Gas supply from Russia to Europe via Ukraine rose on Wednesday morning for the first time in weeks, as price spreads turned more favourable to incentivise flows.

Russia’s Gazprom said it will ship 29.4 million cubic metres (mcm) of gas to Europe through Ukraine via the Sudzha entry point, up from Tuesday’s level of 24.5 mcm.

However, flows are still around 27% lower than levels at the start of the winter gas season last year.

The transit line through Ukraine remains the only remaining route for Russian gas flows to central and western Europe after the Nord Stream 1 pipeline was stopped because of damage caused by explosions last September.

In January, Russian deliveries slumped via this route from the previous month. Analysts attributed this to importers taking less gas under remaining long-term Russian gas contracts as milder temperatures and healthy stocks in Europe caused prices to fall to pre-Ukraine war levels.

However, now price spreads are more favourable than previously to incentivise more Russian flows, said Yuriy Onyshkiv, gas analyst at Refinitiv.

Dutch gas prices closed higher on Tuesday due to outages in Norway and expectations of colder weather for the next week.

Meanwhile, nominations, or requests, for Russian gas into Slovakia from Ukraine via the Velke Kapusany border point also rose to 23.7 million cubic metres (mcm), compared to 18.6 mcm the previous day, Ukrainian transmission system data showed.

Additional Russian flows via Velky Kapusany are likely to stay in Slovakia, however, and not be pumped further into Austria and Italy, Onyshkiv said.

Eastbound gas flows on the Yamal-Europe pipeline to Poland from Germany and flows of Russian gas via Ukraine remained stable on Wednesday morning, pipeline operator data showed.

Exit flows at the Yamal Mallnow metering point on the German border stood at 850,252 kilowatt hours (kWh) per hour between 0700 CET and 0800 CET, little changed from the previous day.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Nina Chestney; Editing by Arun Koyyur)