Gazprom On Track To Fill Russian Gas Storage By End-October

Gazprom is on track to have filled Russia’s underground gas storage by the end of this month, a senior executive said on Thursday, which could potentially mean that the Russian gas giant could send more gas to Europe after that.        

The Russian gas monopoly, a major supplier to Europe, has been accused in recent weeks of deliberately withholding additional supply to its customers, thus exacerbating the natural gas crunch and sending prices to record highs.

The European Commission is looking into complaints from some European Union (EU) member states that Russia isn’t sending more gas on top of the long-term contracted volumes, European Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson told Reuters on Tuesday.

“We are looking into this claim, together with Executive Vice President Vestager, who is responsible for competition rules, because it is of course a very serious matter,” Simson said.

However, “Our initial assessment suggests that Russia is fulfilling its long-term contracts,” the EU Energy Commissioner told Reuters.

After reaching another record high on Wednesday, natural gas prices in Europe and the UK reversed some of the gains later in the day after Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested that Gazprom could send more gas to its European customers.

Putin also took the opportunity to blame the high natural gas prices on Europe. What’s more, Putin blamed Europe’s energy market crisis on the green transition.

On Thursday, the International Energy Agency’s executive director Fatih Birol told the Financial Times that the IEA’s assessment points to the fact that Russia could boost its European exports by 15 percent of peak winter supply.

The IEA’s head called on Russia to prove it is a reliable supplier, as it has always claimed it is. If Gazprom raises exports, the additional volumes could ease the supply crunch and calm the nervous markets, Birol told FT.

“I don’t say they will do it but if they wish so, they have the capacity to do it,” the IEA’s chief told FT, referring to Russia.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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