Japan To Increase Russian Gas Imports By 2Mln Tonnes Using Arctic LNG 2 - Russian Consul

SAPPORO/TOKYO (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 16th May, 2023) Japan has not withdrawn from Russian gas producer Novatek's Arctic LNG 2 project and plans to increase imports of Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) by 2 million tonnes per year by 2026, Sergey Marin, the Russian consul general in the Japanese city of Sapporo, told Sputnik.

"A consortium of (Japanese trading company) Mitsui & Co and Japanese national oil and metal company JOGMEC has retained a 10% stake in Novatek's Arctic LNG 2 project. The only clarification: in March last year, Japan froze new investments in this project due to the financial sanctions ... If all goes as planned, Japan will add about 2 million tonnes of LNG per year to the share it is currently receiving from Russia, that is about 9% of total imports," the Russian consul general said.

The Arctic LNG 2 project is currently working, but LNG production has not yet been launched, Marin specified.

"The first line is scheduled to be launched by the end of this year, while the second and the third (lines are scheduled to be launched) in 2024 and 2026 (respectively)," he added.

The Arctic LNG 2 is Novatek's second heavy-tonnage LNG project after the Yamal LNG. The resource base is connected to the Utrenneye gas field located in Russia's Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. The project provides for the construction of three technological lines with a capacity of 6.6 million tonnes each. The total capacity is estimated at 19.8 million tonnes of LNG per year.

Novatek initially planned to launch the first line of the Arctic LNG 2 in 2023, the second in 2024 and the third in 2025, but in April 2022, the company announced possible changes in the project's schedule due to technical hurdles caused by the Western sanctions imposed on Russia.