Slovakia has started receiving Russian gas via the TurkStream pipeline, warding off the country's energy crisis after Ukraine stopped transporting gas through its territory, RT reported.
In a video posted on Facebook on February 10, Prime Minister Fico said, "Russian gas is now starting its journey to Slovakia via TurkStream". He also acknowledged the joint efforts of Russia and Turkey. "We should recognize their role in this," the Slovakian Prime Minister said.
Last week, Slovakian state gas supplier SPP announced it would start importing Russian gas via the TurkStream gas pipeline from January 1 and plans to double the amount of gas transported in April.
Slovakia needs between 4 and 5 billion cubic meters of gas per year to meet domestic energy needs. Slovakia received about 3 billion cubic meters of gas from Russia via Ukraine until transit was stopped earlier this year.
Ukraine will not extend the five-year gas transit agreement with Gazprom when it expires at the end of 2024. This has cut off Russian gas flows to Hungary, Romania, Poland, Slovakia, Austria, Italy and Moldova. These countries have already recorded a significant decline in Russian gas imports due to Russian sanctions and the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipeline in 2022.
According to Prime Minister Fico, although the TurkStream pipeline helps Slovakia meet its immediate energy needs, Bratislava continues to exploit alternative sources to strengthen long-term energy security.
The TurkStream pipeline consists of two branches, one of which serves Turkey's domestic needs and the other supplying gas to Europe. Last month, Russia accused Ukraine of attacking a drone at a gas compressorship station in Russia's Krasnodar region, which supplies gas to TurkStream. Turkey later confirmed the attack but said the gas flow via TurkStream was not affected.
Also related to the TurkStream pipeline, according to TASS's calculation on February 12 based on data from the European Gas Transmission System Operators Network (ENTSOG), the supply of Russian gas to Europe via this pipeline set a new record last week.
From February 3 to 9, more than 390 million cubic metres of gas were pumped through the Strandzha-2 gas compressors at the Turkey- Bulgaria border (the inland section of Turkstream).
This is an absolute record for weekly shipments since the gas pipeline began operating in January 2020. The previous record for gas transit via the TurkStream pipeline was 376 million cubic meters in the week of January 13 to 19.
Also last week, the daily gas supply record via TurkStream was consecutively broken, reaching 56.7 million m3 on February 10.
Previously, gas transported via the TurkStream pipeline to Europe reached a record of 1.56 billion m3/month in January 2025. In 2024, the volume of gas transported on the pipeline will increase by 23% to 16.7 billion cubic meters. Of these, a record 7.6 billion cubic meters were transported to Hungary.
