Gazprom Starts Producing LNG at Plant Near Nord Stream Pipeline

Gazprom PJSC has produced its first liquefied natural gas at a small-scale facility on the Baltic Coast near the start of the shuttered Nord Stream pipeline to Germany.

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(Bloomberg) — Gazprom PJSC has produced its first liquefied natural gas at a small-scale facility on the Baltic Coast near the start of the shuttered Nord Stream pipeline to Germany. 

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Two production lines at Portovaya LNG have produced some 30,000 tons of the super-chilled fuel, Gazprom Deputy Chief Executive Officer Vitaly Markelov said at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok. One tanker is already moored near the facility while another is expected to arrive soon, Markelov said, providing no comments on the destination.

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The LNG plant is located near the Portovaya compressor station, the starting point of the Nord Stream pipeline under the Baltic Sea that failed to return from maintenance on Saturday, exacerbating Europe’s energy crisis. Earlier this year, the facility was in the spotlight after NASA satellites detected flaring on Russia’s Baltic coast, raising concerns that the nation’s gas giant was burning fuel rather than supplying it to Europe amid sanctions over the war in Ukraine. Flaring is a normal part of the commissioning of LNG facilities. 

The facility completed 72 hours of testing on Monday, though “some paperwork is left to be done,” Markelov said. 

Portovaya LNG has an annual capacity of 1.5 million tons, or less than a sixth of the nameplate capacity of the Gazprom-led Sakhalin-2 site in Russia’s Far East. Portovaya is set to supply the super-chilled fuel to Russia’s Kaliningrad region, sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland, and increase Gazprom’s portfolio.