Moldovan Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilita said that the country has received some limited amounts of natural gas from Romania, after it declared the state of alert triggered by the crisis on the natural gas market.
The infrastructure needed to deliver natural gas from Romania to the capital of Moldova Chisinau, namely the interconnector and Ungheni-Chisinau pipeline, was completed and operated by a Moldovan subsidiary of Romania’s Transgaz.
Last week, the energy regulator in Moldova approved the transport fees for Transgaz’ subsidiary Vestmoldtransgaz, thus removing the last obstacle, save for the price, for the exports of gas from Romania.
Moldova already faces problems with natural gas shortage, after Russian Gazprom cut the supplies by one third as part of the ongoing negotiations with the pro-EU authorities in Chisinau.
However, there is one more obstacle for exporting natural gas from Romania to Moldova. Part of the supplied gas would go to the power plant located in internationally unrecognized Transnistria, which delivers electricity to Moldova as well. but has never paid for the gas received from Gazprom. In other words, no supplier would send natural gas from Romania to the Cuciurgan power plant unless the Moldovan Government guarantees for the contract.
