Nord Stream, the world’s longest subsea natural gas pipeline, will halt the link from Russia to Germany for 11 days of planned maintenance.
The works will start June 24, 2014 and require a shutdown first of both lines and then of each pipe separately, Nord Stream said in a statement. Opal Gastransport, which carries natural gas onward from Nord Stream, said upstream maintenance would cut supply by 100% June 24-28 and 50% June 28 to July 4 in a maintenance schedule on its website dated June 2, 2014.
“The temporary interruption of supplies has been factored into the nominations of gas planned for Nord Stream to transport to downstream European partners during 2014,” the company said. “The schedule for these maintenance activities has been agreed and coordinated with Nord Stream’s upstream and downstream pipeline partners well in advance.”
An Gazprom led venture started work on Nord Stream, which ships Russian gas produced at Siberian fields directly to Germany under the Baltic Sea, in April 2010, 15 months after a pricing conflict with Ukraine interrupted transit shipments to European clients. While Gazprom halted supplies to Ukraine on June 16 this year in a comparable dispute, transit flows have thus far been unaffected.
The works will include annual maintenance of mechanical components, as well as testing of the automation system, Nord Stream said.
The 1,224 km Nord Stream pipeline can transport as much as 1.9 Tcf of gas annually, enough to meet more than 12% of the 28 nation EU’s demand. Gazprom cannot currently use the full capacity of Opal, a connecting pipeline onshore Germany, because of EU regulations requiring separate ownership of distribution and production assets.
The European Commission, the bloc’s regulator, may allow Gazprom to ship full volumes via Opal if the Ukraine situation remains unresolved and there are disruptions, Gazprom CEO Alexey Miller said June 16 in Moscow.
Gazprom, which has a monopoly on pipeline gas exports from Russia, supplies the fuel to Europe via the Yamal-Europe pipeline via Belarus and Poland and with gas from its storage facilities in the region as well as through Nord Stream and Ukraine.
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