BAKU, Azerbaijan, May 12. As Ukraine halts Russian gas through one of major transit points (Sokhranivka pipeline), it will be hard for the EU to meet its gas needs in 2023, Trend reports, citing Capital Economics, UK-based research and consulting company.
According to the research, “the heightened competition for gas imports suggests that prices will remain high at least until spring 2023”.
Meanwhile, Russia has been reducing its gas exports transit through Ukraine for many years already, however, those still accounted for 26 percent of total EU’s gas imports from Russia in 2021.
“Given that the pipeline carried about one-third of this gas, Europe could lose around 8-10 percent of Russian gas supply. Ukrainian gas transmission operator said the gas could be re-routed to other pipelines, but Russia’s Gazprom claimed that was technically impossible,” Capital Economics noted.
Capital Economics hardly believes that supply disruptions will not occur, which could, in turn, derail EU’s increasingly successful efforts to rebuild stocks ahead of next winter. Gas reserves in storage facilities are now close to seasonal norms, and LNG imports have increased sharply.
Currently the gas demand is very low due to summer season approaching, while high prices will also be encouraging gas consumers to use power as efficiently as possible, the report said.
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