Brussels, 16/10/2013 (Agence Europe) - In the first half of October, Russian gas giant Gazprom supplied 6.8 billion cubic metres of gas to the EU, a 30% rise on the same period in 2012, the company's Chief Executive Alexey Miller announced on 15 October. “This confirms our forecasts - Europe continues showing high demand for Russian gas and the upward trend of gas supplies to foreign markets will persist”, he says in a press release. Gazprom's total sales outside Russia rose by 15.5% in the first nine months of this year, to 119.4 billion cubic metres.
Gazprom not convinced of potential of schist gas. Russia does not see the sense in large-scale schist gas production given the huge traditional reserves it holds, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak is quoted by Russian agencies as saying on Wednesday. Gazprom has said several times that it does not see the potential of schist gas and describes what is happening in North America as simply a bubble. President Vladimir Putin said in the spring, however, that Russia had not turned its back on schist gas, noting that, according to experts, it offered significant prospects. Russia's schist gas reserves have been estimated at 8,000 billion cubic metres (9th place globally), providing 15 years of production. Russia has the world's second largest reserves of shale oil, however, and plans are already afoot to develop these in order to offset the loss of oilfields that are coming to the end of production. (EH/transl.fl)