To this end, the ministry has submitted to the government an updated description of procedures on diversification of natural gas supply, which has been worked out in accordance with amended provisions of the Law on LNG terminal.
“The draft decision aims to establish the minimum annual volume of natural gas regasification, which is necessary to maintain stable process of regasification technology of the liquefied natural gas terminal in the minimum uninterrupted mode, as well as to amend the description of procedures on diversification of natural gas supply,” the ministry said in a letter to the government.
“<…> to establish, for a period of at least five years from the date of application of natural gas supply diversification requirements, the minimum annual volume of natural gas regasification, which is necessary to maintain stable process of regasification technology of the liquefied natural gas terminal operating in the minimum uninterrupted mode, i.e. 540 million cubic meters of gas per year,” the ministry said.
According to the ministry, this measure would help ensure that the natural gas imported through and re-gasified at the LNG facility would be given priority when buying gas for state-governed generation of electricity or heat.
The description of procedures on natural gas supply diversification stipulates that electricity producers and the designated supplier would have until May 1, 2014, to sign contracts of at least five years’ term. However, natural gas purchase volumes could be revised each year.
Klaipėdos Nafta (Klaipėda Oil), the state-owned petroleum product terminal operator, is developing the LNG facility project. About a billion cubic meters of gas is expected to be pumped via the LNG facility in its first year of operation. It is planned that the LNG terminal in Klaipėda will have an annual capacity of 2 to 3 billion cubic meters. Lithuania plans to build the LNG terminal to obtain a cheaper alternative to Gazprom-supplied Russian gas by the end of 2014.
The National Control Commission for Prices and Energy estimates that gas consumption in Lithuania this year should decline by 1.8 percent from 2012, to some 3 billion cubic meters.
Klaipėdos Nafta is quoted on the Secondary List of the NASDAQ OMX Vilnius Stock Exchange.
