MOSCOW, January 20. /TASS/. Reverse gas supplies via the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline from Germany to Poland have continued for a month, according to the information provided by the gas transport operator Gascade. Gazprom stopped directly pumping gas via the pipeline to Europe on December 21, 2021, due to the lack of requests from European consumers.
Reverse gas supplies via the pipeline from Germany to Poland are not only underway, they reached almost 1.3 mln cubic meters per hour earlier on Thursday, which corresponds to around 30.4 mln cubic meters per day.
The Yamal-Europe transnational gas pipeline stretches over the territory of Russia, Belarus, Poland, and Germany. The design capacity of the pipeline is 32.9 bln cubic meters of gas per year.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier that Gazprom did not book capacities on the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline due to the lack of purchase orders from European buyers. Reverse deliveries enable the Europeans to re-sell gas purchased under long-term contracts, he added.
Gazprom itself has noted that it supplies gas to Europe in accordance with consumers’ requests under current contracts.
Gazprom gas exports to non-CIS countries plunged by 41.1% in the first half of January 2022 to 5.4 bln cubic meters. There was no pumping via Yamal-Europe, while the deliveries through Nord Stream dropped by almost 7.5% compared with the end of 2021. Moreover, gas transit via Ukraine was almost 2.5-fold lower from January 1 to 18 year-on-year, according to the figures on the company’s website. That said, Gazprom boosted supplies in January in several directions, including Bulgaria, Turkey, Bosnia and Herzegovina.