OREANDA-NEWS. Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee and Karsten Heuchert, Chairman of the Verbundnetz Gas (VNG) Executive Board had a working meeting today as part of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum 2015.

The parties addressed the issues of the bilateral cooperation in the gas industry, particularly, the interaction within the underground gas storage sector. Gazprom and VNG are jointly implementing the Katharina UGS construction project in Germany. At present, four caverns with the aggregate working capacity of over 210 million cubic meters are operational within the UGS facility. In 2017 Katharina will have seven caverns. By that time, the aggregate capacity will exceed 600 million cubic meters, while the daily withdrawal capacity will reach 26 million cubic meters of gas. The meeting participants stressed that the UGS facility greatly contributed to securing reliable gas supplies to Western Europe, inter alia, via the Nord Stream gas pipeline.

VNG business activities involve natural gas import, underground storage and supply to consumers in Germany’s eastern federal lands and Berlin. The company’s shareholders are EWE holding 47.9 per cent, Wintershall Holding – 15.79 per cent plus one share, VNG VUB – 25.79 per cent less one share, Gazprom – 10.52 per cent.

The Katharina UGS facility is a joint project established on a par between Gazprom and VNG.

Nord Stream is an export gas pipeline with the annual capacity of 55 billion cubic meters of gas, running from Russia to Germany across the Baltic Sea. Nord Stream, a joint project company (Gazprom owns a 51 per cent stake, Wintershall Holding and E.ON Global Commodities – 15.5 per cent each, Gasunie and ENGIE – 9 per cent each) is the project operator.