Pumping capacity via the Ukrainian gas-transit corridor has remained at yesterday’s level for European consumers.
“Gazprom is supplying Russian gas for transit via Ukraine as usual as per the bookings of European consumers at 94.6 million cubic meters on March 17,” Gazprom spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov told reporters.
According to the data of the Gas Transmission System (GTS) Operator of Ukraine, the nomination for March 17 is 95 million cubic meters, and bookings for March 16 totaled 94.5 million cubic meters.
The Yamal-Europe gas pipeline, which pumps gas through Belarus and Poland to Germany, switched to reverse mode on Tuesday and will continue pumping gas from Germany to Poland on Wednesday. Gazprom did not book any capacity along the Polish section of the pipeline either for the regular session or for the additional night session. Gas supplies from Germany to Poland, meaning off-take of additional volumes from the main European hubs, are another component of the current high prices in the EU.
Electricity generation from renewable sources is declining once again this week. The contribution of wind generation to the energy balance of Europe averaged 17% for the week of March 7 to 13; on Monday, and it has averaged 12% over the three days of this week, according to data from the WindEurope association. The weather forecast for the next few days should be calm.
Capacity utilization of Ukraine’s transit corridor on Friday remains at the same high level, in line with the long-term contract volumes of 40 billion cubic meters per year or 109 million cubic meters per day.
European buyers have increased nominations for Gazprom’s gas after prices soared due to the imposition of sanctions on Russia. Gas prices at the TTF hub were $1,383 per thousand cubic meters on Friday morning.
“Gazprom is supplying Russian gas for transit via Ukraine as scheduled in accordance with the requests of European consumers – 109.5 mcm on March 11,” the company’s official spokesperson Sergey Kupriyanov told reporters.
As confirmed by data from the Ukrainian GTS Operator, the nomination for March 11 is 109.4 mcm, while that for March 10 was also 109.4 mcm.
The spot price for gas in Europe continues to soar and is already 57% above Tuesday’s closing.
Prices for the nearest, April futures contracts at the TTF hub have broken the $2,000-mark, rising first to $2,011 and then an all-time high of $2,227 per thousand cubic meters on Wednesday afternoon, the previous high being $2,138 on December 21. These contracts closed Tuesday at $1,418, according to ICE Futures exchange data.
But that appears to have been the peak, with prices swinging down on news of a new short-term booking for Yamal-Europe pipeline capacity from 3:00 p.m. Moscow time until the end of the gas day. So far it looks like there will be an additional 0.8 million cubic meters per hour, which is 20% of the pipe’s capacity, in which case an additional 15 mcm of Gazprom gas will be delivered to Europe by morning.
The average TTF price on February was $935.
Apart from the Ukraine crisis, gas prices have risen in Europe due to an abrupt drop in temperatures this week and in wind power generation.
The first published nomination for gas transit across Ukraine on March 2 is 108.8 million cubic meters, according to Gas Transmission System Operator of Ukraine data.
In other words transit capacity utilization will again be high. The nomination is adjusted throughout the day and that for Monday is currently 109.3 mcm.
European buyers have requested more gas from Gazprom after sanctions against Russia sent gas prices soaring: gas is trading at $1,332 per thousand cubic meters at the TTF hub.
Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal has discussed the possibility of increasing natural gas supplies to Ukraine through the territory of Slovakia with Prime Minister of Slovakia Eduard Heger.“Slovakia is one of the main partners of Ukraine in the energy sector. Today, we have discussed the possibility of increasing natural gas supplies to Ukraine through the territory of Slovakia. This can happen in accordance with the agreements of the gas transmission system operators of our countries,” Shmyhal at said a joint briefing with Heger in Zakarpattia region on Friday.In addition, he said that in the transport sector, an important component of cooperation could be the provision of rail container traffic on the Asia-Europe route.Shmyhal announced Ukraine’s interest in increasing additional freight traffic through the country. “A promising area of cooperation is the creation of multimodal logistics terminals for handling cargo at the Ukrainian-Slovak border,” he added.The parties also discussed the development of border infrastructure, in particular, the functioning of joint checkpoints and joint customs control.“Cooperation with Slovakia in the customs sphere is no less important for us. We are working on mutual recognition of the results of customs control,” he added.The Prime Minister of Ukraine said that in the near future the dates of the meetings of the Ukrainian-Slovak Commission on Economic, Industrial, Scientific and Technical Cooperation, the Commission on Cross-Border Cooperation and the Commission on National Minorities will be determined.Shmyhal also thanked Slovakia for supporting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.
Transit of natural gas through the gas transmission system (GTS) of Ukraine in January-October 2021 amounted to 35.3 billion cubic meters, which is 21.6% less than in the same period of 2020 (45 billion cubic meters), and 56.7% less than in ten months of 2019 (81.5 billion cubic meters), according the Gas Transmission System Operator of Ukraine (GTSOU).
In particular, in the western direction 32.456 billion cubic meters of gas were supplied by transit (to Slovakia – 22.43 billion cubic meters, to Hungary – 6.799 billion cubic meters, to Poland – 3.227 billion cubic meters); in the south direction – 2.833 billion cubic meters were supplied (to Moldova – 2.439 billion cubic meters, and to Romania – 394 million cubic meters).
In October, transit amounted to 2.634 billion cubic meters, which is 19.1% less than in September due to the cessation of gas supplies to Hungary via the Ukrainian route by Gazprom. In particular, in the direction of Slovakia, transit amounted to 2.117 billion cubic meters, Poland – 342 million cubic meters, and Moldova – 176 million cubic meters.
The GTSOU notes that according to the results of booking the capacities of the Ukrainian GTS on the RBP and GSA platforms for October 2021, Gazprom not only did not book the additional transit capacities, but also significantly reduced the use of the booked annual capacities, since no applications for transit of Russian gas to Hungary were received from October 1.
As a result, the average daily volumes of Russian gas transported through the territory of Ukraine in October fell to 86 million cubic meters, which is below the minimum volume under the current transit agreement (110 million cubic meters).
“We are concerned about the reduction in transit of Russian gas through the Ukrainian route: since October 1, the volume of pumping has been lower than the booked capacity. Although since November 1, transit to Moldova has increased thanks to a new contract for the supply of gas from the Russian Federation, however, the overall use of the Ukrainian GTS capacity for transit of Russian gas continues to decline: on average, at the beginning of November, it was 60 million cubic meters per day,” GTSOU Director General Serhiy Makogon said.
