GAZPROM LOOKING TO INCREASE NATURAL GAS SUPPLIES TO BRITAIN
RIA Novosti
20:06 | 12/ 12/ 2007
MOSCOW, December 12 (RIA Novosti) – Gazprom is seeking to increase
natural gas supplies to Britain, the Russian company said on Wednesday
after a meeting between CEO Alexei Miller and British Minister of
State for Energy Malcolm Wicks.
The Russian natural gas monopoly has been selling natural gas to
Britain under short-term contracts since 1999, with its gas exports
to the country increasing rapidly. Last year, the company supplied
8.7 billion cubic meters of natural gas to Britain.
"Prospects for expanding Russian natural gas supplies to the British
market and Gazprom’s joint activity with British energy companies
in the oil and gas sphere were considered at the meeting," the
statement reads.
The parties also discussed the implementation of cooperation agreements
between Gazprom and Britain’s energy giant BP, including natural gas
and liquefied natural gas deliveries.
Britain has been a natural gas net importer since 2004. A number of
Western experts have forecast that the country’s demand for natural
gas imports will reach 40 billion cubic meters by 2010. The Nord
Stream gas pipeline currently being built under the Baltic Sea to
pump Russian natural gas to Europe should become a new channel of
natural gas supplies to Britain.
In April 2006, Gazprom Marketing & Trading Ltd, a Gazprom subsidiary,
delivered the first 140,000 cubic meters of liquefied natural gas
(around 85 million cubic meters of natural gas) to the Isle of Grain
terminal in Britain.
In June 2007, Gazprom, Ã~BÃ~P and the Russian-British joint oil venture
TNK-Ã~BÃ~P signed an agreement to establish a strategic alliance for
long-term investment in joint energy projects and asset swaps both
in Russia and in third countries.
Latest reports say that the Gazprom board will consider the company’s
participation in gas and energy projects in Armenia at a meeting next
Tuesday, when the company’s performance in 2007 is due to be reviewed
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