1. Introduction

Russia holds the world’s largest reserves of natural gas, the second largest coal reserves, and the eighth largest crude oil reserves. Russia recent years has become the world’s top gas exporter, mainly to Europe. At the time of fast growing electricity demand, when consumption significantly rise with development of new technologies, gas as a source of electricity become more and more important issue. Topic will discuss natural gas industry in Russia and Russian Company Gazprom. Gazprom is a peculiar corporate giant in gas industry. It is most internationally oriented company in Russia.

2. The role of geography

Sitting astride the Eurasian landmass and occupying a territory of 17,098.2 thousand square kilometers, and spanning 11 time zones from Kaliningrad in the west to Kamchatka in the east, Russia is the largest state in the world in terms of territorial extent. Its northern shores wash against the Artic Ocean, while the southern resort region of Krasnodar enjoys a Mediterranean climate. Today Russia’s population is 142.2 million, and the average population density is 8.3 persons per square kilometers (1). However, this hides considerable regional variation: the average population density in the Central Federal District, which includes Moscow, is 57.7 persons per square kilometer, while in the Far Eastern Federal District it is only 1.1 persons. The Central Federal District occupies 3.8 per cent of Russia’s territory and was home to 26.2 per cent of Russia’s population at the beginning of 2006. By contrast, the Far Eastern Federal District occupies 36.1 per cent of Russia’s territory, was home to 4.6 per cent of Russia’s population at the beginning of 2006 and produced 4.6 per cent of total GRP in 2005, down from 6.4 per cent in 1998. The purpose of this parade of statistics is two fold: first, to highlight the sheer scale of