Page 5 - bne IntelliNews monthly magazine April 2025

bne April 2025 Companies & Markets I 5
highly subsidized domestic prices. It makes Gazprom entirely loss making,” Elina Ribakova, non-resident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said in
a social media post.
Ukraine removed 15bn cubic metres from the market when it refused to renew the Russian gas transit deal on January 1 that needs to be replaced. In addition, the cold winter means that Europe has also burnt an excess 10 bcm of gas that will also have to be replaced. These shortages are expected to drive up the cost of gas this summer so by softening the requirement to have tanks 90% full by November will reduce demand and restrain the price of gas the EU hopes.
The missing 25 bcm of gas supply also happens to be exactly the amount of gas that the surviving strand of the partially destroyed Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline can deliver, which remains intact, full of “technical gas” and could be turned on tomorrow. That has led some to suggest restarting the Nord Stream
gas supplies to Europe could be a card to play in the current ceasefire talks between Ukraine and Russia, led by the US.
Countries including Germany, France and the Netherlands have raised concerns that the EU’s fixed deadlines for filling
gas storage facilities are already pushing up market prices.
The European Commission has proposed maintaining the binding gas storage targets until 2027. However, EU governments and the European Parliament are in negotiations over possible amendments before approving the final regulations, Reuters reports. A draft proposal circulated among EU member states late on March 14 suggests moving the deadline for the 90% requirement for gas storage and instead, setting the deadline to a window between October 1 and December 1. Additionally, the proposal would make the EU’s intermediate gas storage targets voluntary rather than compulsory.
Diplomats from EU member states are set to discuss the proposed changes as part of an effort to avoid a repeat of the 2022 energy crisis that saw gas prices decuple that some argue has already begun. The draft was prepared by Poland, which currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency and is leading negotiations among member states.
The EU introduced the gas storage requirements in 2022 in response to Russia’s sharp reduction in gas deliveries, aiming to secure sufficient reserves for the winter months when heating demand peaks.
Druzhba pipeline oil deliveries
suspended temporarily due to drone
strike, Hungarian FM says bne IntelliNews
Oil deliveries to Hungary via the Druzhba pipeline have had to be suspended temporarily on March 11 due
to a Ukrainian drone strike on one of the pipeline’s measuring stations.
Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said he had spoken to Russia’s deputy prime minister in charge of energy affairs, who had told him that oil deliveries via the Druzhba pipeline have had to be temporarily halted due to a Ukrainian strike. Repairs are under way, and deliveries could resume late
in the afternoon or early evening, he said, according to
a ministry statement.
"If the Druzhba oil pipeline is rendered inoperable, then it practically becomes physically impossible to supply oil to Hungary and Slovakia," Szijjarto warned, adding that attacks on Hungary’s energy infrastructure were "unacceptable". "We have made this position clear in Brussels on multiple occasions, and the European Commission guaranteed that there would be no attacks on the infrastructure supplying energy to Hungary," he said.
Russia's First Deputy Energy Minister Pavel Sorokin later informed the Hungarian government that the Russian operator had repaired the damage and transits had been restarted on the Druzhba pipeline
The EU has significantly reduced its reliance on Russian oil since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, however, the
Druzhba pipeline oil deliveries suspended temporarily due to drone strike, Hungarian FM says / bne IntelliNews
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