Russia’s Gazprom is attempting to negotiate a five-year extension of its existing short-term gas supply contract with Turkmenistan’s gas producer Turkmengaz following the resumption of Turkmen gas sales to the state-controlled Russian gas monopoly in early April.

Russian Deputy Minister of Energy Anatoly Yanovsky has suggested that both companies are trying to agree the start-up of deliveries under the discussed contract extension from 1 July.

Supplies under the current contract are expected to come to a halt by the end of June.

In its latest Russian standards accounting report, Gazprom said that it and Turkmengaz signed an amicable agreement on 31 January 2019 to resolve their mutual claims in an arbitration institute in Stockholm, Sweden.

A short-term contract between the two companies calls for the delivery of about 1.2 billion cubic metres of Turkmen gas to Russia via the Central Asia-Centre trunkline built in the Soviet era.

Industry observers in Moscow do not expect Turkmenistan to increase its gas deliveries to Russia, as the country continues to push forward with a major gas export pipeline project, known as Tapi, under its long-term plan to diversify its export routes.

The Tapi project calls for an export pipeline to be laid from Turkmenistan across Afghanistan and Pakistan to the country’s border with India, with an annual throughput capacity of 33 Bcm of gas.

Additionally, Turkmenistan is also looking at the possibility of arranging cross-Caspian gas pipeline shipments to Azerbaijan, from where it could ship gas to European markets.

The country’s key gas export market remains China, to which Turkmenistan is linked by a three-leg pipeline, with an option to add a fourth leg.

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Gazprom aims for extension