Russia plans to accelerate gasification of settlements

In Russia, they want to accelerate the gasification of settlements. Sergei Mironov, head of the Fair Russia party, addressed such a request to Mikhail Mishustin, Chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers. In it, he asks to accelerate the gasification of small settlements and consider the possibility of providing targeted compensation to citizens for the purchase of alternative fuels before the completion of gasification.

"With the onset of the heating season, residents of rural and small towns who do not have access to mains gas are once again faced with the problem of a sharp increase in heating costs. This issue is systemic in nature, affects the basic living conditions of citizens and is directly related to the implementation of the constitutional principle of equality of citizens' rights regardless of their place of residence," the document says, which is available to Izvestia.

It is noted that ensuring equal access of the population to basic utilities and energy infrastructure is one of the key priorities of state policy, enshrined in national strategic documents, and is within the competence of the Government of the Russian Federation and public companies of the fuel and energy complex.

It also reports that starting from July 1, 2024, tariffs in the field of housing and communal services were indexed by an average of 9.6%, while the spread by region ranged from 4 to 15%. Thus, with the continuing level of inflation and rising household costs, heating costs are becoming critical for households, especially in rural areas, where household incomes are traditionally lower than the national average. At the same time, national socio-economic development plans envisage bringing the country's gasification level to at least 83% by 2030.

"However, achieving the targets is complicated by the presence of a significant number of rural settlements and individual households that have not yet been provided with the technical ability to connect to gas distribution networks. Taking into account the above, it seems advisable to establish at the level of the Government of the Russian Federation the priority of completing the internal gasification of all settlements with permanent residence of citizens and bringing the technical possibility of connection to the borders of each land plot," the document says.

It also notes that at the same time, it is necessary to expand the mechanism of pre-gasification, taking into account the interests of socially vulnerable categories of citizens, large families and residents of hard-to-reach territories.

"In order to ensure equal conditions, it is proposed to provide subsidies for indoor equipment, as well as to establish unified deadlines for connection procedures to gas distribution networks. Until the completion of comprehensive gasification measures, as a temporary measure for the heating period, it is possible to introduce targeted compensation for part of the costs of purchasing and using alternative fuels according to the application principle, which will reduce the burden on family budgets and ensure social justice," the document says.

The document emphasizes that the implementation of the proposed solutions will help reduce the share of household heating costs in the structure of consumer costs, reduce the environmental burden in rural areas, create additional conditions for the development of small and medium-sized businesses in related industries, as well as strengthen the energy sustainability of territories. It is pointed out that in the end, these measures will ensure equal access of citizens of the Russian Federation to basic public services, regardless of their place of residence, which fully complies with the constitutional principles of the welfare state and the strategic priorities of national development.

"With the onset of the heating season, many residents of rural and small towns, where there is no access to mains gas, again face the problem of a sharp increase in heating costs. As a rule, people are forced to buy firewood and coal, but given low incomes, high cost and seasonal price increases for heating oil, many citizens cannot afford such expenses," Sergei Mironov explained to Izvestia.

He also clarified that in order to solve the heating problem, the state has launched a gasification program for small settlements, but gas has not yet been released everywhere. It is for this reason that the Just Russia Party proposes at the government level to set a priority for completing internal gasification of all settlements with permanent residents.

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Earlier, on October 16, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the plenary session of the International Forum "Russian Energy Week" (REN) that the level of gasification in Russia has almost reached 75%, and this indicator continues to grow. The Russian leader stressed that over the past five years, 100,000 km of gas distribution networks have been laid in the country.

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