Viktor Mikhaylov, scientific manager of VNIIEF, director of Strategic Stability Institute

– This agreement is mutually beneficial and interesting for both parties and the economy as a whole

On Dec 16 2008 Chairman of the Board of Gazprom OJSC Aleksey Miller and Director General of Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation Sergey Kiriyenko signed a six-year general cooperation agreement. The agreeing parties are planning to implement strategic projects to develop sea and shelf gas deposits (Shtokmanovsky deposit, deposits in Yamal and the Far East); to supply electricity to gas transportation networks for supply of gas to regions of the Russian Federation and export of gas to Western Europe and South-east Asia; to coordinate inter-related investment projects; to develop new technologies, designing competitive (import-substituting) production for enhancing the efficiency of prospecting, extraction, transportation, storage, processing of natural gas and gas condensate. The parties are also planning to develop a program of scientific-technical cooperation to be renewed each three years and to set up a council for coordination of joint action under strategic projects and investment programs.

I think that the general agreement between Gazprom and Rosatom will allow the parties to plan their annual financing and to coordinate their inter-related investment projects for the next six years.

Nuclear companies have long been cooperating with Gazprom: since 1998, when they concluded general agreement for development of cooperation in the field of enhancement of the efficiency and safety of mining, transportation and processing of natural gas (gas condensate). Our research institutes develop and supply systems for control and measurement of the parameters of mined and transported gas, design and introduce software for control and management of linear part of gas pipelines (telecontrol) in northern regions, deign and introduce systems of information and supervision of the work of gas mining companies.

Obviously, this agreement is mutually beneficial and interesting for both parties and the economy, as a whole. I am also sure that the integration of the experience and industrial capacities of the two sectors will guarantee development and introduction of competitive products in the gas sector. In fact, Rosatom is putting its intellectual property into commercial use.