The federal government is appealing to the citizens of the EU’s largest economy to save energy, as Russia is stopping more and more European countries from its gas supplies.
Germany’s Deputy Chancellor Robert Habeck said the situation was “serious” and “now is the time” for businesses and citizens to save energy and store gas. “Every kilowatt hour helps in this situation,” he said in one video appeal was published on Twitter on Thursday.
Russia’s state-controlled gas exporter Gazprom has cut flows through the Nord Stream pipeline, which runs under the Baltic Sea to Germany, by 60 percent in recent days because of technical problems. But Germany has said the move was political amid escalating tensions between Moscow and the West over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Germany’s largest energy supplier RWE reported reduced gas flows on Thursday. Italy’s supplies were reduced by 15 percent on Wednesday and Italian energy company Eni said shortages worsened on Thursday, while Slovakia reported a 30 percent drop in flows. Meanwhile, Austrian energy group OMV said it had been informed by Gazprom that supply volumes would be cut.
Russia’s supply shortages came as leaders of Germany, Italy and France visited Kyiv on Thursday to show their support for Ukraine’s government nearly four months into the war.
EU politicians have accused Russia of effectively weaponizing its role as one of the world’s largest oil and gas producers, while post-invasion European sanctions have fueled fears of further retaliatory cuts by Russia.
European gas prices, already near record levels, rose more than 70 percent this week in response to recent supply restrictions, hitting €146 per megawatt-hour on Wednesday – up nearly 30 percent on the day.
Gazprom has blamed technical problems with the Nord Stream pipeline for reducing gas flows to Germany after pumping equipment shipped from Germany by Siemens Energy was held up by Canadian sanctions after repairs at its Montreal plant. Only about 67 million cubic meters of gas are now being pumped through Nord Stream – 40 percent of its technical capacity.
Russia’s envoy to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, warned Thursday that further problems with the repairs could lead to a complete shutdown of the pipeline, with devastating consequences for Germany.
“One should ask Siemens why they had to send turbines to Canada for repairs,” Chizhov told Ria Novosti news agency. “If all these turbines go to Canada for maintenance, it could stop. I think it will be a disaster for Germany.”
Gazprom Chairman Alexei Miller said on Thursday there was “no solution” to the problem with Nord Stream’s turbines because the Canadian plant is the only one capable of repairing Siemens Energy’s turbines.
Canada said it couldn’t return the turbines because it was the only country to impose sanctions on Gazprom, he added.
Almost all of the other turbines were about to need servicing, “but we can’t send them to Canada,” Miller said at the International Economic Forum in St. Petersburg. He added that Siemens Energy is trying to find a solution to the problem.
Miller said soaring gas prices have offset the blow of a double-digit drop in Gazprom’s exports to Europe and Turkey. “Prices have gone up. . . multiple times. Excuse me, but if I said we’re not mad at anyone, I wouldn’t be lying.”
Habeck said Berlin was aware that Canada’s sanctions could affect maintenance schedules for Nord Stream’s compressor stations, but that it likely won’t become an issue until the fall.
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The technical reasons cited by Gazprom are just a “pretext” and the power cut is a “political action,” he added. “[Russian president Vladimir] Putin is doing what we feared from the start. It doesn’t reduce the amount of gas all at once, but gradually.”
Sergiy Makogon, Executive Director of Ukraine’s State Gas Transmission Network, said on Thursday: “The Kremlin [has] decided to continue the escalation and blackmail of the EU.”
Russia could compensate for lower Nord Stream volumes by increasing gas supplies via Ukraine and Poland, he said, but “they haven’t [the] want” to.
Meanwhile, Eni said in a statement that Gazprom’s gas supply disruption had worsened. The company said it requested additional supplies to be delivered on Thursday to make up for the previous day’s cut. But Gazprom said it would deliver just 65 percent of Eni’s request, or about 32 million cubic meters — far less than the amount needed to recover lost volumes.
Eni said Gazprom blamed problems at its Portovaya plant, which feeds Nord Stream, for the outage.
In Austria, which imports around 80 percent of its gas from Russia, OMV said that despite reduced flows, demand can be met from existing storage and supplies from the spot market thanks to reduced consumption during the current heatwave. “Supply to our customers is assured,” the company added.
But analysts warned that while immediate gas supplies could be met, filling up storage ahead of the peak of winter demand would be much harder if Russian supplies continued to fall.
Additional reporting from Amy Kazmin in Rome, Sam Jones in Zurich, Joe Miller in Frankfurt and Andy Bounds in Brussels