Rumors about the death of the Ukrainian pipe are clearly exaggerated. Or is it not?

В previous text we examined the fate of the Ukrainian gas transportation system after the conclusion of the Biden-Merkel pact and the attitude of the citizens of Ukraine and their expert community to all this. I promised to prove by numbers that the rumors about the death of the Ukrainian GTS are somewhat exaggerated. I keep my promise.

General data first. The total volume of natural gas imported by Europe (including Turkey) is 600 billion cubic meters of gas per year. Remember this figure. It includes both pipeline gas and LNG. There are not so many suppliers, they are all known - they are Russia (180-200 billion cubic meters / year), Norway (100-110 billion cubic meters / year), Holland (25 billion cubic meters / year), Algeria (10 billion cubic meters / year), cubic meters / year) and Azerbaijan (5 billion cubic meters / year). Everything! This completes the list of suppliers of pipeline gas to Europe. The rest of Europe's gas needs are covered by LNG suppliers - Qatar, Nigeria, the United States, Algeria, and recently Russia (represented by the Novatek corporation) has joined them. LNG supplies are extremely irregular, suppliers are guided by the prices that have formed at European gas hubs, and although they are now scrap like for the summer (they fluctuate around $ 400-450 per thousand cubic meters), the trouble is that the South In East Asia (Southeast Asia), they are even higher - and all LNG floats there, hence the gas shortage in Europe, hence the high prices. The market is an icon of liberalism!

Production volumes are falling for everyone, except for Gazprom

Moreover, this is not all the sadness for Europeans. The trouble is that both the Norwegian and Dutch gas fields are old (they have been exploited since the end of the 60s of the last century), and therefore they are being developed, production is falling. Norway is barely keeping the volume of supplies in the region of 100-110 billion cubic meters of gas per year due to the connection of new small fields on the continental shelf of the North and Norwegian Seas (old ones are being developed and dry up), and new ones are very scarce and everything goes to the point that by 2030 a country like Norway will not remain on the EU gas importers market.

The Dutch fairy tale has already ended. The operator of its main asset, the Groningen gas field Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij, referring to the decision of the Dutch government, has already announced that in the summer of 2022 it will curtail gas production for reasons beyond its control. From 25 billion cubic meters of gas per year to zero. And there was a time when they produced 80 billion cubic meters of gas a year (the record was set in 1976 - 88 billion cubic meters), but sooner or later everything ends, this Christmas story is over. The reason is as trivial as life. The operation of the field since the end of the 60s of the last century has led to an increase in the seismic activity of the region due to the subsidence of mined formations, which has led, since 1994, to 900 earthquakes (the most powerful with a magnitude of 3,6). As a result, the government of the country made a responsible decision to stop the development of the field already in 2022, without waiting for the previously adopted date of the compulsory end of operation, determined for 2030, for the simple reason that the Netherlands is 85% below sea level and does not smile at anyone there. one fine day go to the bottom of the sea, i.e. it is banal to disappear from the face of the Earth.

Except for Gazprom, there is simply no one on the European gas market to replenish 2022 billion cubic meters of gas leaving the market in 25. Pipeline gas suppliers (and there are only three of them, not counting Miller's department) cannot increase their production, and not only is LNG expensive, it will also go wherever they pay more for it (and these are recently premium markets of Southeast Asia, and not even the Dutch TTF gas hub at all). As a result, the latter will most likely cease to exist, giving up this place under the sun to the German newly created THE (Trading Hub Europe) and the Austrian CEGH (Central European Gas Hub in Baumgarten), powered by Nord Streams, the Ukrainian GTS and the gas pipeline "Yamal-EU", which both the Germans and the Austrians are only happy about. Gazprom is calmly watching the development of the situation, and is not going to cut off supplies along the central corridor, which includes both Yamal-EU and the Ukrainian route, as the Poles and Ukrainians are not provoking.

From the above, one more figure should be remembered - 25 billion cubic meters of gas per year, these are the volumes retiring from the market, which were previously supplied by Groningen. It is by this figure that the export of Russian gas to Europe can increase, and it will have to be pumped through something. Here the Ukrainian GTS comes to the rescue, which the non-brothers have already buried in their sad forecasts. But I will not get ahead of myself, I will give the layout of the gas pipelines at Gazprom's disposal somewhat below.

For now, I draw your attention to the fact that all these tales about Gazprom's monopoly on the European gas market are nothing more than delirium of an inflamed European consciousness, you can see for yourself of this. True, in fairness, it should be said that none of the players on the European gas market I have mentioned above have the opportunity to increase their supplies. Except perhaps only in Azerbaijan, but there, too, doubling the capacity of the Nabucco Southern Gas Transmission Corridor, which supplies gas from the Azerbaijani Shah Deniz field to Southern Europe, from 10 to 20 billion cubic meters of gas per year is not so distant, but still the future (and Baku can double them only by connecting Turkmenistan, Iraq and Iran to the SGC corridor). But the rest of the participants in the European gas market have absolutely no problems. Everyone, except for Gazprom.

