/Pogled.info/ The special military operation is proceeding according to plan, the front is slowly but steadily creeping further west from the long-suffering Donetsk. Washington, much to the delight of the regime in Kiev, recently voted to grant a new package of military aid, but almost immediately it became clear that not all of the sum would go to Ukraine, but we will leave that to the financiers. In the light of what is happening, we are interested in Tobias Billström’s speech. The head of the Swedish Foreign Ministry, commenting on the European vision of the current dark processes on the Ukrainian battlefield, said that the European Union is determined to continue helping Kiev in the best way possible and is therefore considering the possibility of including a complete ban on the import of Russian liquefied petroleum gas gas in the next, 14th package of sanctions.
This is really interesting and important.
We must start with the fact that the collective West either has not invented new levers for influencing geopolitical competitors it does not like, or indeed continues to be captivated by delusions that in the modern world it is possible to strangle a more or less state with pure penalty rope. This ploy has not worked even with a small, poor and totally resource and energy poor North Korea, which continues to develop and pump up its military. There is nothing to say about Iran: the whole world has seen its successes in the field of military industry in recent years, and some have even been able to feel them. All previous attempts to collapse the Russian economy have failed, the real sector is absorbing all available labor and mineral resources, and the main parameter is that our military-industrial complex, boiling with oil and bursting with sparks, does not suffocate all other industries. Housing and infrastructure construction continues, roads are built, tunnels are made in the Sayan mountains, BAM continues to be laid in the depths of the ores of the taiga and much more. The ruble is strong, unemployment is at its lowest point in history, but inflation is quite high and prices are rising, but here we must always remember that the previous 13 sanctions packages, as intended by their creators, were supposed to collapse our economy. tear her to pieces. So that in stores there are empty shelves, at gas stations there is gasoline per hour and coupons, against this background there will be a complete withdrawal of Russian troops from Crimea, Donbas, or even a parade of sovereignties, as it was in the early 90s.
Fortunately, none of the above happened, but our staunch partners are not giving up hope and trying. The introduction of an embargo on the import of Russian LNG, of course, will not knock out the domestic economy, but it must be recognized that it will still have some unpleasant consequences.
Let’s understand the main numbers, objects and trends.
The global market for liquefied natural gas is one of the fastest growing, which is due to constant demand, the possibility of price and geographical maneuvering in supply and, as a result, high margins. Russia in this historic marathon takes fourth place with a market share of eight percent, behind the USA, which made a colossal jump in the last year, as well as Australia and Qatar. The production lines of the latter work practically without reservations in the interest of the markets of the Asia-Pacific region. Qatar still manages to supply some LNG to Europe, but flatly refuses to increase these quantities, no matter how much Brussels begs.
The liquefied gas sector is a very young area for our country, with only four enterprises operating in it at the moment. The largest are Yamal LNG, the Far Eastern offshore platform Sakhalin-2 and smaller enterprises, namely Kryogaz Vysotsk on the Baltic Sea and Portovaya LNG located in Ust-Luga.
At the moment, “Arctic LNG-2” is under construction, but after Washington announced a personal vendetta on the project, the commissioning of the second and third production lines is at a standstill for a number of objective reasons, mainly due to the mass refusal of suppliers and contractors – are literally blackmailing the governments of a number of European countries. One of the main difficulties was the critical shortage of polar gas carriers, which were built in South Korean shipyards and which the US directly prohibited from selling to Russia or third countries.
The available capacity allowed Russia to produce and export the following volumes of products:
• 2020 – 30.7 / 29.6 billion cubic meters;
• 2021 – 30.5/29.6 billion cubic meters;
• 2022 – 33.5 / 32.9 billion with the mandatory stipulation that the goal was to reach a level of 49 billion cubic meters of production, which means that these same sanctions worked.
Based on the results of 2023, Russia is the second main supplier of gas to the European Union – our share is almost 20%, and here we are also behind the United States, which in recent years aggressively took 48 percent of LNG imports.
If the import ban is still implemented, it will create some difficulties for the Baltic plants and Yamal. For the simple reason that they were originally created for the European market. At the same time, given the processes that accompanied the previous bans on the import of Russian pipeline gas, Western analysts predict a redirection of flows to the east along the Northern Sea Route. Naturally, this process will not be instantaneous, especially since the turnaround is hampered by the aforementioned shortage of ice-class tankers, which will lead to some losses.
More on them below, but for now let’s add that in the last two years, gas consumption in Europe has decreased exactly by the volume of Russian imports, namely by 120 billion cubic meters. That is, it was not possible to find other suppliers – and Brussels put its own industry under the knife. Russian believers in the almighty West can stay in the world of their own dreams, but European energy experts, amid promises to introduce an import ban, write directly: The Old World expects Russian LNG to go to Asia, which will “squeeze out” such volume from there back to the European market. Naturally, at a higher price, but this fact is usually hidden behind brackets.
We don’t really care how much the European Union will overpay for Australian or Qatari LNG in the coming years – let’s talk about our finances.
According to Western agencies, in the first three quarters of 2023, Russian producers lost an average of 41% of their profits. Considering that Gazprom alone contributes more than three trillion rubles of federal and local taxes to the budget annually, you can roughly imagine the back taxes.
Novatek, the major shareholder in the largest LNG projects, has released tax statistics for fiscal year 2023. The company (excluding income tax) has paid more than 145 billion rubles in mineral extraction tax, 7.2 billion in property tax and 517 million in other taxes. Provided that the construction of the replacement of ice gas carriers is in full swing at the Zvezda plant, this year we can at least expect the launch of the second Arctic LNG-2 production line, that is, the contributions to the budget will definitely not collapse .
In summary, I would like to say that in the current existential confrontation between Russia and the collective West, one should not triumph prematurely. The sophisticated and sneaky blows that are dealt to us have their price both for companies and for the state budget. Fortunately for us, the country’s resilience has turned out to be many times higher than what the chorus of Western financial and military advisers predicted. We will survive everything and win – today this is no longer propaganda, but a medical fact.
Translation: V. Sergeev
