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Transneft Won't Stray from Export Schedule
The Federal Antimonopoly Service will submit a draft government resolution on Transneft to government agencies for conciliation by the end of the month. The resolution will give the state oil transport company the right to set the oil export schedule and to confirm the procedure for providing nondiscriminatory access to the pipeline to oil companies, Federal Antimonopoly Service deputy chairman Anatoly Golomolzin told Kommersant. Transneft continues to insist that setting the export schedule is the work of a state agency, not the company.
Golomolzin said that the purpose of the draft resolution is to unify practice among natural monopolies. “There is no organ in electric energy that confirms schedules,” Golomolzin observed. “There they have a completely comprehensible procedure for turning in an application and a deadline for its consideration.” He added that it was the Federal Power Agency and the Ministry of Industry and Energy that were insisting on the transfer of scheduling rights to Transneft. The changeover may take six months to a year to complete.
Negotiations on transferring that right to Transneft have been going on since 2004. Formally, the schedule is set by Rosenergo and confirmed by the Ministry of Industry and Energy. In reality, Transneft is already involved in the scheduling process. Golomolzin made it known that a working group made up of representatives of the Ministry of Industry and Energy, Rosenergo, the Federal Antimonopoly Service, Ministry of Economic Development and Trade and Transneft was able to conciliate the draft with Transneft and “it is not an additional burden or a punishment for the company.”
Both the Ministry of Industry and Energy and Transneft have stated that their positions have not changed. Neither agency would comment on the draft resolution or when it might be submitted to the government. The Federal Antimonopoly Service said that the changes would come into effect no sooner than next year.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Mar. 13, 2007
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