Russia’s exports of liquefied natural gas declined by 2.5% in 2025 to 31.3 million metric tons, preliminary LSEG data showed on Tuesday, amid Western sanctions over Ukraine.
For December alone, Russian LNG shipments decreased by 2% from a year earlier to 2.99 million tons, while slipping by 3.5% from November.
LNG exports from Russia have been curbed by U.S. sanctions, notably against the new Arctic LNG 2 plant, which have significantly limited the use of the tanker fleet for fuel transport.
Europe also plans to completely shun Russian LNG from 2027.
Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said on Thursday Russia has pushed back by “several years” a plan to reach an annual liquefied natural gas output target of 100 million tons, citing sanctions.
Exports from Arctic LNG 2 are all going to China. China received its first LNG cargo from the sanctioned Russian project at the end of August, ship-tracking data from Kpler and LSEG showed, days before a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
LNG exports from Russia to Europe this year fell by 16% to 13.8 million tons, preliminary data showed. In December, exports to Europe totalled around 1.5 million tons, down from 1.8 million tons in the same month a year ago.
Shipments from Novatek’s NVTK Yamal LNG plant declined by 6.6% this year to 18.3 million tons, according to the data. In December, the supplies from the plant fell by 14% year on year to 1.5 million tons.
This month, all of the cargos from the project went to Europe.
Supplies from Arctic LNG 2 amounted to 1.2 million tons this year, the data showed, compared to just 200,000 tons in 2024. In December, the deliveries fell to 148,000 tons from 222,000 tons in November.
Asia-oriented Sakhalin-2, controlled by Gazprom GAZP, saw exports rise 4% this year to 10.3 million tons.
Source: Reuters
