By KYIV. Jan 6 (Interfax-Ukraine) – At a meeting on Friday, the Cabinet of Ministers replaced the temporary acting heads of JSC Ukrgazvydobuvannia and JSC Ukrtransgaz: Oleh Tolmachov, replaced Oleksandr Romaniuk and Roman Malyutin replaced Serhiy Pereloma.
This was reported by the Naftogaz group on Friday evening.
“Roman Malyutin and Oleg Tolmachev are high-class specialists with significant experience in the oil and gas sector. They are well-versed in the latest international best practices, but at the same time they have worked extensively in Ukraine and understand the challenges that are currently facing us," Naftogaz Group CEO Oleksiy Chernyshov said.
Tolmachev, who headed the Naftogaz Exploration and Production division at Naftogaz Group, has more than 20 years of experience in the extraction of hydrocarbons in North America. He held senior positions at gas production companies in the US including BP America, Chesapeake Energy, EnCana Oil & Gas USA, and Eclipse Resources and Montage Resources. He led high-tech projects focusing on the development of large fields in North America with deposits of gas and gas condensate. His responsibilities included increasing the economic efficiency of projects and managing multifunctional teams (geology, development, drilling, production, preparation and processing of hydrocarbons).
Malyutin, who has over 20 years of experience in gas transportation and storage enterprises, took offices from the operator and engineer at the Kegychiv underground gas storage to the deputy chief engineer of the eastern region of the Gas Transmission System Operator of Ukraine. During the last year and a half, he headed the technical department of Ukrtransgaz, where he was responsible for the operation of compressor stations along with metrology, and also led projects on the development of low-carbon technologies and the storage of hydrogen.
For his part, Serhiy Pereloma, who headed Ukrtransgaz for two and a half years, and before that headed its Supervisory Board, wrote on his Facebook that "it was a time of powerful transformations that we were doing for the sake of the future of this unique company and the state of Ukraine."
"I am really proud that together with the staff of Ukrtransgaz we have created a mechanism that today works like clockwork. And even in the difficult Ukrainian gas market, in a country involved in the war for its independence, they trust us and are ready to store gas in underground gas storage facilities" he said.
At the same time, Pereloma said that Ukrtransgaz was built as an independent UGS operator, working according to standards with leading European gas operators, and certification and further storage of EU strategic gas reserves is a completely feasible task.
Among the successes, Pereloma also named "building a unified, transparent and impartial" system of work with customers.
"As a result, we switched from ad hoc orders from the most courageous international gas traders to a single system of work with clients, where the electronic platform and the UGS Code became the basis. And today, among our clients there are more than 1,100 companies that order services from 27 countries of the world and three continents: Europe, Asia and North America," the ex-head of Ukrtransgaz said.
He also expressed confidence that Ukrtransgaz would adequately complete the current most difficult heating season, get rid of old debts and carry out the financial recovery that had begun, and also continue plans to re-equip one of the UGS facilities for hydrogen storage, delayed due to the Russian attack.
