The State Duma at the plenary session on Tuesday adopted in the first reading a bill amending the law "On gas export," according to which the list of companies receiving the right to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) is expanded.

Currently, a number of Novatek projects, as well as state-owned Rosneft and Gazprom, are eligible to export LNG.

According to the document, the law is amended in order to fulfill the task of increasing the production of liquefied natural gas in the Arctic by granting the right to export LNG from sites licensed after 1 January 2013.

Gazprom is currently a monopolist in pipeline gas exports in the Russian market. The discussion on the admission to export markets of independent gas producers, including Rosneft and Novatek, has been under way for several years. The first step towards liberalization was to allow LNG exports without Gazprom's mediation. The right to export LNG was granted to companies whose subsoil license as of January 1, 2013 provides for the construction of a liquefied natural gas plant or the sending of the produced gas for liquefaction to such a plant. At the end of 2013 Novatek, implementing the Yamal LNG project, and Rosneft began to have such a right.

Source: https://tass.ru/ekonomika/8122385