Belarus Seeks to Join Ukraine LNG Project

Belarus is seeking approval from the Ukraine to become partner in the construction of a liquefied natural gas terminal on the Black Sea in Ukraine, according to Kommersant- Ukraine

Citing an unidentified senior official in the Energy and Coal Ministry, the newspaper reported that Belarus may invest as much as $500 million to the existing $1.5 billion plan to increase the terminal’s capacity.

The Ukrainian government announced a tender to develop the country's first regasification terminal earlier this month. Ukraine plans to build an LNG regasification plant on the Black Sea coast with a capacity of 10 billion cubic meters a year by 2014.

Five sites are reportedly under consideration for the  terminal; near Odessa Port-Side Plant, a site near the oil depot of OJSC Ukrtransnafta (the two sites are located near the Yuzhny Port), a site near Ochakiv (Mykolaiv region), a site on the coast of the Berezansky firth (Mykolaiv region) and an offshore LNG terminal near Odessa.

Belarus is also moving to increased development of oil shales.  One of the largest projects in the social and economic development program for 2011-2015 adopted by the Council of Ministers last week (Resolution No. 942) was launching the construction of a mining and chemical plant for oil shale processing with a capacity of 5 million tonnes per year.