Gazprom ships its own LNG via the Northern Sea Route for the first time

In the written statement made by Gazprom, it was stated that the LNG tanker named Velikiy Novgorod shipped the natural gas produced by the company in the Portovoya field in Russia to China.

In the statement, it was noted that the company carried out the LNG shipment in question via the Northern Sea Route for the first time, and that the new route significantly shortened the LNG shipment time to the Asia-Pacific region.

The importance of the Northern Sea Route for Russia is rapidly increasing

The Northern Sea Route, which is called Russia’s “alternative to the Suez Canal”, stands out as the route that the Russian government has given the most importance to development recently.

While 4 million tons of cargo were transported annually via the Northern Sea Route in 2014, the volume in question increased to 34 million tons last year. The Russian government aims to increase the volume of cargo transported via the Northern Sea Route to more than 100 million tons by 2030.

While a container ship going from Tokyo to Hamburg would need to travel approximately 48 days via the Suez Canal, this time is reduced to approximately 35 days via the Northern Sea Route.