Page 13 - EurOil Week 03 2023

EurOil POLICY EurOil

EU acts to conserve gas in 2022

with new regulations

RUSSIA IN an effort to mitigate the energy crisis in 2022 gap. Electricity generation from natural gas fell
the EU has introduced a raft of reforms to better by 13.9% in 2022, partly offset by electricity from
The EU is introducing preserve its gas supplies, but with the Interna- renewable energies and coal
reforms to better tional Energy Agency (IEA) predicting there will Thanks to the EU’s Green Deal, many of the
preserve its gas. be a 30bn cubic metre shortage of gas in 2023 reforms to end Europe’s dependence on gas
there is more to do to avoid another energy crisis were well underway, but now they have been
in the next heating crisis. accelerated.
Russia’s share of gas imports to Europe Alongside the broader structural changes tar-
decreased from around 55% in 2021 to around geted by the Fit for 55 package and the REPow-
20% in 2022 as a whole, as volumes from the erEU plan, there have been major additional
Netherlands and Belgium as well as LNG policy initiatives and infrastructure projects that
increased. seek to increase the resilience of European gas
Things have been made easier after natural markets, strengthen solidarity and limit exces-
gas consumption fell by 14.8% compared to the sive price spikes. The IEA named the following
previous year; milder weather, and EU initiative measures in its recent report “How to Avoid Gas
to reduce demand by 15%, and demand destruc- Shortages in Europe in 2023”:
tion of 10%, equivalent to 50 bcm, of which 10 Introduction of minimum gas storage obliga-
bcm was due to factory closures, has taken some tions: The European Union adopted a new stor-
of the pressure off, but gas and power still remain age regulation in June 2022, according to which
at historically record levels. storage sites must be filled to at least 80% of their
At the same time investment into renewa- capacity before the winter of 2022-23, and to
bles has continued the move away from com- 90% ahead of all following winter periods. Sev-
bustibles. The share of renewable electricity in eral EU member states adopted more stringent
electricity consumption rose to almost 47% in regulations, aiming for fill targets above 90%.
2022, but the IEA says that the rollout of new The EU intermediate storage targets for 2023
renewable resources needs to triple to close the include a 45-55% fill level for 1 February.

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