OREANDA-NEWS. A working meeting between Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee and Jean-Francois Cirelli, Special Advisor to the Presidency of ENGIE (Gas Supplies) took place today within the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum 2015.

The parties addressed the current state of and the development prospects for cooperation in the energy sector. The discussion centered on the need for higher reliability of Russian pipeline gas supplies to France and other European countries. In this context, the parties pointed out the importance of transit-free gas transmission routes and highlighted the need for new direct gas supply routes to Europe.

ENGIE (former GDF SUEZ) is a prominent European energy company focused on power generation as well as natural gas exploration, production, processing and marketing projects.

The cooperation between Gazprom and ENGIE in the gas supply area started back in 1975. In 2006 Gazprom and ENGIE signed the Agreement to extend all the three existing contracts for Russian natural gas deliveries to France till 2030. In addition, the parties agreed on additional gas supplies to ENGIE through Nord Stream. At present, ENGIE’s contractual gas volumes for this pipeline are 2.5 billion cubic meters per annum.

In 2014 Gazprom supplied France with 7.6 billion cubic meters of gas.