Page 9 - FSUOGM Week 07 2020

FSUOGM PERFORMANCE FSUOGM
Gazprom overseas sales down 3.5% in 2019
RUSSIA
Sales were down in Gazprom’s top foreign markets, Germany and Turkey.
THE overseas gas sales of Russia’s Gazprom contracted by 3.5% in 2019, the state-owned company reported on February 14, as a result of lower volumes to Turkey and Western Europe. Total sales – including exports and traded sup- plies – amounted to 233.2bn cubic metres last year, down from 241.7 bcm in 2018.
European gas demand rose by 1.8% year on year to 560 bcm, primarily as a result of the replacement of coal with gas as a fuel in power generation. Growth would have been stronger were it not for abnormally warm weather.
Gazprom nevertheless ceded some market share to LNG supplies, which ooded the con- tinent last year as a result of a weaker premium price in Asia and increased supply.
e company’s sales in Germany, the biggest recipient of Russian gas, slid by 8.5% last year to 58.5 bcm. Meanwhile sales to the UK, almost all comprising non-Russian traded volumes, sunk 27.6% to 10.3 bcm. Declines were also recorded in Italy, Finland, Greece, Switzerland and Den- mark, more than o setting growth in Austria, France, the Netherlands and Belgium.
For the whole of Western Europe, shipments were down 4.7% at 131.9 bcm.
Sales to another key market, Turkey, also slumped 35.3% to 15.5 bcm last year. Gas- red power plants in Turkey scaled back production last year, a er depreciation of the Turkish lira drove up the price of gas imports, making it di cult for them to compete with other sources of energy such as hydroelectric dams and coal plants.
Turkey also had access to increased gas sup- ply from Azerbaijan, following the launch of the Southern Gas Corridor (SGC) in mid-2018. Gaz- prom brought its own new pipeline to Turkey on stream last month, TurkStream. But rather than pumping extra gas to Turkey, the pipeline’s pri- mary purpose, at least initially, will be diverting supplies away from Ukraine.
Gazprom’s sales to the rest of Europe, exclud- ing the former Soviet Union (FSU), were up 14.5% at 43.9 bcm last year. e biggest growth was seen in Central Europe, led by a 42% surge in Hungarian sales to 10.5 bcm. Sales to Croatia, the Czech Republic and Slovakia also increased, countering declines in Bulgaria, Romania and Slovenia.
e FSU region took 36.5 bcm of gas, up 2.4% on the year. Sales increased in Latvia, Kazakh- stan and Armenia, but decreased in Lithuania and Estonia. Gazprom also sold 1 bcm of gas to Azerbaijan in 2018 to help it deal with a domestic supply squeeze, but did not deliver anything to the country last year.
Gazprom’s LNG sales from Sakhalin Island dropped 4.8% to 5.04 bcm. e company also initiated pipeline sales to China in December a er launching its Power of Siberia project. Ship- ments had reached 328mn cubic metres by the end of the year, and are projected to total 4.6 bcm in 2020 and ramp up to a full capacity of 38 bcm per year by 2025.
e company’s domestic sales were down 2% in 2019, at 265.9 bcm. ™
Week 07 19•February•2020 w w w. N E W S B A S E . c o m
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