GE stops servicing gas turbines in Russia - paper

MOSCOW. June 20 (Interfax) - General Electric stopped servicing gas turbines in Russia as of June 19 after the imposition of expanded U.S. sanctions, national daily Kommersant reported on Tuesday, citing sources at Russian power companies.

The U.S. company also closed access to the turbine monitoring system and in future could stop supplying original parts, including turbine blades, the paper said. The end of cooperation under existing service contracts will also put an end to supplies of original spare parts for the turbines of both GE and Alstom, which has been part of GE since 2015, the paper's sources said.

The combined capacity of GE gas turbines in Russia's energy system is about 5 GW, and the total capacity of power plants using such turbines is about 8 GW.

The end of servicing, including repairs, inspections and part replacement, is most critical for the most powerful F-class and H-class turbines. For example, Unipro's Surgutskaya GRES-2 and Shaturskaya GRES power plants have 9FA turbines, while EL5-Energy's (formerly Enel Russia) Sredneuralskaya GRES has a 9FB turbine, the paper said.

GE also has a 49% stake in Russian Gas Turbines LLC (RGT), a joint venture with Russian power company Inter RAO , which owns the other 51%. RGT said at the end of 2022 that its strategy was under review and no longer called for localizing production of GE's powerful GT13E2 gas turbine.

GE announced in March 2022 that it was suspending operations in Russia with the exception of support for existing energy services. GE said in its report for the first quarter of 2023 that its remaining assets in Russia and Ukraine were worth an estimated $300 million and were primarily in the energy business and did involve activities subject to sanctions or the company's internal restrictions.

The Russian Energy Ministry told reporters later that the "Russian united energy system has a margin of safety." It said there were already several enterprises "with the competencies to service and repair foreign gas turbines of varying capacity." The ministry also recalled that generating companies had been allowed to de-rate foreign-made turbines and defer their own modernization projects. "The situation is under the Energy Ministry's constant control and is working closely with power industry participants," it said.