Ukraine expands its transmission capacity to receive up to 6.6 bcm of gas a year from Poland

Ukrtransgaz has completed the modernization of Komarno compressor station in Lviv region, which is part of the Ukraine-Poland interconnector. This upgrade expands the capacity of Ukraine’s gas transmission system to receive gas from Poland to 6.6 bcm a year. The west-east flow tests are scheduled for late October.
The recent upgrade of the pipeline will enable both east-west and west-east gas flows between Ukraine and Poland, as well as higher capacity and flexibility to ensure uninterrupted heating season 2019/2020 for both countries in case of zero transit of Russian gas from 1 January 2020.
The design capacity of the modernized pipeline section is 15 mcm per day for east-west flow and 18 mcm per day for west-east flow.
Ukraine has thus completed the necessary technical preparations to implement its part of the Gas Memorandum signed by Ukraine, the US and Poland in August. Ukraine is now able to receive volumes of gas which exceed the capacity of the regasification terminal in Œwinoujœcie.
Naftogaz manages Ukraine’s vast underground gas storages strategically positioned mostly at the western border of the country, next to Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania. Naftogaz is ready to offer up to 10 bcm of storage capacity to European traders in order to accumulate gas at attractive summer prices and resell it in the European market in winter. This would help to level out summer-winter price fluctuations and generate considerable savings for European consumers.
In order for such flows to materialize from Poland, however, it is important to expand the capacity of the bottleneck in the Polish gas transmission system from Tworzen to Pogorska Wola. According to the Polish side, the new pipeline is expected to be ready in 2021.