EU Mulls Using Ukraine Gas Storage to End Slovakia Spat Over Lost Transit Fees | OilPrice.com
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Breaking News:
The European Commission is considering a plan under which Ukraine would boost natural gas imports from Greece and Turkey, store the gas, and send it in the winter via Slovakia to other EU countries, POLITICO reports, as the EU is seeking to resolve a Slovakia-Ukraine dispute over gas transit and lost fees.
Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico has defied the EU and met with Putin in Moscow at the end of December to discuss Russian gas supply to Slovakia ahead of the halt to deliveries via Ukraine.
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On December 31, the supply deal for Russian gas to Europe transiting Ukraine expired, and deliveries stopped on January 1, after Ukraine said it would not pursue an extension of the transit agreement.
At 0500 GMT on New Year’s Day, Gazprom halted pipeline deliveries, and the last remaining EU members that were still receiving gas from Russia until December 31 – Austria, Slovakia, and Hungary – lost this source of supply.
Slovakia also lost transit fees estimated at about $542 million (500 million euros) per year.
A day ahead of the stoppage of the supply via Ukraine, Slovakia threatened to suspend electricity deliveries to Ukraine after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reiterated his decision to not extend the natural gas transit deal with Gazprom.
The new plan considered by the EU would allow for the storage of up to 10 billion cubic meters of gas in Ukrainian storage sites for shipment via pipelines in Slovakia without having to buy Russian gas, POLITICO reported on Friday, quoting officials with knowledge of the talks.
This plan “would make Slovakia a transit country again,” an official with the European Commission told POLITICO. It would also align with the EU’s REPowerEU objectives to phase out imports of Russian gas by 2027, the official added.
At a visit to Ukraine last month, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that the EU “will seize the full potential of Ukraine’s vast gas storages, of which 80% are located close to EU Member States.”
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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