Gazprom ups its targets for gas market growth

By Amie Ferris-Rotman

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Gazprom (GAZP.MM) said it had increased its growth targets for the UK gas market as the Russian gas export monopoly presses ahead with its strategy of controlling its gas all the way to western European consumers.

A spokesman for Gazprom's British unit said on Monday that the company wanted to grow its presence in the British commercial gas market tenfold by 2011.

"By 2011 we aim to have 15 percent," Philip Dewhurst, spokesman for Gazprom Marketing and Trading (GM&T), said.

Previously, Gazprom said it was targeting only 10 percent of the commercial market or market for small and medium sized business consumers.

Gazprom supplies Europe with around a quarter of its natural gas needs. Traditionally it delivered gas at border points to large western European utilities.

However, the state-controlled company wants to buy or build pipelines and supply businesses across the continent so it can extend its reach all the way to consumers' premises, a move which worries many European politicians.

Earlier this month, Gazprom said it wanted 10 percent of the French gas market within four or five years and GM&T said it was interested in taking up to 15 percent of the commercial Irish gas market.

Dewhurst said GM&T was growing well organically but would not rule out acquisitions in the UK.