Russia has been gradually increasing gas deliveries to Europe over the past nine months, boosting exports by 15% compared to last year and edging toward record gas deliveries via all routes, including Ukraine, Gazprom Export says.
According to company CEO Elena Burmistrova, from January to September this year Russia’s state energy giant Gazprom boosted gas deliveries to Germany by a third compared to last year, while supplies to Turkey and Romania were also increased significantly.
“Close to record-breaking gas volumes were supplied to overseas markets year-to-date. We ramped up deliveries to the largest consuming market – Germany – by a third against last year, by 2.5 times to Turkey and fourfold to Romania. This is via all the routes, including Ukraine. We are consistently supplying extra gas volumes to the best of our ability,” Burmistrova said.
The top manager expressed regret over the effect caused by the rise in gas prices in some countries, but noted that in order to make the gas market balanced and predictable, Europe should consider long-term contracts instead of relying on spot prices. She further stated that if European partners come to understand that long-term contracts help cope with the energy crisis, Gazprom “will look for those acceptable models that will work for both suppliers and consumers.”
Burmistrova stressed that Gazpom is meeting all its contractual obligations to European consumers in accordance with the existing long-term contracts, adding that those contracts provide the physical volumes of gas that would guarantee supply in the cold winter months ahead.
According to Gazprom Export figures, the company is on course to deliver record-breaking volumes of gas to Europe this year, which has already exceeded last year’s figure for the first nine months through September by 15%, reaching 145.8 billion cubic meters. In total, Gazprom planned to export 183 billion cubic meters of gas to Europe in 2021.
During trading on the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) on Wednesday, the price of November futures at the TTF gas hub in the Netherlands exceeded $1,900 per thousand cubic meters, setting a new historical maximum. However, prices began to rapidly decline later in the day following the announcement by President Vladimir Putin that Russia is ready to further boost gas supplies to Europe, including via short-term contracts on the St. Petersburg International Commodity Exchange.
On Thursday morning the price plunged below $1,000 per thousand cubic meters for the first time since September 29, but later corrected to above $1,200.
At the opening of trading on Friday the price of gas contracts on the TTF was up 6% from the closing value of the previous day, rising to $1,224 per thousand cubic meters, ICE data shows. By 6:08 GMT the price adjusted to $1,165 per thousand cubic meters.