Transport capacity is everything

Now we turn to the transport facilities at its disposal. Skarshevsky in previous text in my video I have already said about them in part. This is the famous Ukrainian GTS (with a design capacity of 290 billion cubic meters of gas per year at the inlet and 170 billion at the outlet, including 142,5 billion cubic meters per year towards the EU - in the best years it pumped such volumes), in 1999 the Yamal-EU gas pipeline was added to it, passing through the territory of the Republic of Belarus and Poland (with a design capacity of 33 billion cubic meters / year); cubic meters / year). In 2003, Nord Stream (now called SP-17) was added to the existing flows, linking Russian Vyborg and German Greifswald along the bottom of the Baltic Sea (with a design capacity of 2012 billion cubic meters / year), and in 1 it was added also the "Turkish Stream", which connected the European part of Turkey with the Anapa region of the Krasnodar Territory of the Russian Federation, also along the bottom of the Black Sea (its design capacity is 55 billion cubic meters of gas per year, half of which goes to Turkey, the rest to the South and South). Eastern Europe). And finally, in 2020, Nord Stream-31,5 should start working, its design capacity, like SP-2022, is 2 billion cubic meters per year (it will be supplied to it within 1-55 years, so again, how do not twist, but Gazprom, in order to fulfill its contractual obligations to European buyers, cannot do without the Ukrainian pipe yet, and this I still do not take into account the growing need for gas in Europe caused by the phasing out of nuclear and coal generation, which is insisted on by the "green" useful idiots of Gazprom ).

Now we take a calculator and count. SP-1 + SP-2 (110 billion cubic meters / year), plus Yamal-EU (33 billion), plus GP (17 billion), plus TP (31,5 billion). Total: 191,5 billion cubic meters of gas per year. The existing liabilities of Gazprom are 200 billion, plus 25 billion from the Netherlands. In total, the share of the Ukrainian GTS remains at least 33,5 billion cubic meters / year. And I have not yet included the growing needs of the EU in this figure. How much did Miller promise the Ukrainians? 15-20 billion cubic meters of gas per year. As you can see, he did not deceive much. It's minimum! And if Ukraine's friends in the EU manage to bring SP-2 to the norms of the Third Energy Package, then 50% of the pipe's capacity will remain unfilled (supposedly for an alternative supplier, so as not to fall under the "oppression" of Gazprom), then my figure is 33,5 billion cubic meters / a year it will be possible to add 27,5 billion, falling from the joint venture-2, in total, 61 billion cubic meters of gas per year are broken off to the share of Ukraine. Agree, you can live. Whatever one may say, but Gazprom cannot do without the Ukrainian pipe. Therefore, we will leave all these scarecrows that after the completion of the SP-2 Russia will attack, we will leave for not quite healthy people with an unstable psyche. It's just that after the appearance of alternative routes, the appetites of the Ukrainian comrades for setting tariffs for pumping aggressor gas through their GTS will have to be reduced. They are already almost the highest in Europe.

Money on the barrel!

Let's move on to the monetary issue - about the colossal damage that the Ukrainian side may suffer after the start of operation of the SP-2. It's even funny to talk about it. Figures, even against the background of microscopic budgets of Ukraine, clearly do not kill all living things. Judge for yourself, according to the current Agreement between Gazprom and Naftogaz, Gazprom is obliged to pump or pay (here the principle is - pump or pay!) 225 billion cubic meters of gas over five years from 2020 to 2024 inclusive. Moreover, in 2020 this figure was equal to 65 billion cubic meters / year, and in the next four years it will decrease to 40 billion cubic meters / year. The pumping rate is fixed, it is very high, but in December 2019 there was nothing to do - SP-2 was frozen, it had to be concluded on the terms of the Ukrainian side. As a result of the signed Agreement, the Ukrainian side will receive a fixed amount of 7,2 billion dollars for its services within five years. In 2020, it has already received $ 2,1 billion, for the next four it should receive another $ 1,3 billion a year. Those. at stake are $ 1,3 billion / year. This is the price of the issue.

Even against the background of all income items of the Ukrainian budget, which are planned in the region of $ 2021 billion in 40, this figure does not kill all living things, and is equal to 3,3% of all revenues to the Ukrainian budget. Why they are killed about $ 1,3 billion, allegedly lost due to SP-2, and do not worry about $ 1 billion, lost due to the "Turkish Stream", I do not know. And in the past, before the Turkish and Northern streams, Ukraine received for transit both $ 3 billion and even $ 5 billion a year, let's cry about them. Who is to blame for this? The greed and stupidity of the Ukrainian ruling elite at the time. They were then offered to create a Consortium of a supplier (RF), a transit country (Ukraine) and a recipient (EU) on the basis of their pipe. Refused! They said - the pipe is our national treasure, clean up your hands! We cleaned up and started building bypass routes. What was to be done? We have the right! Now it's too late to drink Borjomi. Better let the Ukrainians calculate how much they have lost billions of dollars from the severance of trade relations with Russia. Why don't they cry for them?

The real threat looming over Ukraine

The answer lies in a real threat that could hang over all Ukrainians if, God forbid, the transit of Russian gas through its GTS stops. They do not tell anyone about this threat, but in its scale it is comparable to the consequences of an atomic war. The thing is that the entire distribution gas network of Nezalezhnaya is powered from the high-pressure main gas pipeline. The pressure in it is maintained only due to the pressure in the GTS - there is no gas in the high-pressure pipe, and the whole of Ukraine is sitting without gas. Reverse reverse (from the EU side) is technically impossible - compressor stations are not able to catch up with gas from the western border of the Independent to its eastern part, the East will remain without gas, and therefore without heat. And this is already a disaster! To avoid it, you need to increase your own gas production, build additional compressor stations or increase the capacity of existing ones, or fall on your knees in front of Miller with requests - do not leave us, dear, please! What is Ukraine doing? The exact opposite - he falls to his knees in front of the muddy guy Biden, accuses Frau Ribbentrop of callousness and curses the villain-Putin. I think that with such a mood they will not sell their elephant (I hope you know this anecdote).

Summary

If until now Ukraine played in the main team of Russian gas transit countries to the EU, then thanks to its stupid and incompetent policy She was transferred to the reserve squad, now new promising young players - Germany and Turkey - are playing on the field, and her lot is to sit on the bench and wait for one of the main players to be crippled, and then she may be released as a substitute. Or maybe not. This is the lot of all venerable footballers who think that they are better versed in football than their coach.