ARMENIA CEDES CONTROL OF PIPELINE TO GAZPROM
Bloomberg News, The Associated Press
Thursday, April 6, 2006
MOSCOW Gazprom said Thursday that it had signed a 25-year agreement
with the former Soviet republic of Armenia that includes provisions
granting the Russian natural gas giant control of part of an
Armenian-Iranian natural gas pipeline and a power-generating unit at
the Razdan-5 electric plant.
The agreement also obliges Armenia to give Gazprom’s Armenian joint
venture ownership rights to the 197-kilometer, or 122-mile, stretch
of the pipeline to Iran, which has yet to be built, as well as the
right to export electricity produced at the Razdan-5 power plant.
The agreement sets a price for Armenia of $110 per 1,000 cubic meters
of natural gas until Jan. 1, 2009, according to a Gazprom statement.
Opposition politicians in Armenia have already expressed concern
over Russia’s control of the small country’s energy infrastructure,
an impact that the new deal will magnify.
Gazprom has sharply raised prices recently for Ukraine, Georgia
and Moldova.
It argues that it is merely ending subsidies to former Soviet republics
and bringing the rates closer to market prices, but critics say the
Kremlin is using Russia’s energy wealth as a political weapon.
A top Gazprom executive this week called for the tripling of prices
in Belarus, the last former Soviet republic to pay significantly
below-market prices for Russian natural gas.
Armenia is Russia’s chief ally in the strategic Caucasus Mountain
region, partly because it is host to a Russian military base. Moscow
already largely controls the Razdan-5 plant, the country’s main
electricity producer, which it received in 2003 as a debt payment,
and Armenia is wholly dependent on Russia for natural gas supplies. $@
Norwegians lift U.K. supply
Statoil and Norsk Hydro, the two largest oil companies in Norway,
booked more space on a new pipeline from Norway that could meet about
20 percent of Britain’s demand for natural gas, a top executive at
the pipeline’s operator said, Bloomberg News reported from London.
The pipeline will connect North Sea gas fields to Easington on
England’s eastern coast. It is to start delivering gas from existing
fields in October and a year later connect to Ormen Lange, a new gas
field operated by Norsk Hydro.
“The owners of the pipeline have booked the capacity for a good many
years in a way that there will be good utilization of capacity,” said
Thor Otto Lohne, a senior vice president at the Norwegian pipeline
operator Gasso.
At 1,200 kilometers, Ormen Lange will be the world’s largest undersea
pipeline, capable of shipping 70 million cubic meters of natural gas
a day. The entire Ormen Lange project, named after a ship owned by
the Viking king Olav Tryggvason, includes an onshore processing plant.
Britain, the European Union’s biggest user of natural gas, is
increasingly dependent on imports and stored supplies as supplies in
the North Sea dwindle.
MOSCOW Gazprom said Thursday that it had signed a 25-year agreement
with the former Soviet republic of Armenia that includes provisions
granting the Russian natural gas giant control of part of an
Armenian-Iranian natural gas pipeline and a power-generating unit at
the Razdan-5 electric plant.
The agreement also obliges Armenia to give Gazprom’s Armenian joint
venture ownership rights to the 197-kilometer, or 122-mile, stretch
of the pipeline to Iran, which has yet to be built, as well as the
right to export electricity produced at the Razdan-5 power plant.
The agreement sets a price for Armenia of $110 per 1,000 cubic meters
of natural gas until Jan. 1, 2009, according to a Gazprom statement.
Opposition politicians in Armenia have already expressed concern
over Russia’s control of the small country’s energy infrastructure,
an impact that the new deal will magnify.
Gazprom has sharply raised prices recently for Ukraine, Georgia
and Moldova.
It argues that it is merely ending subsidies to former Soviet republics
and bringing the rates closer to market prices, but critics say the
Kremlin is using Russia’s energy wealth as a political weapon.
A top Gazprom executive this week called for the tripling of prices
in Belarus, the last former Soviet republic to pay significantly
below-market prices for Russian natural gas.
Armenia is Russia’s chief ally in the strategic Caucasus Mountain
region, partly because it is host to a Russian military base. Moscow
already largely controls the Razdan-5 plant, the country’s main
electricity producer, which it received in 2003 as a debt payment,
and Armenia is wholly dependent on Russia for natural gas supplies. $@
Norwegians lift U.K. supply
Statoil and Norsk Hydro, the two largest oil companies in Norway,
booked more space on a new pipeline from Norway that could meet about
20 percent of Britain’s demand for natural gas, a top executive at
the pipeline’s operator said, Bloomberg News reported from London.
The pipeline will connect North Sea gas fields to Easington on
England’s eastern coast. It is to start delivering gas from existing
fields in October and a year later connect to Ormen Lange, a new gas
field operated by Norsk Hydro.
“The owners of the pipeline have booked the capacity for a good many
years in a way that there will be good utilization of capacity,” said
Thor Otto Lohne, a senior vice president at the Norwegian pipeline
operator Gasso.
At 1,200 kilometers, Ormen Lange will be the world’s largest undersea
pipeline, capable of shipping 70 million cubic meters of natural gas
a day. The entire Ormen Lange project, named after a ship owned by
the Viking king Olav Tryggvason, includes an onshore processing plant.
Britain, the European Union’s biggest user of natural gas, is
increasingly dependent on imports and stored supplies as supplies in
the North Sea dwindle.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
