Azernews.Az

Europe's gas market is currently undergoing transformation, a European energy expert has said.

Alexander Rahr told Trend news agency over the phone on Monday that at present, there are factors of uncertainty on the global gas market, for example, a shale gas revolution in the U.S.

"The U.S became not only independent on its gas supply, it can now export liquefied gas itself," said Rahr, a Trend Expert Council member.

The expert said the volume of gas supply on the European market will increase in the coming years. "This means that gas prices will not grow as rapidly as before," he said.

In his opinion, this development will lead to many questions, which will have to be addressed by the "gas society, politics and gas business". Therefore, it is difficult to predict how the European gas market will look in the future, Rahr said.

According to the analyst, another important factor is that the demand for gas in Asia is growing.

"Now we will see that the main gas sales market will shift from Europe to Asia," the expert said. "This will happen quickly."

According to him, such countries as Turkmenistan, Russia and Kazakhstan, understand this and so they are trying to get a foothold in the East. At the same time, the European market will continue to be dependent on gas as alternative fuel sources are still too expensive.

"Europe will continue to be in need of gas, but the main issue in this situation is the price," Rahr said.

The analyst said the price is an important factor for investors who will build pipelines. They need to know whether or not to invest in such expensive infrastructure, he said.