Shell is still trading Russian gas more than a year after pledging to withdraw from the Russian energy market, the BBC reports
The company was involved in nearly an eighth of Russia’s shipborne gas exports in 2022, according to analysis from campaign group Global Witness.
Shell has been trading Russian gas since the early 1990s and is one of the largest importers of Russian gas into Europe. In 2016, Shell imported around 4.5 billion cubic metres (bcm) of gas from Russia, equivalent to around 10% of Europe’s total gas imports.
In 2022, the company made an estimated $5.4 billion gross margin from trading LNG and optimising its LNG portfolio, according to the analyst firm Bernstein. This was a third of Shell’s total estimated 2022 revenue from all energy trades
Shell has a long-term gas supply contract with Gazprom, Russia’s state-owned gas company, which expires in 2028. In addition, Shell has a joint venture with Gazprom, called Sakhalin-2, which produces around 10 bcm of gas per year.
Shell is also working with Novatek, Russia’s largest independent gas producer, on the Yamal LNG project in Arctic Russia.
Only three companies traded more Russian liquified gas, two of them Russian, while only four countries supplied more to Shell’s traders in 2022.
Image: Shell LNG tanker CARDISSA, via Wikipedia
