During the upcoming two to three years, natural gas will become a commodity available to the population nationwide. This was announced by Armenia’s deputy acting minister of energy, Areg Galstyan, reported News Armenia on April 11. According to the deputy minister, in the specified period about 500,000 users will receive natural gas supplies. In comparison, towards the end of 2006, 442,000 residents of Armenia had direct access to natural gas.
As News Armenia reported, citing Galstyan, the expansion of natural gas supply will be carried out owing to the Iran-Armenia gas pipeline, the “construction [of which] will be finished within the set timeframe.” The initial annual capacity of this pipeline will be about 300-400 million cubic meters (m³), which is expected to be increased to up to 2.3 billion cubic meters in the future, reported the news source.
Currently, the sole natural gas supplier of Armenia is Russia. Every year, Russia pumps from 1.8 billion to 2 billion cubic meters of gas to Armenia through the territory of Georgia. The monopoly of natural gas delivery and distribution in the Armenian market lies with the Armenian-Russian joint venture ArmRosGazprom.
This information was originally published April 11, 2007 (www.newsarmenia.ru). -- 03.05.2007