The rush by the likes of China, the E.U. and the U.S. toward Turkmenistan as an alternative supplier of gas to Russia defies logic as the country may not be able to meet its contractual volumes, the chief executive of Russian gas monopoly OAO Gazprom (GAZP.RS), Alexei Miller, will say in a speech Tuesday.
"Sometimes the zeal to diversify at any price defies logic and leads to curious results," Miller will say in a speech to be delivered at the European Business Congress here, according to information received by Dow Jones Newswires.
Officials and companies from the E.U., the U.S. and China are courting the Central Asian state in a bid to secure gas resources, he will say.
" Turkmenistan seems to be contracting gas volumes which are not guaranteed by proven reserves or real production capacities...as a result, some customers risk not actually getting the gas they are contracted to receive."
Late May, Turkmenistan 's deputy oil and gas minister Bairamgeldy Nedirov said the country's gas production will soar to 250 billion cubic meters annually by 2040, from 72 bcm last year.
The country will export 200 bcm of gas in 2040, compared with 50 bcm last year, the official of the secretive state said, with exports of 125 bcm by 2015 and 140 bcm by 2020.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Friday that he would travel to the Turkmenistan at the beginning of July amid a struggle to control its enormous gas reserves, AFP reported.
"We will discuss a range of issues in early July during my official visit to Ashgabat," Medvedev said during a meeting with Turkmen counterpart Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov on the sidelines of a regional summit in St. Petersburg.
"Russia is Turkmenistan 's main strategic partner," Berdymukhamedov said.
Gazprom's Deputy CEO Alexander Medvedev will say Tuesday that the company believes it would be a "big mistake" if continental Europe abandoned the pricing of gas index-linked to oil prices.
"There is no evidence that when transitioning to free-floating export prices on gas they will in fact be lower than those indexed...in terms of oil," he will say.