OAO Gazprom, which provides about a
quarter of Europe’s natural gas, increased exports to the region
and Turkey to a record this year as customers won price
reductions and colder weather boosted demand.
Supplies rose 16 percent to 161.5 billion cubic meters in
2013, excluding volumes traded by the Moscow-based company’s
European units, Gazprom Export said today in an e-mailed
statement, citing preliminary data. The previous record was 160
billion cubic meters in 2008, according to the company’s 2012
financial report.
Germany, Italy and the U.K. led the increase in gas imports
from Russia this year, a Gazprom Export spokeswoman said by
phone, asking not to be identified citing company policy.
Russian gas exports have rebounded after a slump in 2012 as
a colder-than-usual start to this year in Europe depleted
inventory levels. European customers including RWE AG (RWE), Germany’s
second-biggest utility, and Italy’s Eni SpA won lower gas prices
under their long-term supply contracts with the Russian gas
exporter. Gazprom also benefited from Europe’s dwindling supply
options as producers of liquefied natural gas diverted their
fuel to Asia, where prices reached a record in February and are
higher than in Europe.
Gazprom’s shipments to Germany, its largest customer in the
European Union, increased by more than 20 percent to levels last
reached before the 2008 economic crisis curbed demand, according
to the spokeswoman. Supplies to Italy jumped by more than 60
percent, she said.
Average Price
The average price that Gazprom charged its European
customers declined to “slightly above” $380 per 1,000 cubic
meters, according to Gazprom Export. That compares with $385 in
2012 and $383 in 2011, according to Gazprom’s 2012 financial
report.
Gazprom declined to comment on how much gas was supplied in
Russia and former Soviet republics. Shipments declined 9 percent
and 16 percent, respectively, in the first nine months of the
year from the same period of 2012.
European LNG imports declined by 23 percent in the first 10
months of 2013 and supplies will continue to be shipped away
from Europe next year, Trevor Sikorski, head of natural gas,
coal and carbon at Energy Aspects Ltd., said in a Dec. 20
research report.
“Our deep-dive analysis into global gas markets also
highlights a further 8 percent year-on-year growth in Europe’s
‘Call on Gazprom’ for 2014,” analysts at Sanford C. Bernstein &
Co., led by Oswald Clint, said in a Dec. 18 report.
(Bloomberg)