Azerbaijan, Baku, Oct. 8 / Trend , H.Hasanov/
The issue of resuming the Turkmen gas supplies to Russia via the Central Asia-Center (CAC) pipeline, halted more than six months ago, still remains open.
The Russian President's Press Service has reported only a "political decision", reached by the Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev during his visit to Turkmenistan in mid-September. The main issue - the price - has not been touched on. Time needed for coordination to a greater extent, apparently, depends on forecasts of weather forecasters. A heating season is coming.
OJSC Gazprom, as it turns out, is hammering out the specific agreement with the Turkmengaz state concern and starts issuing the contract. Just a week ago, one of the Russian monopolist's reports said that there is no Turkmen segment in the Gazprom's 2009 plans updated due to the crisis.
Yesterday, the official of the Turkmen fuel and energy complex added few details at the oil and gas conference in Kazakhstan that transportation in the northern direction may be resumed by late October. However, he said, the issue with the price has not yet agreed. In general, uncertainties in the long-standing history between Ashgabat and Moscow do not become smaller after a personal meeting of the Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov with Medvedev.
If one does not consider the facts that the distinguished guest was presented Akhalteke racer, and in his presence, the agreement on production sharing was signed on one of the blocks in the Turkmen part of the Caspian Sea with Russia's ITERA, which, incidentally, held negotiations for several years and hoped for the three hydrocarbon blocks. The sides resolved technical issues for the CAC, have agreed upon "price formula", but did not agree on a specific price issue for natural gas supplies, neither via the existing pipelines, nor the future ones. According to the latest news, everything remains under negotiation.
Russia suspended imports in April this year because of the accident on the main CAC. Turkmenistan declared that the explosion occurred for one reason: the Russia company drastically reduced the volume of the Turkmen natural gas without prior notice. Such actions were described by the Turkmen Foreign Ministry as "hasty and irresponsible, because it created a real threat to life and health of people and could cause unpredictable ecological consequences." The Russian company is accused of "unilateral gross violation of contract terms of gas sale." Economists said that Turkmenistan lost up to one billion dollars per month.
Moscow has contracted the Turkmen gas for year ahead, for 25 years - up to 50 billion cubic meters of gas annually, with a request for further increase. The sides agreed to hold talks on prices, separately, in 2009 it was established, as was supposed, yet in 2008. The world recession has made major adjustments, but a sudden accident served as a pretext.
Russia has not accepted any protests, saying that Turkmenistan had been warned in advance, but the decline was forced, as demand for natural gas considerably decreased in the world due to the global crisis. Elementary arithmetic won geopolitics, but the Russian media reports that even such giant company as Gazprom could not afford to buy gas for unreasonably high prices at a loss. Avoiding Ashgabat's request on compensation for technical failure, Moscow raised the issue of reviewing the transaction to cut either the volume of purchases of gas, or its value.
In such scenario, the Trans-Caspian gas pipeline project through Kazakhstan to Russia (bandwidth up to 30 billion cubic meters of gas per year) almost fell out of sight. At least, Astana as a transit partner pulled up a feasibility study of its site.
Turkmenistan possesses the world's largest natural gas reserves (ranking fourth, following Russia, Iran and Qatar), and claims the role of one of the key players in the energy field in the Caspian region. By early 2010, Ashgabat will use an alternate pipeline to China (a design capacity of up to 40 billion), additional branches will be launched to Iran (which will give the opportunity to sell up to 20 billion cubic meters). All this, one way or another, marks the end of the era of Gazprom monopolist in Central Asia, maintaining certain leverage to prevent the Central Asia from the expensive European market.
Brussels hopes that the Turkmen gas can partially fill the Nabucco project (more than $30 billion), which should lay the pipeline under the Caspian Sea. But this, as experts believe, can be prevented by the differences again arose between the two close neighbors - Azerbaijan (ready gas supplier for Nabucco) and Turkmenistan (potential) - because of disputes over hydrocarbon fields in the Caspian Sea.
"It is much more important to solve a legal problem in general, than to argue about ownership of separate geographical areas," recently said Berdimuhamedov, who also noted that he was in favor of economic pragmatism and ready to continue the diplomatic dialogue with Baku. The unresolved legal status of the Caspian Sea can prolong the time of Turkmenistan's joining the European project. "This is to some extent played into the hands of Moscow and in addition to Tehran. They are interested in the energy dominance in the region," considers the western expert, who has worked for many years in Ashgabat.
"Predictably, the upcoming Baku summit of the Caspian Sea would not solve the problem," he said, noting that Baku and Ashgabat would be advantageous to reach a compromise on the bilateral level, in order "together to forestall."
Russia does not want to lose their accustomed positions, although earlier it was profitable - for a long period, the Central Asian gas (and at a low price) is acquired for its resale at exorbitant prices to Europe and Iran, because of growing demand for new energy sources in the EU, hopes to end the isolation of the country and independently engage in the game. As recently noted by Berdimuhamedov, the gas market in the near future will not be less important than the oil market on the planet.
Turkmenistan - one of the world's largest hydrocarbons exporters, and its position over time has not become weaker, because the country has proven reserves of hydrocarbons, which is enough for dozens of years for strong exports.
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