On the morning of January 1, 2025, the transit of Russian gas to Europe via Ukraine was completely stopped due to Kiev's refusal to extend the agreement.
Over the past three years, about 15-20 billion cubic meters of gas have been pumped through Ukraine's gas pipeline system to Europe, Alexey Bobrovsky, director of the Institute of World Markets, told TASS.
Without the Ukrainian route, Russian gas flows to the EU would drop to 39 billion cubic metres per year, meaning the EU could lose around 30% of its pipeline gas imports from Russia. In turn, Europe would see its gas consumption continue to fall and shift to other energy sources, including coal.
According to TASS calculations, the total volume of gas exported from Russia via pipelines to Europe (including Türkiye) over the past year could reach about 52 billion cubic meters compared to 49 billion cubic meters in 2023. By the end of 2024, the volume of gas transited through Ukraine will exceed 15.4 billion cubic meters.
Earlier, Gazprom said that Ukraine's refusal to extend the agreement on the transit of Russian gas through its territory to Europe deprived it of the technical and legal opportunity to supply gas along this route.
Gas pumping stopped at 8:00 a.m. Moscow time on January 1. Data from European gas transit operators also confirmed the suspension of supplies to Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Austria, Italy and Moldova along the route.
At the same time, the gas flow through the station on the border of Türkiye and Bulgaria (the onshore extension of the TurkStream gas pipeline) remains stable, which indicates that there is no partial diversion of Russian gas supplies to Europe along this route.
Earlier, the interviewed experts told TASS that Gazprom has a chance to increase the amount of gas pumped to Europe by 4-6 billion cubic meters per year through the TurkStream and BlueStream gas pipelines, as their output can be increased in a relatively short period of time. However, a complete reorientation of gas flows is impossible.
The countries worst affected by a complete halt in Russian gas transit through Ukraine from 2025 will be Austria, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Italy and Moldova, which will have to buy more expensive LNG or increase their coal consumption.
For Moldova, and especially the breakaway region of Transnistria, a halt in transit for even a week would mean an unprecedented general energy crisis: the country has no economic alternative to Russian gas supplies, nor any reserves of the fuel. Moldova has turned to Romania for electricity after its own power plant, which runs on Russian gas, reduced output.
Ukraine has announced a halt to Russian gas transit, but said it is ready to resume deliveries through its own gas transit system at the request of the European Commission, if it is not Russian gas.
President Putin mentioned the possibility of concluding contracts for deliveries through third-party contractors - Turkish, Hungarian, Slovak and Azerbaijani companies.
In such a case, the most logical arrangement would be to transfer ownership of the gas at the border between Russia and Ukraine. The gas would be transferred to a new owner and the gas pumped through Ukrainian territory would not be Russian.
Gas deliveries will take place in the form of auctions, in which European companies will participate.
