Moscow has started cutting shipments to Europe, affecting 12 member states and pushing Germany to raise its gas-risk level to the 2nd-highest «alarm» phase.
Energy security is at the top of the EU’s political agenda, with the region’s leaders expected to discuss the issue at a summit in Brussels on Friday.
Frans Timmermans, the European Union’s climate chief, said:
- The supply woes have pushed gas and power prices to record levels, fueling inflation
- Europe is paying a very high price for its dependence on Russian gas
- I never, ever mind being dependent on a close friend like Norway but we never again have to be dependent on somebody like Putin
The EU aims to curb imports from Moscow by almost 2/3 this year and phase out Russian fossil fuels by 2027.
Timmermans said:
- Norway and the EU will partner to face the challenge caused by Putin, who’s trying to divide by starving us of energy
- We need to make sure that we show solidarity on the European scale
In the statement, the EU and Norway said that their agreement would bring close to 100 terrawatt hours of extra energy to the European market.
Total exports from fields in the Nordic nation are poised to jump about 8% this year to 122 billion m3, the government said last month.
The extra volume would amount to an increase of about 9 billion m3 this year compared with 2021 sales, still a fraction of Russia’s flows to the EU, which exceeded 155 billion m3 last year.
That was about 40% of the bloc’s total consumption.
Thursday’s initiative is a means of telling EU citizens that though the markets are very difficult, «jointly Norway and the EU, we’ll find a way out of this situation», Timmermans said.
Author: Haley Zaremba
