Registration / Login
text version
War and Peace

 Hot news

Main page » News » View
Printable version
Gazprom plans Ukraine bypass
08.04.13 23:08 f.USSR
By Vladimir Socor

On April 3, in Moscow, President Vladimir Putin and Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller announced a colossal series of gas projects. These involve an expansion of existing big projects or a reactivation of earlier, unimplemented proposals. Ukraines start of gas imports from Europe, reducing dependence on Gazprom, triggered this Putin-Miller move. In a set-piece dialogue, they outlined these intentions:

  • Reviving the Shtokman extraction project in the Russian Arctic (no specifics mentioned);
  • Adding a third parallel line to the Nord Stream pipeline on the Baltic seabed to Western Europe, and prolonging that third line tosupply the Netherlands and Britain with Russian gas. This would boost Nord Streams capacity from the existing 55 billion cubic meters (bcm) to more than 80 bcm per year;
  • Designing the South Stream pipeline for its originally proposed capacity of 63 bcm per year, with four parallel lines on the seabed of the Black Sea en route to Europe. This seems to imply reinstating South Streams southwestern branch toward Italy, which Moscow had dropped in 2011 from the initial project, instead prioritizing the northwestern branch to Central Europe;
  • Building a new pipeline from Belarus via Polish territory to Slovakia - the long-proposed Kobryn (Belarus)-Poland-Velke Kapusany (Slovakia) line - to connect Russia with Central Europe. This line would plug into Slovakias gas corridor.
  • The Slovakian corridor carries the lions share of Russian gas supplies to the European Union, representing the direct continuation of Ukraines transit pipelines to Europe. The proposed Kobryn-Velke Kapusany line would circumvent Ukraine, but would not affect Slovakia, inasmuch as the same gas volume would enter Slovakia from Poland, instead of entering from Ukraine. The export destinations (Austria with the Baumgarten distribution center, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Italy) would not be affected either.

    Compared with the Nord Stream and South Stream mega-projects, a Kobryn-Velke Kapusany pipeline with its proposed 15-bcm annual capacity looks almost restrained. But, if built, it could deal a coup de grace to Ukraines gas transit system, which is already facing the South Stream bypass threat. A Kobryn-Velke Kapusany line would not add any new volumes of Russian gas to Europe. The operative goal of this project is to increase Russian pressure on Ukraine to cede control over its transit pipelines to Gazprom.

    To achieve that operative purpose, the Kobryn-Velke Kapusany project need not be actually implemented. It only needs to become a credible threat, which would however require Warsaws and Bratislavas acquiescence, at least in the form of conducting serious discussions about this project with Moscow.

    Apparently, the Kremlin and Gazprom hope that the European Union member countries Poland and Slovakia might assist Russias efforts to obtain control over Ukraines transit pipelines under compounded pressures.

    According to Putin and Miller in their joint appearance, Gazprom has recently held talks with Polish and Slovakian companies, which allegedly expressed very strong interest in the implementation of the Kobryn-Poland-Velke Kapusany pipeline.

    According to Putin and Miller, this line could be built and become operational by 2018–2019, after South Stream will have been built by 2017. Stipulating such deadlines (without a discussion of resources for the South Stream project) is designed to scare Ukraine into submission. Russia would not need to come up with new gas volumes, but merely to re-route existing export volumes into a Polish transit pipeline, before they reach Ukraines transit system.

    Kobryn, in the southwestern corner of Belarus on the Polish border, is the exit point of the Beltranshaz trunk pipeline connecting with Polands pipeline grid. Gazproms proposal, under discussion since the late 1990s, envisages building a 600-kilometer pipeline from Kobryn, via eastern Poland, to Velke Kapusany in easternmost Slovakia, the entry point of the main transit pipeline from Ukraine en route to Central Europe.

    Under the latest, Putin-Miller proposal, Gazprom would divert 15 bcm per year from Ukraines transit pipelines into the Kobryn-Velke Kapusany route. Whether the re-routing of this volume would still allow sufficient capacity for Russian gas supply to Belarus itself through the Beltranshaz pipeline is not entirely clear. Russia normally supplies Belarus with approximately 20 bcm of gas annually for Belaruss own consumption. Another 2.5 bcm per year of Russian gas is delivered through a Beltranshaz line to Lithuania and onward to Russias Kaliningrad exclave.

    Gazprom has completed in 2011 a phased takeover of Beltranshaz under Gazproms full ownership, achieving an integrated gas transportation system on Belaruss territory. This is partly intended as an overture to a phased takeover of Ukraines gas transit system. Meanwhile, it is obviously more profitable for Gazprom to use its own transit pipeline on Belaruss territory, rather than pay transit fees for using Ukrainian transit pipelines.

    Separately from Beltranshaz, Gazprom owns and operates the Yamal-Europe One transit pipeline, with a capacity of 30 bcm per year, running across northern Belarus into Poland and onward to Germany. The Yamal-Europe One pipeline is fully dedicated to supplying Poland and Germany with Russian gas. Russia (and, at times, Poland) intermittently discussed building a Yamal-Europe Two pipeline, parallel to Yamal-Europe One, toward Poland and possibly Germany.

