Gas Supply Services

Categories / City Services/Housing and Communal Services
GAS SUPPLY SERVICES. The first gas-generating retort installations in Russia appeared in St. Petersburg in the early 19th century. Initially gas was used for lighting. In 1819 the first gas lamps were lit on Aptekarsky Island. In 1835 Gas Lighting St. Petersburg Society was founded in the city. The Company enjoyed the monopoly for industrial production and sales of gas. The same year the building of the first gas plant in Russia was completed in the vicinity of Obvodny Canal. Coal for manufacturing of coal gas (illuminating gas) was delivered from Great Britain, while all the lighting equipment was produced at St. Petersburg plants. The cast molding of lamp-posts was done at Arsenal Plant, and armature hardware was produced at other factories. The production of gas lamp cases was set up at the Porcelain Manufacture (today Lomonosovsky Porcelain and China Plant). The city gas pipelines were assembled out of cast-iron pipes. Scientists B.S. Yakobi and D.I. Mendeleev made a significant contribution to the arrangement of gas supply system, as well as architect A.A. Montferrand who designed the shape of gas lamps. The building of the first street lighting gas pipe-lines was completed in 1839, and 167 gas lamps were constructed for the lighting of Palace Square, Bolshaya Morskaya Street and Malaya Morskaya Street, Nevsky Prospect (up to the Fontanka River), Bolshaya Sadovaya Street, Obukhovsky Avenue and Tsarskoselsky Avenue (up to Obvodny Canal). In 1856 the 2nd gas plant was built near Obvodny Canal (dismantled in 1972). By the late 19th century 5 gas plants functioned in St. Petersburg with the total productive capacity of 30,000,000 cubic meters of natural gas a year. Natural gas was used for lighting of streets, institutions and commercial establishments, as well as for heating, water heating and cooking. Since the appearance of electric lighting in St. Petersburg in 1880 natural gas was mainly used as fuel. By 1915 nearly 10,000 gas-stoves and nearly 20,000 hot-water heaters had been installed in city flats. During WWI of 1914-18 gas plants operated on Donetsk coal. The launching of coke gas plant in 1935 in Leningrad and general reconstruction of plants contributed to growth of natural gas output up to 48,000,000 cubic meters a year by 1940, while the number of flats with installed gas service increased up to 25,000. During the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45 nearly all gas plants were destroyed. The works for coke gas plant restoration were completed by 1946, and in 1948 its output amounted to 73,000,000 cubic meters of gas a year for 70,000 flats. In the late 1940s natural gas supply was provided by a 270-kilometer gas pipeline linking Leningrad and Kokhtla-Jarve. In 1959, a 805-kilometer-long cross-country gas pipeline linking Serpukhov and Leningrad was put into operation, as were a pipe-line linking Belousov and Leningrad in 1967 and a pipe-line linking Ukhta and Torzhok with Leningrad in 1969. The building of a high-pressure circular pipe-line around Leningrad was completed in 1972. In the late 1980s winter gas supply in Leningrad exceeded 35,000,000 cubic meters a day; the length of gas supply network totalled 4,850 km, and gas was installed in 1,260,000 flats. Natural gas consumption in these years came to nearly 12,000,000,000 cubic meters a year. In 2002 the total length of the gas network in St. Petersburg amounted to 4,962 km, the system maintenance was carried out by Lengaz City Gas Supply Service (cooperative management), and gas service was installed in 1,300,000 flats. The share of natural gas in the fuel balance of the city does not exceed 92%.

References: Прометеи голубого огня: История газоснабжения С.-Петербурга / Н. А. Барбухин, В. Е. Ганис, В. М. Клименко. СПб., 2003.

I. A. Bogdanov. Jakoby Boris Semenovich (Moritz Herman)
Mendeleev Dmitry Ivanovich
Montferrand Auguste Augustovich (Henri Louis Auguste Leger Ricard de)
Aptekarsky Island/Saint Petersburg, city
Bolshaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city
Dvortsovaya Square/Saint Petersburg, city
Fontanka River/Saint Petersburg, city
Malaya Morskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city
Malodetskoselsky Ave/Saint Petersburg, city
Moskovsky Ave/Saint Petersburg, city
Nevsky prospect/Saint Petersburg, city
Obvodny Canal/Saint Petersburg, city
Sadovaya St./Saint Petersburg, city
Кондрачук В. М., Астахов С. С., Барбухин Н. А. Из истории газификации // Газовая пром-сть, 1985 Lomonosov Porcelain Factory
1949