16 Dec 2010 14:16

Belarus plans to buy 22.5 bcm of gas a year in 2011-2015

MINSK. Dec 16 (Interfax) - Belarus plans to import 22.5 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Russian gas a year in 2011-2015, Deputy Energy Minister Mikhail Mikhadyuk said at a press conference in Minsk on Thursday.

"The gas balance for 2011 calls for importing 22.5 bcm of Russian gas. We have done a lot in the area of energy conservation and diversification of supplies, but our industry is growing. In the next five years, given growth in industrial output, we are forecasting that volume of annual purchases," Mikhadyuk said.

Belarus continues to study the issue of building an LNG terminal, Deputy Energy Minister Yury Rymashevsky said.

"We have looked at how those operations are organized in other countries. We were in Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands. Now we are evaluating whether Belarus should go that route," Rymashevsky said.

For now Belarus has not made a decision to build its own regasification terminal.

Just in the past few days Lithuania approved construction of an LNG terminal there, but that facility will only have enough capacity to supply the domestic market, he said. The floating terminal will be built in the port of Klaipeda and will have capacity to regasify 2 billion-2.5 billion cubic meters of gas a year.