OREANDA-NEWS. June 27, 2012. Chelyabinsk hosted today a joint meeting of Gazprom and the Pipe Producers Association. The Company's delegation was led by Vitaly Markelov, Deputy Chairman of the Management Committee.

It was noted at the meeting that Gazprom's high demands enabled domestic pipe plants to upgrade the production capacities and to advance the quality of large diameter pipes (LDP) to the global level.

Delivery of Gazprom's large-scale gas transmission projects such as the Bovanenkovo – Ukhta, Ukhta – Torzhok and Southern Corridor gas trunkline system will ensure the load of Russian pipe companies for today and in the future. For instance, Gazprom's LDP demand to build, retrofit and overhaul gas pipelines between 2012 and 2014 is estimated at 1.4 million tons per year.

Gazprom is determined to keep on boosting the domestic industry and raising the competitive ability of its products. In this context, the meeting touched upon higher demands to the quality of fittings (branches, T-bends, shutoff valves). Besides, the Company expects that other equipment producers servicing Gazprom will also improve their products to the level achieved by pipe companies in LDP output. To this end, Gazprom, inter alia, will continue developing the sci-tech cooperation with Russian producers.

As part of the visit to Chelyabinsk, Gazprom's experts visited production sites of Trubodetal, Chelyabinsk Pipe Rolling Plant and Pipeline Connectors.