. In January, Gazprom transported an average of 149 million cubic meters of gas daily via this route compared with 71 mcm in January 2018 and 147 mcm in January 2017.
With reserves this year lower than those in the previous year, Gazprom is using them more slowly, which reflects on the overall statistics for gas offtake from storage facilities since the start of the offtake season.
Beginning with Jan. 20, the trend has changed, and offtake is consistently exceeding last year’s indicators. As a result, the current level of reserves has fallen below 2018 figures for the first time this season. As of the last reporting period on Jan. 29 reserves totaled 50.01 percent of facilities’ maximum capacity compared to a figure of 50.35 percent in the previous year.
