- Claude Turmes: “without LNG ports, we would be completely vulnerable to blackmail”
- Despite scandals: gas from Azerbaijan to provide relief
- Data Act: how the data economy should get going
- Study: biometric facial recognition violates human rights
- Coal imports to Europe rising rapidly
- 24 objectives for the TTC
- Bernd Lange becomes CCC chairman
- Interior ministers establish “Schengen Council”
- Dispute with EU: Poland wants to abolish disciplinary chamber
- Agreement in dispute over Turow open pit mine
- ECB: reassess situation in March
- Victor van Hoorn: sustainable investments not profitable
The current gas price crisis continues to preoccupy the European Union’s top politicians. In the view of Luxembourg’s Energy Minister Claude Turmes, only a package of measures will help: increase energy efficiency, expand renewable energies and diversify gas sources. The demand for gas will continue to fall. From a climate policy perspective, gas also has no future, says Turmes in an interview with Charlotte Wirth.
Today, the EU is continuing its search in Azerbaijan for possible alternatives to Russian gas supplies. In Baku, Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson is taking part in a meeting of the Advisory Council for the so-called “Southern Gas Corridor”. The meeting is to focus on a possible expansion of capacities for further deliveries to the west. However, expectations are not too high. “It is important for politicians to look at alternative energy suppliers. In the end, it is companies that have to decide on the market for supplies,” said BDI Chief Executive Joachim Lang Eric Bonse.
The EU Commission wants to help data-driven business models in Europe get off the ground. The Data Act as a new legal framework is intended to make it easier for start-ups and smaller companies in particular to access valuable data. A new draft shows: the EU Commission wants to make manufacturers of connected devices – from virtual assistants to cars – responsible for this. They are to give users access to data generated by them, and must also pass this on to other companies if they wish. This is intended to strengthen small repair businesses, for example. Till Hoppe has taken a close look at the draft Data Act.
Eugenie Ankowitsch
Feature
Claude Turmes: “without LNG ports, we would be completely vulnerable to blackmail”
Minister, you said a few weeks ago that the energy price crisis was a “short-term extreme situation”. Do you still believe that?
We are in an atypical situation; after all, a war between Russia and Ukraine is on the horizon. But the question we already had to ask ourselves during the last Russia-Ukraine crisis is how the EU is dealing with its dependence on Russia. During the first gas conflict between Russia and Ukraine in the mid-2000s, the EU diversified and built LNG ports, for example. If this diversification had not been carried out, we would be even more vulnerable to blackmail from Russia today. In the short term, we now need to take action to cushion prices for end-users. In the long term, we need to diversify our energy sources and use less gas.
Can we manage that? There are studies that say we will consume more, at least in the next few years, because gas is used as a bridging technology.
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