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Baltic natural gas pipeline shut over suspected leak Baltic Sea gas pipeline shut down over suspected leak
(32 minutes later)
Balticconnector, which connects Finland and Estonia, is expected to resume operations only by late winter Operators have refused to speculate on the source of the system failure, according to Reuters
The Balticconnector pipeline between Estonia and Finland, which was shut down on Sunday morning due to a suspected leakage, may remain offline for months or more, senior executive at Finnish energy company Gasgrid Janne Gronlund has told local media. An undersea gas pipeline connecting Finland and Estonia is temporarily out of service after gas system companies in both countries observed an unexpected drop in pressure likely caused by a leak, its operators have said.
Launched in 2019, the 77-kilometer pipeline link that is used for transferring gas from a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) import terminal in Finland to Estonia has an annual capacity of 2.6 billion cubic meters. “I do not want to speculate at all on the cause of the leak,” Janne Gronlund, a senior executive at Finnish energy firm Gasgrid, told Reuters on Sunday. He added that gas supplies remained stable, and that measures had been taken to isolate the pipeline to prevent further gas from escaping.
“The earliest that might be possible is late winter,” Gronlund said in an interview with Demokraatti on Monday “But you should be prepared for repair works to take some time.” Gronlund said the pipeline, which is capable of flowing in either direction depending on requirements, was transporting around 30 gigawatt hours of gas each day from Finland to Estonia at the time of the fault.
The Finnish state-run gas system operator Gasgrid and its Estonian partner Elering reported that preparations for inspecting the gas route for the leak were underway. They said that the seabed structure would be surveyed to identify the exact location and cause of the outage, adding that a conclusion could still be days away. Gasgrid also said gas “has been secured through the Inkoo floating LNG terminal for the time being.”
According to Elering in Estonia, before the stoppage most of the gas that arrived from Finland was forwarded to Latvia. The “unusual drop in pressure” was first noticed just before 2am local time (11pm GMT) by Gasgrid engineers and operators from Estonia’s Elering, the Finnish company said on its website.
Gasgrid in Finland also said that gas supply there remained secure thanks to the Inkoo floating LNG terminal in the south of the country. The Exemplar vessel has a capacity of 150,900 cubic meters and an annual regasification capacity of over five billion cubic meters of gas. The 48 mile (77km) Balticconnector pipeline links Inkoo in Finland and the Estonian port town of Paldiski, and across the Gulf of Finland – a stretch of the Baltic Sea that extends in Russian waters towards the port of St. Petersburg. The pipeline began its commercial operations in early 2020.
Meanwhile, Estonia is getting the gas it needs from Latvia, which imports gas in liquefied form as well. Elering has indicated that any shortfalls in its supplies would be bolstered by gas from Latvia.
Last year, Finland leased a floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU) to receive LNG, replacing supplies from Russia, which were cut in the wake of sanctions introduced against Moscow over its military operation in Ukraine. In September of last year, the Nord Stream pipelines transporting gas between Russia and Germany in the Baltic Sea were hit by underwater explosions which led to four leaks. The incidents, which remain unsolved, are considered by authorities to have been sabotage.
For more stories on economy & finance visit RT's business section In February, American journalist Seymour Hersh cited anonymous sources from the intelligence community in a report claiming that US President Joe Biden had ordered the CIA to blow up the pipelines. He added that the operation was conducted in conjunction with the Norwegian Navy and that a NATO exercise in the region was used as cover. Washington has denied having any role in the sabotage.