The new drastic reduction in natural gas deliveries announced by Gazprom is “further proof” that Europe must “reduce its dependence on Russian supplies as quickly as possible”, the Czech energy minister said today. current semester the rotating presidency of the EU.
“Unity and solidarity are the best weapons we have against (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and I’m sure we will show that today,” Josef Sikela said, ahead of the start of a summit in Brussels with his counterparts from the 27 member states of the EU to agree on a plan to reduce EU gas consumption.
Gazprom announced yesterday, Monday, that as of tomorrow, Wednesday, it will drastically reduce to 33 million cubic meters daily deliveries of Russian natural gas to Europe via the Nord Stream pipeline, arguing that maintenance work on a turbine needs to be done, i.e. approx. at 20% of its capacity.
The European Commission last week proposed a 15% cut in European gas demand from August in order to overcome falling Russian supplies and avoid a severe winter crisis. About 40% of the EU’s natural gas imports came from Russia until last year.
The Brussels plan to be discussed by member states today stipulates that each country “must do its best” to reduce its natural gas consumption by at least 15% between August 2022 and March 2023 compared to the average of the last five years during the same period.
In the event of a “risk of serious shortage”, an alarm mechanism would make the 15% reduction “binding” for the 27.
The diplomats of the 27 worked on the proposal of the European Commission and modified it in depth in the hope of reaching an agreement of the member states today, according to a version of the text accessed by AFP.
This proposal foresees that the European Council and not the European Commission will decide on the eventual implementation of binding targets.
Furthermore, this target of 15% will be adapted to the specific situation of each country thanks to a series of exceptions, taking into account in particular the levels of storage that have been achieved and the possibility of exporting the saved gas to other countries.
“Member countries are facing different issues, but in the end I expect we will have a political agreement,” said Energy Commissioner Country Simson today as she attended a meeting of EU energy ministers.
Source: RES-MPE
Source: Capital
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