In the United States he met with American Commerce Secretary Donald Evans and heads of energy companies.
The press release, which has come to hand at RIA Novosti, says that Evans has confirmed the intention of the American administration to give all-round support to the development of business cooperation between Gazprom and American energy companies.
Miller informed him of results of Gazprom's joint work with American partners in preparing the gas supplies project to the American market. Gas may arrive mostly from the Shtokman gas-condensate field (Barents sea shelf in north-western Russia).
The communique says that, during this visit, a memorandum on mutual understanding was signed with the company Chevron Texaco. The memorandum particularly intends a six-month study of the possibility of joint realisation of oil and gas projects in the United States and Russia.
Alexei Miller also had meetings with Exxon Mobile president Rex Tillerson, Conoco Phillips president Jim Malva, Petro-Canada president and board chairman Ron Bronemann. They discussed cooperation in the LNG production technology and an outlook for its shipments to the American market. In focus were matters of marketing and sale of Russian gas in the United States.
The United States is the largest consumer of natural gas in the world. It actual consumption in 2002 was 667.5 billion cubic metres, or 26.3 percent of the world's. Meanwhile, the United States' own gas output was 548 billion cubic metres in 2002.
The United States is one of the world's most promising LNG markets. Presently, the United States imports about 6.5 billion cubic metres of LNG. Some experts prophesy its export to increase to 104 billion cubic metres by 2020, above all due to its increasing consumption in the electricity sector. A stable economic growth may also entail increased demand in the housing and utilities, commercial, industrial sectors.
Now the United States has four LNG-reception terminals. Their total capacity is about 23.5 billion cubic metres annually. Another ten terminals are planned to be built on the eastern and western coasts. Their total capacity will be over 75.5 billion cubic metres annually.