    The construction of Nord Stream on the Baltic seabed, bypassing the mainland, has rendered that version of Yamal-Europe Two moot. Moscow, however, now proposes the name Yamal-Europe Two for the Beltranshaz trunk pipeline that would carry Russian gas from a junction point within Belarus to Kobryn and the exit to Poland.

    Poland has no need for this pipeline, no reason to cooperate with this Russian project, and no grounds for compounding the pressure on Ukraine. However, Slovakia is a vulnerable target of Gazprom. Like Ukraine, Slovakia is fearful of losing transit volumes in the event that Russia builds South Stream. In that case, the same westbound gas volumes that would be shifted from Ukraines transit pipelines could ipso facto be shifted from Slovakias transit pipelines, these being a direct westward continuation of Ukraines pipelines.

    Moscow, however, now seems to offer to maintain the gas transit volumes through Slovakia, re-directing them via Poland, instead of Ukraine, into the Slovakian pipeline system. Russias move seeks to isolate Ukraine while incentivizing a separate Slovak deal with Gazprom.

    The South Stream project is designed to scare Slovakia almost as much as Ukraine. The pressure on Slovakia is not so obvious because Russia refrains from advertising it publicly, whereas it heavily publicizes its pressures on Ukraine.

    Back in 2000–2002, Russia insistently discussed the Kobryn-Poland-Velke Kapusany project with Belarus, Poland and the European Union, in an early effort to circumvent Ukraines transit system. In 2002, Ukraine ostensibly agreed (without seriously intending to deliver) to share its transit system with Gazprom in a consortium, possibly with minority German participation.

    After this, Moscow de-emphasized the Kobryn-Poland-Velke Kapusany project because it counted on using the Ukrainian system under Gazproms control. This story may recur, albeit to a full denouement this time, if Ukraine yields to Russian pressure. In that case, the unaffordable South Stream and the more bankable Kobryn-Poland-Velke Kapusany project would become redundant.

    Vladimir Socor is a Senior Fellow of the Washington-based Jamestown Foundation and its flagship publication, Eurasia Daily Monitor, and is an internationally recognized expert on the former Soviet-ruled countries in Eastern Europe, the South Caucasus and Central Asia. Socor is a regular guest lecturer at the NATO Defense College and at Harvard University’s National Security Program’s Black Sea Program. He is a Romanian-born citizen of the United States based in Munich, Germany.

     

    USSR215.08.13 17:12
    Kirdyk ukranian dreams
    Ðóññêèé
    Archive
    Forum

     Exclusiveread more rss

    » Destruction of Ukraine’s Central Bank
    » The World files their 27 Grievances against the United States of America.
    » Yom Kippur War Redux – Petrol D0llar’s Last Hurrah
    » How the Alchemists saved the Planet in 2019
    » What will the US Treaty of Paris look like?
    » Addition by Subtraction, (x, y)↦x−y
    » Too Little, Too Late, will there be a Romanov ending for the Sudairi Seven?
    » Week 21: When economic arguments end, the arms race begins

     Newsread more rss

    » Afghan Taliban leader accuses U.S. of creating doubts over pact
    » Kyrgyz President Accuses Atambayev of Violating Constitution by Resisting Detention
    » Chinese foreign ministry slams U.S. interference in Venezuela
    » With an eye on Russia, China and a horse, Pentagon chief visits Mongolia
    » Pentagon Claims Iran Uses GPS Jamming in the Gulf So It Can Lure and Seize Foreign Ships
    » USAF X-37B Military Space Planes Mystery Mission Circling Earth Hits 700 Days
    » China destabilizing Indo-Pacific: U.S. Defense Secretary
    » EU must change its negotiating terms for Brexit, says Barclay

     Reportsread more rss

    » A Brief History of the CIA’s Dirty War in South Sudan
    » US GDP report: Keynes on steroids
    » Are Russia and the US Finally on the Same Page in Afghanistan?
    » The IMF Takeover of Pakistan
    » Voices from Syria’s Rukban Refugee Camp Belie Corporate Media Reporting
    » Report Shows Corporations and Bolsonaro Teaming Up to Destroy the Amazon
    » Ukraine: the presidents change, but the oligarchical system remains the same
    » The Cowardice of Aung San Suu Kyi

     Commentariesread more rss

    » The Biggest Threat to the US Indo-Pacific Strategy? Washington Itself.
    » Ukraine on the cusp of change
    » India’s Looming Agricultural Crisis: A Unique Chance to Change the System?
    » The Saker interviews Stephen Karganovic
    » Media and Politicians Ignore Oncoming Financial Crisis
    » In an astonishing turn, George Soros and Charles Koch team up to end US ‘forever war’ policy
    » Vladimir Putin says liberalism has ‘become obsolete’
    » You Are Fighting In The Most Important Battle Of All Time

     Analysisread more rss

    » A battle for supremacy between China and the US
    » UAE Withdrawal from Yemen
    » US, Pakistan move in tandem to end Afghan war
    » Is Baoshang Bank China’s Lehman Brothers?
    » From the Green Revolution to GMOs: Toxic Agriculture Is the Problem Not the Solution
    » OPEC+ oil supply cuts signal smooth Gulf sailing
    » G20 Osaka: the end of American leadership?
    » Trump’s Brilliant Strategy to Dismember U.S. Dollar Hegemony
     
    text version The site was founded by Natalia Laval in 2006 © 2006-2024 Inca Group "War and Peace"