Categories: World

Gazprom: Siemens Energy ready to repair Nord Stream 1 ‘but no room for work’

Gazprom: Siemens Energy ready to repair Nord Stream 1 ‘but no room for work’

Russia’s Gazprom said today that Siemens Energy was ready to help repair damaged equipment for the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline, but there was nowhere available to carry out the work, Reuters reports.

In a statement, Gazprom said that Siemens Energy is participating in the repair work under an existing contract between the two companies and is ready to repair faults that, according to Gazprom, forced it to cut gas supplies to Germany through the pipeline.

On Friday night Gazprom said it had detected an oil leak in a turbine and would not resume gas supplies to Germany via Nord Stream 1 until it was fixed. He said that repairs can only be carried out at a specially configured workshop.

“Siemens participates in the repair work in accordance with the current contract, identifies malfunctions and is ready to fix the oil leaks. Only there is nowhere to make the repair,” Gazprom said in a statement on its Telegram channel.

Flows through Nord Stream 1 were due to resume early Saturday morning. But hours before gas was to start pumping, Gazprom released a photo on Friday that it said showed an oil leak on a piece of Nord Stream 1 equipment.

Siemens Energy, which supplies and maintains the equipment at Nord Stream 1’s Portovaya compressor station, said on Friday that the leak was not a technical reason for stopping the gas flow, adding that it could be sealed on site and was “in the context of routine maintenance work”. Read the full story

Europe has accused Russia of using natural gas supplies as a weapon in what Moscow has called an “economic war” with the West over the fallout from Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine.

The Kremlin blamed Western sanctions for shutting down Nord Stream 1 and putting obstacles in routine maintenance work. Western officials have rejected that claim, and Siemens Energy has said the sanctions do not prohibit maintenance.

Before the latest round of maintenance, Gazprom had already reduced flows to just 20% of the pipeline’s capacity.

Source: Capital