Algerian Natural Gas Exports To Italy Rise By 94 Percent

Algerian exports of natural gas to Italy increased for the second year in a row, by nearly 100 per cent during the three months of the current year. In March, Algerian exports exceeded that of Russia for the first time in years to reach 2.19 billion cubic meters compared to 1.55 Billion cubic meters for Russia.

Italian gas consumption figures for the first quarter of the year published by the Italian Energy Agency showed that Algerian exports increased at the expense of their Russian counterpart for the second year in a row, noting that the quantities of Russian gas imported by Italy from Russia slumped during the first quarter of the year 2017 by 8.7 percent.

The figures showed that Algeria has returned strongly to the Italian gas market for the second consecutive year, as the volume of Algerian gas exported to Italy increased by 93.7 percent in the first quarter of the current year, compared with the same period last year, that is 160 percent compared to the previous year (2015) .

It is also noted that the Italian economy has hiked its consumption of gas in the same period by about 17 percent compared to last year, and this increase in imports were covered mainly from the Algerian gas exports, which grabbed the lion’s share of the increase, by 94 percent, and only 6.2 percent of gas coming from the East across the Adriatic Sea, a slight increase in northern gas and from Libya and with on focus a decline of about 9 percent in Russian gas imports.

In March alone, Algerian gas exports to Italy doubled by 320.4 per cent compared with March 2016. Exports exported via the “Transmed” pipeline linking Algeria to Italy (Sicily) through Tunisia amounted to 2 billion and 219 million cubic meters in March 2017.

In March, Algerian exports to the European country have always exceeded their Russian counterpart for many years. Russia’s gas exports dropped by 47 percent, to 1.55 billion cubic meters in March 2017, while Algerian gas exports hiked to reach 2.2 billion cubic meters.