Italy: Government takes steps to reduce Russian gas supplies

The Italian government has begun to take steps to address the reduction of gas supplies from Russia, which in recent days has reached 50%.

Next Tuesday, a “technical” meeting will be held at Rome’s Ministry of Ecological Transition with the heads of the country’s companies that manage the gas supply and the relevant network, with the aim of a detailed analysis of the situation. On Wednesday, a new, higher-level meeting is scheduled, in which the Italian Minister of Ecological Transfer Roberto Tsingolani and the heads of the specific companies are expected to take part.

According to the Corriere della Sera newspaper today, the Italian Hydrocarbon Group Eni has decided not to publish the results of the contacts and requests to Gazprom, in order not to indirectly affect the sale price of Russian gas.

At the same time, Corriere confirms that the main goal of the Italian government at this stage is to increase the rate of gas storage as much as possible in view of the winter. The whole effort aims to cover 80% of the storage limit by October. “For the time being, all we have to avoid is keeping our hands crossed,” Eni Group CEO Claudio De Scalci told La Repubblica.

De Scalzi added that gas supplies from new suppliers should be increased (new agreements are planned with Algeria), but did not rule out that in the winter in Italy some measures may have to be implemented to partially reduce gas supplies.

Due to the big heat wave that hits Italy and the relative water shortage, finally, these days the operation of two units that produce hydroelectric energy was forced to stop in the country.

Source: ΑΠΕ-ΜΠΕ