The saga with the notoriously late gas turbine delivery from Canada via Europe to Russia continues, as the turbine needed for a compressor station at the Nord Stream pipeline has not reached Russia yet.
The argument over who is shipping the equipment where and who is responsible for the delays has been going on for weeks now. The turbine is currently stranded in Germany.
Meanwhile, gas flows from Russia to the EU have slowed.
Russia has blamed Western sanctions for the fact that the turbine that was repaired in Canada was returned to Europe but hasn't reached Russia yet. Russia says that because of issues at other turbines, another one of which was also sent for repairs at the end of July, Gazprom slashed gas supply via Nord Stream again-to just 20% of the pipeline's capacity. This happened days after Gazprom restarted the pipeline at 40% capacity on July 21 after regular 10-day maintenance.
Earlier this week, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that The Kremlin didn't have anything to add to what Gazprom had already said: there are equipment failures necessitating urgent repairs, and there are additional "artificial difficulties" caused by the "illegal sanctions and restrictions."
On Wednesday, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz laid the blame on Russia, again, saying that the turbine is ready for work and Germany is ready to ship it. Scholz was pictured by Reuters standing next to the turbine during his visit to Siemens Energy's site in Muelheim an der Ruhr in Germany.
Scholz's visit to the site of the turbine manufacturer was the show the world that the equipment works and that "there was nothing mystical to observe here," the Chancellor said.
"It's quite clear and simple: the turbine is there and can be delivered, but someone needs to say 'I want to have it'," Scholz said as carried by Reuters.
Germany and the EU are bracing for further reductions in Russian gas supply ahead of the winter, even if the turbine makes it to Russia.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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Tsvetana is a writer for Oilprice.com with over a decade of experience writing for news outlets such as iNVEZZ and SeeNews. More
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