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“The tap has been turned off,” said Poland’s Climate Minister Anna Moskwa on Polish radio. Poland and Bulgaria have been without gas from Russia since yesterday. EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called Moscow’s actions “an attempt by Russia to blackmail us.” However, both countries had planned to phase out Russian gas anyway and serious supply bottlenecks were not to be feared, it was said after a crisis meeting in Brussels. Read Eric Bonse and Manuel Berkel‘s analysis of how the two countries are securing gas supplies now and in the future and what von der Leyen had to say about payments in rubles.
Fertilizer prices were already extraordinarily high in February. Since Russia’s attack on Ukraine, they have risen by a further 40 percent, according to the EU Commission. The problem is that many EU countries are also dependent on imports from Russia in this area. But these are now failing to materialize. In addition, high energy prices are driving up production costs for fertilizers. This could have a strong impact on food supplies, as Timo Landenberger reports. The German Farmers’ Association is already warning of drastic losses in harvests.
Sarah Schaefer
Feature
EU Commission calls gas freeze blackmail
The situation in Poland and Bulgaria is under control, it was said after a crisis meeting in Brussels. Serious supply bottlenecks are not to be feared, said an EU diplomat. Poland and Bulgaria had planned to phase out Russian gas by the end of the year anyway. Poland would be affected by 10 billion cubic meters (bcm) per year, but could get supplies from LNG terminals, and storage facilities in the country were 76 percent full, tweeted Bruegel expert Simone Tagliapietra.
Bulgaria is 90 percent dependent on Russian imports and storage levels are only 15 percent, but the imported volume from Russia is comparatively low at 3 bcm. Bulgaria has an interconnector with Romania and the IGB pipeline to Greece is scheduled to come on stream in September at the latest. Through it, 1 bcm per year is expected to flow from Azerbaijan to Bulgaria in the future. In addition, Bulgaria has already booked LNG deliveries through Greek ports, a spokesman for the Energy Ministry in Athens said yesterday. In total, the IGB has a capacity of 3 bcm, which can be increased to 5 bcm, according to the Athens newspaper Kathimerini.
Gas transit to other states is not affected by the steps taken against the Polish and Bulgarian companies, according to Tagliapietra and utility Uniper. So far, they see no major changes on the Yamal route, Uniper CCO Niek den Hollander told analysts. However, CEO Klaus-Dieter Maubach warned of unpredictable reactions from Moscow in an interview with the German newspaper FAZ: “If the West decides to impose an oil embargo, it cannot be ruled out that the Russians will react with a gas supply freeze.”
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