France has not received any Russian gas since June 15 because “the physical flow between France and Germany has been disrupted,” GRTgaz reported on Friday.
The manager of France’s gas transport network GRTgaz announced on Friday that it would no longer purchase Russian gas via pipeline since June 15 because “the physical flow between France and Germany is interrupted”.
France gets around 17% of its gas from Russia, which can be delivered by pipeline or in liquid form by LNG tankers. The vast majority of imported gas normally came by pipeline via this single point of connection with Germany. Flows have already been reduced by 60% since the beginning of the year and this import point was already operating “at the beginning of 2022” with only 10% of its capacity, according to GRTgaz. For two days, the supply has dropped to zero.
Increase in LNG purchases
GRTgaz does not know the cause of this cut, but it comes at a time when Gazprom has significantly reduced gas supplies to Germany via the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline, but France is importing gas from other countries, including Spain, which recently increased its supplies. And most importantly, according to GRTgaz, it has increased its purchases of liquefied natural gas (LNG), which arrives in terminals near its technical maximum via LNG tankers.
So much so that France has become the world’s largest buyer of Russian LNG, according to Lauri Myllyvirta, an analyst at the Research Center for Energy and Clean Air (CREA), who released a report this week on Russian oil and gas sales. But French manager GRTgaz calmed the fill in French stocks ahead of next winter, which stands at 56% versus 50% typically on the same day.