Russia's state-controlled Gazprom , the world's biggest gas producer, has been expanding steadily around the globe and increasing its dominance at home.
Gazprom supplies Europe with a quarter of its gas needs and in July revised its capital expenditure in 2008 up to just under $30 billion.
The conflict with Georgia, which broke out in August, has increased tension between Moscow and the West and prompted concern that Russia may want to control the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan, which was the first gas pipeline to deliver Caspian gas to Europe without passing through Russian territory.
A similar major pipeline, the Nabucco, is being planned to join Central Asian gas to Europe without touching Russia.
The following outlines Gazprom's projects around the world.
AFRICA:
ALGERIA
- In June 2008 Gazprom opened an office in Algeria, the world's fourth largest gas exporter whose Sonatrach gas company, is a major exporter of gas to Spain.
- In July Gazprom and Sonatrach closed a memorandum of understanding after failing to reach an agreement on cooperation in gas exploration opportunities in Algeria.
- Sonatrach did not rule out future cooperation with Gazprom. The office is Gazprom's first in Africa and will administer the company's operations on the continent.
LIBYA
- Gazprom plans joint venture in Libya to build electricity capacity. It wants a refining joint venture with Libya and a second gas pipeline to Europe under the Mediterranean seabed. Gazprom says it could buy additional volumes of oil and gas from Libya either as swaps or spot purchases.
NIGERIA
- On Sept 3, 2008 Gazprom signed an oil and gas exploration agreement with Nigeria, which has the world's seventh largest gas reserves. The Nigerian government said in January that Gazprom would spend between $1 billion and $2.5 billion developing the resource-rich country's gas sector.
AMERICAS:
BOLIVIA
- Gazprom signed an agreement in March with the Bolivian state energy company YPFB to assess natural gas exploration and production projects in the South American country. Under the deal, Gazprom and YPFB would form a joint venture with the majority controlled by Bolivia's Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos (YPFB).
UNITED STATES
- Gazprom says it wants to supply up to 20 percent of U.S. gas markets within decades. It is in talks with Chevron , ConocoPhillips , Total , StatoilHydro , Sempra and Royal Dutch Shell on assets swaps, purchase of LNG assets and access to regasification terminals in the United States, Mexico and Canada.
- In 2006, Chevron and Gazprom Neft, Gazprom's oil arm, formed the Northern Taiga NefteGaz joint venture to introduce hydrocarbons in West Siberia but in June Gazprom suspended work on the venture in the Arctic Yamal-Nenets region because work "hasn't been as promising as previously thought."
- Gazprom wants to join a gas pipeline project in Alaska and has made a proposal to BP and ConocoPhillips .
EUROPE:
AUSTRIA
Austria received 5.40 billion cubic metres (BCM) from Gazprom in 2007. In June Gazprom said Austria's OMV will join its South Stream gas pipeline project which will deliver 30 billion cubic metres of Russian gas a year to southern Europe via the Black Sea. Austria is a transit route for Russian gas to Italy, France, Hungary, Slovenia and Croatia.
- In May, OMV signed a memorandum of understanding on giving Gazprom a stake in its gas hub and establishing joint storage projects. OMV's central European gas hub, situated at the border with Slovakia, handled 7.7 billion cubic metres of gas in 2006.
- Gazprom supplies three quarters of Austria's gas under a term deal with OMV.
BRITAIN
Britain received 1.18 bcm natural gas from Gazprom in 2007.
- Gazprom says it wants to take its share of the British market, Europe's biggest, to 10 percent and sell up to 10 billion cubic metres a year, up from the current 4 bcm, by 2010.
- Gazprom wants to buy North Sea gas projects, boost its share in the Interconnector pipeline between Britain and Belgium and expand storage capacity.
CZECH REPUBLIC
Czech Republic received 6.96 bcm natural gas from Gazprom in 2007. After the Czech Republic liberalised its market in 2007, Gazprom singed a long term gas delivery deal with its Czech arm Vemex to annually deliver up to 500 million bcm of gas.
ESTONIA, LATVIA, LITHUANIA
- Gazprom wants to build gas storage in the former Soviet Union's Baltic states, but it is seeking alternative pipeline routes to avoid dependence on traditional transit states.
In particular, it wants to build a pipeline under the Baltic Sea from Russia to Germany, which would bypass Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as Poland and Belarus.
The planned pipeline is to be built by a consortium, Nord Stream, majority-owned by Gazprom and including Germany's BASF and E.ON and Dutch Gasunie.
FRANCE
France received 9.81 bcm gas from Gazprom in 2007.
- Gazprom supplies around one quarter of France's gas needs under term contracts with Gaz de France . Gazprom sees Gaz de France and Algeria's Sonatrach as important partners to swap Russian pipeline gas in Europe against liquefied natural gas (LNG). It seeks to get access to end-users in France.
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