Bulgaria is starting to consume US liquefied gas, which is a first step towards diversifying supplies and reducing dependence on imports of Russian natural gas only. On 31 May at the Greek LNG Revituse, the first tanker arrived with 90 million cubic meters of raw material for Bulgargaz, the unloading of which started on 1 June. This was announced at a press conference on Friday by Bulgarian Minister of Energy Temenujka Petkova and the managers of the state-owned companies Bulgargas - Nikolay Pavlov and Bulgartransgaz - Vladimir Malinov.
The supplier of the raw material is the Dutch company Colmar, which was among the participants in the first auction in Bulgargaz auction for alternatives to Gazprom deliveries of 144 million cubic meters of gas. It was won by the Greek DEPA and it was announced that the prices achieved were lower than those of Russian gas, but it was not stated what they were.
Now the gas arrivals are for the second quarter, the next "Colmar" will provide another 50 million cubic meters, Minister Temenujka Petkova explained.
"Prices are competitive and lower than those of the current supplier. I think this is a very serious step forward towards the liberalization of the natural gas market in Bulgaria and a very clear sign that the government is working very diversely towards diversification and not only in words, but also in deeds," she said.
Colmar, however, has deposited with the Ministry of Energy a request for negotiations and a delivery agreement of 500 million cubic meters for the next 5 years to be traded on the currently established gas exchange. It is expected to start operating on 1 October 2019. The gas exchange is part of the intention to build a center for regional and even European trade in natural gas - the so-called Balkan gas hub.
“All this shows that the way the government is going towards diversification, direction of liberalization of the market is correct, and what we have undertaken as a commitment we carry it out”, Petkova said.