REDUCING RELIANCE ON RUSSIA, POLAND CONSIDERS PURCHASE OF ISRAELI GAS. Gog eyes ‘great spoils’ in Israel for a steady supply of natural gas to ‘sell’ to Europe. Ezekiel 38:13
The discovery of more major natural gas fields in Israel since 2009 has transformed the Jewish state from an energy-dependent country into an energy supplier.
BY EYTAN HALON. APRIL 29, 2019. JPOST.
Polish state-controlled energy
company PGNiG is considering the purchase of Israeli natural gas as it seeks to
reduce its dependence on key Russian supplier, Gazprom.
“We want to be the company at the crossroads of North-South and East-West… we
need something to the south,” PGNiG chief executive Piotr Wozniak told Reuters
last week. “So we are looking at all those places to the south of Poland very
carefully… So yes, we are interested in Israel,” Wozniak said.
PGNiG currently sources over half of the natural gas that it resells from
Moscow-headquartered energy giant Gazprom, majority owned by the Russian
government, in a 22-year take or pay deal set to expire in 2022. Polish
authorities have declared that they will not extend the deal, with PGNiG accusing Gazprom of abusing its
dominant position in the central European and Baltic markets.
Ahead of the conclusion of the Gazprom deal, PGNiG has sought to diversify its
gas purchases, increasing imports of liquefied natural gas from Qatar, Norway and
the United States. PGNiG is also preparing to supply the Polish market with gas
produced on the Norwegian Continental Shelf, via the Baltic Pipe
interconnection through the North Sea, Denmark and the Baltic Sea at the end of
2022.
“Our operations still are exposed to the risk of unexpected interruption of supply from the East, as we have already
experienced on several occasions,” said Maciej Wozniak, PGNiG’s Vice-President
for Commercial Affairs, earlier this year.
“Therefore, our current priority is to build an alternative, long-term portfolio of secure supplies from 2023 onwards, based on market principles and prices.”
Until large discoveries of natural
gas were made off Israel’s coastline in recent years, few perceived
historically natural resource-poor Israel to be a significant source of energy.
This perception
started to change with the discovery of the Noa gas field off the shores of
Ashkelon in 1999. The discovery of more
major natural gas fields in Israel since 2009 – including Tamar and Leviathan –
has transformed the Jewish state from an energy-dependent country into an
energy supplier, both domestically and abroad.
Israel is currently planning to supply
former adversaries Jordan and Egypt with natural gas valued at $26 billion and
plans to construct a 2,000 km. pipeline to supply Eastern Mediterranean gas to
Europe.
In January, seven countries hoping to benefit from the regions newly discovered
resources, including Israel, established the Cairo-based Eastern Mediterranean
Gas Forum.
Several major energy firms, including American oil and gas giant ExxonMobil,
are reportedly considering competing for a new round of offshore exploration
rights, the second auction of its kind in Israel, with bids due to be submitted
by June 17.
Categories: Gog/Magog Coalition Update