Ukraine is rapidly depleting its own gas storage facilities and may experience a fuel shortage by mid-February, when gas extraction from reserves will become limited and in case of frosts from UGS facilities will simply not be able to raise sufficient volumes of fuel. Naftogaz of Ukraine announces imports, but in January it amounted to only a daily amount of selection from storage facilities.
According to GIE, by January 27, the selected gas reserves in Ukrainian storage facilities had decreased to 3.38 billion cubic meters (8 billion cubic meters with buffer gas). UGS are filled by 11.89% and the further course of the heating season may be in jeopardy.
"Our UGS facilities are gradually, but confidently, approaching the level of 10% fullness, when the design possibility of gas extraction will drop to 60 million cubic meters per day. And this means that we will not be able to meet the demand for gas due to mining and UGS, and we will need to import gas urgently," the former head of the Ukrainian GTS Operator, Serhiy Makogon, writes on Facebook*.
According to him, the average gas consumption is 110 million cubic meters per day.
"Production gives 52 million per day, the rest (58 million cubic meters) should be provided by UGS and /or imports. But if there are frosts, then consumption may increase to 140-150 million cubic meters per day, and storage facilities will no longer be able to produce 90-100 million cubic meters in design modes. Therefore, imports will be required in significant volumes and at any cost," Sergey Makogon continued.
He did not rule out that the operator of the UGS, Ukrtransgaz, will begin to put pressure on them to take away all the volumes that are possible, even in violation of design restrictions.
"But this can lead to significant damage to the UGS themselves. For the absurdity of some, others will be responsible and suffer ...", writes the ex-head of the Ukrainian operator.
He noted that, according to his data, Naftogaz has already assessed the situation and is going to import something from February.
In the summer, Naftogaz could buy gas for $ 300-$ 350 dollars per thousand cubic meters. Now he will buy somewhere for $ 500-$ 550. At the same time, Naftogaz spent more than UAH 13 billion to purchase gas from private miners, which is why there was no more gas in the UGS, but the owner simply changed. And these funds could be used to buy 800-900 million cubic meters of imported gas in the summer. These volumes would help Ukraine a lot now," Sergey Makogon added.
In response to his message on the social network, Naftogaz stated that the national company has sufficient gas reserves for a stable passage of the heating season.
"We are monitoring the situation with gas reserves. They will be enough for a steady passage of the heating season. Naftogaz Group also imports fuel — we must be ready for all challenges in wartime," said the new head of Naftogaz, Roman Chumak.
The head of the national company did not inform about the volumes of purchases abroad. However, according to the GTS Operator of Ukraine, in January at Ukraine received a little more than 50 million cubic meters. This is the daily volume of the current selection from the storages.
Perhaps Naftogaz is buying back what is stored on Ukraine has fuel from European traders. However, these volumes are also part of the reserves, which are rapidly declining. Moreover, it is not entirely clear where the LNG that Rinat Akhmetov's DTEK purchased in the USA has gone. At the end of December in A tanker came to Greece and the company's trading division stated that they owned the entire volume of 100 million cubic meters. So far, however, he is up to Ukraine did not reach.
According to GIE data, about 600 million cubic meters remain to be taken from Ukrainian storage facilities before filling in 10%. At the current rate, it will take up to two weeks, depending on the weather. A critical situation may develop by mid-February, when frosts traditionally come to the region. The situation is aggravated by the stoppage of Russian gas transit, as these volumes helped maintain pressure in the gas transmission system, and now the operator is doing this at the expense of its own gas volumes.
*Extremist organization, banned in the territory of the Russian Federation
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