Turkey and Russia are still wrangling over gas flows and prices, even as the two countries discuss deepening their energy partnership by diverting the planned South Stream pipeline from Bulgaria to Turkey.
Flow rates through the Balkan pipeline route that carries Russian gas to Turkey through Ukraine, Romania and Bulgaria — known in Turkey as the Western Line — are still at around half of their contract volume of 42mn m³/day, energy minister Taner Yildiz told reporters in Ankara the day after a visit by Russian president Vladimir Putin.
"We repeated our demand for an increase in the flow because we are in December, and the peak demand months of January and February are approaching," Yildiz said today. "Officials will look again at this today because the flow has to achieve contracted volumes."
Turkey is not a party to Russia's disputes with the EU and Ukraine, and it is wrong that its gas supplies should be cut because the pipeline passes through Ukraine, Yildiz added.
Yildiz also said that the six percent cut in the price of natural gas for Turkey's state-controlled gas importer Botas that Putin announced yesterday is only an offer and Turkey has presented a counter-offer seeking a deeper reduction, which he did not specify. The Russian proposal is a "positive step" and Turkey hopes to conclude the price talks by the end of the month, Yildiz said.
But the price cut is unlikely to be passed on to consumers because Botas sells gas to Turkish industry and households at a loss, Yildiz said.
Russia is Turkey's biggest gas supplier and the two countries are deepening their energy ties even as they disagree over international issues such as Syria, and Russia rows with the EU. Turkey started talks to join the EU in 2005, but the accession process has stalled in recent years.
Russia will start building sections of Turkey's first nuclear power plant in March next year, after it won environmental approval yesterday. The two countries also agreed a 3bn m³/yr expansion of the Blue Stream pipeline and resolved to explore the possibility of re-routing the South Stream pipeline to Turkey. The EU's refusal to permit the pipeline to land there had made the original route impossible, Putin said.
Yildiz said the experience with the Western Line has underlined the importance of having direct exclusive pipeline access to supplies, and the possibility of terminating South Stream in Turkey also offers the attraction of establishing an international gas trading hub close to the Greek border in Turkish Thrace. Diverting to Turkey would only involve a small change to the final sections of the pipeline route, he said.
But the plan is in the very preliminary stages and Yildiz said there has been no discussion of what stake Turkey would take in any project or of any contractual details. Turkey is looking at the proposal while it also plans for the arrival of increased volumes of Azeri gas and the possibility of other supplies from Iraq, Iran and the eastern Mediterranean, Yildiz said.
The proposed pipeline will have a capacity of 63bn m³/yr, of which 14bn m³/yr would be allocated to Turkey, Russia's state-controlled Gazprom said. That allocation is the same as Turkish state-owned and private-sector companies are currently contracted to take from the Western Line. The remainder would be transported to the Greek border where a delivery point would be arranged, Gazprom chief executive Alexei Miller said.
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