11,877 flights departed from Koltsovo airport in Yekaterinburg; this exceeds the figures for 2004 by 0.5%. 9,161 flights (an increase of 3.8% compared to 2004) were bound for various Russian cities, 801 flights (a decrease of 17.8%) left for the cities of NIS, and 1,915 (a 5.4% decrease) were long-distance international ones. According to Koltsovo spokesperson, the airport served over 1.5 million clients (1,566 792 people), which means a slight increase of 0.8% compared to 2004. Koltsovo airport also transferred 11,544 900 tons of goods and mail, which signifies a 44.6% decrease compared to

‘Yekaterinburg is on the threshold of an office building boom’ Member of Ural Chamber of Real Estate Board and Managing Shareholder of BK-Nedvizhimost PLC Pavel Kusnetsov says. According to the data announced by Mr Kusnetsov, Yekaterinburg has nearly 50 operating office centers, and about 15 are under construction. Mr Kusnetsov claimed that at the moment, the main trends of the local office realty market were growth of supply mainly due to construction of new office centers, demand redistribution in favor of specialized office apartments, improvement of existing and projected office centers.

TGK-9 JSC received a possible natural gas supply limitation warning from Gazprom JSC, the company’s spokesperson reports. The supplies haven’t been limited yet, but the company did receive a notification. ‘This is not an emergency since the possibility of such warnings had been included in the contract which says that gas supplies could be limited in case of cold weather. Besides, we have more than enough gas supplies in store,’ the company’s spokesperson said. It was also made clear that even though all this might influence the electricity prime cost (but not its production) the consumers

Ekaterinburgskaya electrosetevaya Kompaniya (Electricity Supplier of Yekaterinburg) JSC has put its networks at full power. Before the weather grew so cold, its load was only 790 megawatt as opposed to current 908 megawatt, the company’s spokesperson reports. The equipment has still been able to withstand the load so far, so there haven’t been any major power cuts. As for local ones, they are being fixed fast enough, and there aren’t any more of them than usual or compared to January 2005.

11 hotels fit for 647 people were introduced in Yekaterinburg in 2005, Hotels of Yekaterinburg Project Coordinator Tatiana Gushchina reported. According to Ms Gushchina, another 6 hotels went through facultative certification, which resulted in Atrium Palace Hotel once again confirming its five-star status, Ural Hotel getting the four stars, and Oktyabrskaya, Hermitage and Taganskya Hotels getting three stars. At the moment, 36 hotels are available in Yekaterinburg, with the average number of clients being three-quarters of their full hosting capacity, Ms Gushchina said. 10 more hotels fit

Within this week, wholesale oil prices have gone up by 5% to 6%. According to data presented by Ural Oil Company (TNK JSC), AI-80 petrol prices have experienced the greatest increase. ‘The company isn’t expecting to have the retail prices go up since the wholesale ones are still growing,’ the spokesperson for Combustive-Lubricating Supplies Sales Department of Ural Oil Company says. The company managers say that this increase in prices is due to shortages on the home market and more petrol being used in cold weather.

NTMK JSC (Metallurgical Industrial Complex of Nizhniy Tagil) generates 50% of its electricity and buys the other half from Sverdlovenergosbyt JSC while fully providing for the heating on one’s own. The arrival of cold weather caused more heat to be produced for internal use as well as for sale as the company’s power station provides electricity for about 30% of Nizhniy Tagil residents. The terms of the contract state that the company’s power station provide their consumers with 200 gigacalories per hour, but now it has to increase this amount to 350 to 360 gigacalories per hour because of the

‘The U.S. Embassy in Russia issued 80,000 visas in 2005, 10,000 having been issued in Yekaterinburg. This can be seen as a slight lagging compared to Saint Petersburg where 15,000 to 20,000 visas were issued. However, the Embassy is hoping to reach the point of 12,500 visas in 2006, which is going to be an unprecedented number for Yekaterinburg,’ Consul General of Moscow Embassy James D. Pettit announced at the press conference on January 18, 2006. ‘We’ve had a lot fewer rejections lately; thus, refusals made up 25% of all visa applications 2.5 years ago but only 17% in 2005,’ Mr Pettit said.

Chelyabenergo JSC is taking extra steps to make sure their electricity networks can still function properly despite the cold weather. According to the company’s spokesperson, the staff have double checked the equipment, particularly the oil-filled items, some of which required extra filling, and are now keeping a close eye on everything. The tanks, driving gears and control cabinets have been checked as well, extra supplies and spare parts have also been provided for. The emergency teams and facilities are available at any moment. All of the company’s divisions are working non-stop to ensure

Ufaleinickel OJSC Board of Directors approved of signing a loan agreement with Commercial Joint-Stock Bank of Moscow OJSC. The loan comprises $15 million and is to be paid off within 1.5 years. Ufaleinickel OJSC proffered to consider its realty and right to part of the company’s profits a guarantee of its meeting the contract liabilities. The transaction makes up 35.47% of the company’s assets.