Gazprom expanding storage capacity in Saratov Region to support exports to Uzbekistan

MOSCOW. Sept 23 (Interfax) - Russian gas giant Gazprom is expanding underground gas storage capacity in Saratov Region to support exports to Uzbekistan, company deputy department head Sergei Khan said.

"The Stepnovskoye storage facility is now developing. Instead of 68 million cubic meters per day [of capacity], up to 80 [mcm of daily capacity] will be put into operation, and feeding of gas will be secured from this storage facility to the new export route through Kazakhstan to Uzbekistan," Khan was reported as saying by gas industry journal Gazovaya Promyshlennost.

He said every underground storage facility is a very complex geological site. "We've learned how to operate a gas storage facility even with an active water pressure regime. The Stepanovskoye storage facility has four geological reservoirs connected into two storage facilities, with crossflow between them and an active water pressure regime in one of the reservoirs," Khan said.

The Stepanovskoye underground gas storage facility, which opened in 1973, was built in the porous formations of the Vorobyov and Ardatov horizons of the depleted Stepanovskoye oil and gas condensate field. It can store 4.668 billion cubic meters of active gas and is used to even out seasonal fluctuations in gas consumption and peak loads in Saratov Region and the Ural-Volga region, as well as to maintain an operating pressure in the Central Asia-Center trunk gas pipeline.

Gazprom began exporting gas to Uzbekistan in October 2023 with the reversal of shipments through the Central Asia-Center pipeline system. Exports grew to 5.64 bcm in 2024 from 1.28 bcm in 2023.