Kaliningrad without Lithuania and LNG: the exclave was granted three weeks of full gas autonomy

The Kaliningrad Region spent almost three weeks on its own gas reserves — without supplies via Lithuania and LNG. This is evidenced by data from open sources.

From August 10 to August 28, the Kaliningrad Region spent exclusively on its own gas reserves. According to ENTSOG, the platform of UGS operators of EU countries, at that time gas transit through Lithuania fell to zero.

The Lithuanian operator AmberGrid indicates in its annual plans that the repair of the Minsk-Vilnius gas pipeline, which supplies to Kaliningrad, was to be carried out within these terms. The company explained that the highway will be stopped to eliminate defects.

Earlier this year, the transit of Russian gas through Lithuania to the exclave has already stopped four times. And this, as EADaily wrote, was due to the unloading of the Marshal Vasilevsky floating LNG terminal, which delivered cargo from gas carriers and the Portovaya complex, which fell under US sanctions.

This time there was no unloading of the gas carrier. On the one hand, he delivered regasified LNG to Kaliningrad in late July — early August. On the other hand, the tanker left the Kaliningrad region on August 22 to receive a new batch at the Portovaya and returned back after August 29.

Obviously, the exclave was being tested for full gas autonomy. The Kaliningrad region has its own storage facility and in June Gazprom announced an increase in the capacity of UGS.

"The capacity of the Kaliningrad underground gas Storage Facility (UGS) has been increased. In 2024, Gazprom commissioned four more underground reservoirs. As a result, the operational reserve of gas in UGS by the beginning of the selection season of 2024/2025," the company reported.

Gazprom did not report anything about the new storage capacity, but the company had previously planned to reach 800 million cubic meters of UGS capacity by 2025. The Kaliningrad Region received equivalent volumes this year through Lithuania in five and a half months.

Perhaps the tests of full autonomy may also be related to the aggressive policy of neighboring NATO countries towards Russia and directly to the Kaliningrad region.