More households of Germany and Austria choose gas as a source for house heating, Gazprom Export reported on September 12, 2017.
In 2016 about 50% of german households received thermal energy from natural gas, and further 25% from oil products.
In 2015 the share of gas in heating reached only 21.1% while oil products heating had 33.8% share.
The reason for the popularity of gas heating in Germany is in its low price.
Over the past 5 years, the wholesale price of gas in spot markets declined by 36%, and fell at the German border by 45%.
Although only one-third of this decline has reached the end user, retail gas prices in the last 4 years have decreased by 16%, reaching the 12-year minimum in 2017.
Neighboring Austria experiences a similar situation.
According to a study performed by the Austrian Energy Agency, natural gas remains the cheapest fuel for heating in winter 2016-2017, same as in the previous heating season.
All other fuels became more expensive since 2016.
