Gazprom CEO Alexey Miller hopes to sell gas to Korea at high prices to promptly round off negotiations about gas deliveries to China.
Photo: Mikhail Razuvaev
| Other Photos |
 |
|
 |
S. Korea to Pay for Pipeline to China
It appears Gazprom has found the method to fulfill Putin’s order and implement the large-scale project of gas deliveries to China. Even though China is in no mood to yield to high gas prices, Gazprom will be able to offset the costs thanks to the intergovernmental agreement with South Korea that specifies gas deliveries there.
The intergovernmental agreement that was sealed in Seoul Thursday sets to motion the dialog of Gazprom with Kogas of Korea, Gazprom CEO Alexey Miller said yesterday. The negotiations are to result in a long-term contract for gas shipment to South Korea.
“The deliveries could begin in 2012 to 2013 in size of up to 10 billion cu meters a year,” Miller vowed. “There are two ways of laying a gas pipeline to South Korea – overland and offshore.”
When meeting Kogas CEO Lee Soo Ho, Miller also canvassed the possible deliveries of liquefied natural gas to South Korea. These deliveries will be effected under the swap and spot contracts and start much earlier. Gazprom sent the first tanker with LNG to Korea even before the yesterday's visit of Russia's PM Mikhail Fradkov there.
According to analysts, the odds are on project that will provide for shipping the gas to South Korea via the soil of China. Moreover, the future Korean contract of Russia's gas monopoly could be tied to its plans to advance on Chinese market.
Gazprom will soon round off negotiations for shipping 30 billion cu meters of gas to China in 2011. But to ensure the whole amount expected (70 billion cu meters a year), it has to find another moneybag in the region. Backed up by strong coal industry, China has refused for many years to buy gas at the European prices, pressing for discount and special low price.
As to South Korea, the additional incentive for it could be the promise of Gazprom’s assistance to Kogas in joining the Sakhalin-2 project, the analysts speculate.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 18, 2006
|
|
|
