site.btaVertical Gas Corridor Auctions Attract Minimal Interest, Reports Kathimerini

Monday's three auctions for the Vertical Corridor, the gas route linking Greece to Ukraine via Southeastern Europe, attracted very limited offers, ekathimerini.com reported. According to it, this highlighted the market's lack of interest in the project.

Of the total offered capacity of 71.7 gigawatt-hours for February, only 48 megawatt-hours were booked - a quantity that market players describe as practically negligible, Kathimerini said.

According to the available information, there was only participation in Route 1, which concerns the transport of natural gas from Revithoussa or Alexandroupolis, through the networks of Bulgaria, Romania and Moldova, to Ukraine. There was zero participation in Routes 2 and 3, starting from Alexandroupolis and the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), the report said.

Kathimerini recalls that the Vertical Corridor is presented as critical infrastructure for the energy security of Ukraine and Southeastern Europe, as well as a key corridor for transporting US liquefied natural gas to Eastern Europe. At the market level, however, it has failed to attract interest, even in times of heightened geopolitical tension

The buyer, in this case Ukraine, sought gas with the lowest price, while intermediaries - traders and transmission system operators - looked for opportunities for higher margins, supported by strong regional demand due to cold weather.

The Vertical Corridor's inability to attract significant commercial interest, however, is not a temporary issue. Despite reductions in transit fees by operators in the participating countries, it remains more expensive than alternative Central European corridors reaching Ukraine via Poland, Hungary and Slovakia, Kathimerini said.