Ukraine will do without Russian gas during the current heating season in 2015-2016, and most likely, no gas purchases from Russia will be needed next year too, Ukrainian Energy and Coal Industry Minister Volodymyr Demchyshyn said.
As was reported, in 2015 Ukraine cut natural gas imports by 15.9%, or 3.1 billion cubic meters, from 2014, to 16.4 billion cubic meters.
Imports of gas from Russia in 2015 totaled 6.1 billion cubic meters, which was 2.4 times down on 2014 (14.5 billion cubic meters).
Demchyshyn said that by that moment, Ukraine had consumed less gas from the underground storage facilities than it planned. The remaining volume of gas in the underground facilities is expected to be 7 billion cubic meters by the end of the current heating season, but its actual volumes will be even bigger.
