The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has updated a plan on unbundling of natural gas transportation operations from NJSC Naftogaz Ukrainy, Energy and Environment Protection Minister Oleksiy Orzhel said at a briefing in Kyiv on Wednesday.
“Today we updated the unbundling plan, set clear deadlines, laid clear responsibilities for each of the parties [responsible for its implementation],” he said.
Orzhel said that the decision meets European requirements and was supported by Naftogaz Ukrainy, which leadership clashed with the Cabinet of Ministers headed Volodymyr Groysman regarding the choice of the unbundling model.
The minister noted that in addition to certification of the new operator by the Ukrainian regulator, it should also be confirmed from the European side. In this connection, Ukraine will ask the Secretariat of the Energy Community to consider this issue as a priority so that the new operator could fully launch activities from January 1, 2020.
According to him, the Cabinet of Ministers also decided to transfer PJSC Main Gas Pipelines of Ukraine to the Ministry of Finance from the Ministry of Energy and Environment Protection.
“A specially created corporatized company, which has its own supervisory board, namely Main Gas Pipelines of Ukraine, was transferred from the Ministry of Energy and Environment Protection to the Ministry of Finance … It was also the requirement of our European partners,” he said.
Thus, Main Gas Pipelines of Ukraine will submit a request to the regulator to get the certificate of a GTS operator, while the subsidiary of Ukrtransgaz, Transmission System Operator of Ukraine (TSO of Ukraine) LLC, according to the minister, will be liquidated.
“Ukrtransgaz has a separate limited liability company, to which all the assets were transferred, then they are transferred there. I think that taking into account the fact that there are no assets, this is the logic of liquidation,” the minister added.
In parallel, a number of ministries will be involved in the preparation of a bill that will regulate the possibility of unbundling gas transmission activities. The document should be submitted to the Cabinet before the middle of October.
