Gazprom outlines strategy as sales slide

Russia’s gas giant Gazprom released data on Wednesday showing that its gas exports to Europe and Turkey dipped in February, while its potential income for 2017 was revised upward, international media reported.

According to Platts, sales to Europe and Turkey, excluding countries from the former USSR, averaged 582 mcm (20.6 bcf) per day, down from 616 mcm (21.8 bcf) per day in January, on lower demand.

Meanwhile the company’s deputy chairman, Alexander Medvedev, quoted by Bloomberg TV-Bulgaria, said that he foresees a possible increase in foreign currency earnings by USD 5 billion to USD 35 billion this year. Last month, Gazprom posted USD 3.46 billion in net profits for 2016.

Also on Wednesday, the company’s board reviewed its major investment projects. Those include Nord Stream-2 and the TurkStream gas pipeline, the construction of which is scheduled to start later this year.

Also on the table are the the Power of Siberia gas transmission system, of which some 500 kilometres have been constructed to date, the continuing construction of the Amur GPP, which is to be the country’s biggest gas-processing plant, and the Bovanenkovo-Ukhta 2 pipeline launched in January to carry gas from the Yamal Peninsula in northern Siberia.

“Gazprom’s main resource base shifts further northward,” the firm said in a statement.

“The Company makes comprehensive efforts to develop the gas production center in Yamal and to expand the northern gas transmission corridor that reshapes the geography of gas flows for both domestic supplies to European Russia and exports.”