Ukraine Cuts Gas Imports by 35%

KYIV, Ukraine, August 16, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

In January - June 2013 Ukraine managed to reduce its gas import by more than 35 percent compared to the same period in 2012, according to the State Statistics Service. In the first six month of 2013 Ukraine has imported 10,296 billion cubic meters of gas at a price tag of USD 4.334 billion. Notably, most of the Eastern European country's gas import still comes from Russia.

In June 2013 alone Ukraine reduced its import of natural gas down to 0.917 billion cubic meters paying USD 383,803 million - almost half of all gas imported in June 2012, as reported by Ukraine's Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry.

In August 2013 Ukraine's Naftogaz plans to purchase about 2-2.5 billion cubic meters of gas from Russian Gazprom. The projected volume of Russian gas Ukrainian government will purchase in the current year amounts to 18 billion cubic meters. The overall gas import to Ukraine will reach 27.3 billion cubic meters in 2013.

Notably, in 2012 Ukraine already managed to reduce gas import by 26.5 percent - down to about 32 billion cubic meters, following the country's consistent strategy on increasing energy independence. As to securing its independence from expensive Russian gas Ukraine also develops reverse gas supplies from the Western European countries. The total annual volume of gas to be delivered through the reverse supplies can reach over 30 billion cubic meters. This, however, does not eliminate import of Russian gas, but could stimulate adequate pricing, said Minister of Energy and Coal Industry of Ukraine Eduard Stavytskyi in July 2013.

Lately, Ukraine has been developing reverse gas routes from Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and Romania. Ukraine started purchasing gas in the EU in November 2012. On May 15, it started importing gas from Slovakia in a test mode. At this point, Ukrainian government expects to sign a contract for the supply of 7 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year through Hungary and Slovakia, reducing import from Russia to 20 billion cubic meters.

Moreover, in order to secure domestic gas consumption as well as gas transfer to Western Europe during the winter period Ukraine began pumping gas into its underground storages in mid-July 2013, as reported by unian.net.