Russian gas grows dearer

In the fourth quarter of this year, Moldova will purchase Russian gas for US$194 per thousand cubic meters, as against US$186.65 in the third quarter, the president of SA Moldovagaz Alexandru Gusev announced, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. Gusev said that from technical viewpoint there will be no problems in supplying Moldova with natural gas in the cold period of the year. But the risk that the payments will be overdue is still high. “Moldovagaz's debt to Gazprom now totals US$65 million. It consists of the debts of the thermoelectric plants to Moldovagaz, which added up to 1.8 billion lei. 226 million lei of this sum represent the debt for the gas supplied during the 2008 – 2009 heating season. The debts also increased because the price for the end-users set for the first quarter of this year did not match the purchase price of the Russian gas,” Gusev said. He specified that the purchase price was US$340 per thousand cubic meter, but the tariff was about US$280. Tudor Moiseev, director of a thermoelectric plant (CET), confirmed that the debts of the CETs to Moldovagaz are large. But he said that the level of payments made by Termocom to the CETs is only 70%. “If this level was at least 90%, the CETs could settle a large part of their debts to Moldovagaz,” Moiseev said. “Moldovagaz puts a penalty of 0.1% on the CETs in debt, while the penalty imposed by the thermoelectric plants on Termocom is ten times lower. Under an earlier agreement, Moldovagaz was to abandon the penalties given that Gazprom does not use them yet, but the agreement is not observed,” Tudor Moiseev said. Prime Minister Vlad Filat ordered calling a meeting with decision makers and independent experts to discuss the situation in the energy sector and possibilities of improving the financial situation of the energy company.