KIEV: Russian natural gas transit via Ukraine to European countries increased 21 per cent year-on-year to 43.2 billion cubic meters in the first seven months of 2016, official data showed Tuesday. “The transit is carried out in accordance with the contract obligations — in full and in a timely manner,” the Ukrainian state-run Ukrtransgaz Company said in a statement. In July, Russian gas transit through Ukraine to Europe has decreased 17.6 per cent compared with the same month of last year, the statement said.
Currently, about 164.1 million cubic meters of Russian gas is pumped to consumers in Europe via the Ukrainian pipelines every day, it said. In January, Ukraine has raised fees for Russian gas transit via its territory by 67 per cent to $4.5 per 100 km. In 2015, Ukraine delivered 67.081 billion cubic meters of Russian gas to European countries, up 7.9 per cent from a year before. Around 40 per cent of Russia’s gas exports to the European Union traverse Ukraine but Russian gas giant Gazprom has said it seeks to bypass Ukraine by building new pipelines and this could hit Ukrainian transit business.
Ukraine operates several transit pipelines. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said last month Ukraine was unreliable as a transit route for exporting Russian gas to Europe. Russian energy giant Gazprom’s head Alexei Miller has said Russian gas transit to Europe via Ukraine would fall steeply after 2020. Gas will be instead delivered via the second leg of the Nord Stream pipeline under the Baltic Sea to Germany, which Gazprom wants to build together with Royal Dutch Shell among others, despite opposition of some European Union countries. Ukraine has not bought gas directly from Russia since November 2015, importing instead from Europe.
