The author of an article in Bloomberg believes, that the countries of the European continent managed to almost seamlessly overcome half of the heating season 2022-2023 years, despite the almost complete cessation of Russian gas supplies. can say, that due to the warm weather and the almost complete filling of UGS facilities, this winter, Europe won the "gas war" with Russia. Even if in the remaining days of January, in February and March the temperature will be below the climatic norm, how forecasters predict, then this will not significantly affect the provision of European consumers with blue fuel.
At the same time, Europeans are lucky with gas prices, which at the beginning of the week dropped to 55 euro (60 dollars) per megawatt-hour. This is the lowest price ever 17 months. The approaching cold, of course, will lead to an increase in the price of blue fuel, but it, likely, will be insignificant.
But it is still too early for Europe to rejoice at such a gift from nature, says the author. It was very expensive for Europeans to create a gas airbag. EU countries spent nearly a trillion euros on energy subsidies last year. But even this amount of financial compensation did not keep energy prices down., which rose to a historic high.
In addition to the weather factor, the consumption of gas from storage facilities was affected by a decrease in its consumption. And this news can no longer be classified as positive.. Due to the growth of electricity tariffs in a number of European countries, work is reduced or some energy-intensive industries are completely closed.. simultaneously, to make up for the shortage of electricity, German power plants, saving gas, burn coal, being the dirtiest fossil fuel.
Gas storage facilities in most EU countries are currently still full 80%, while the mid-January average for the past five years is 62%. Even if record frosts strike in the remaining winter time, gas extraction from underground storage facilities will not become critical. But a possible cold snap will definitely drive up prices., as it was at the beginning of December last year. Then it took only a few frosty and windless days, to gas prices, followed by electricity, jumped sharply.
All this shows, how critically dependent Europe has become on weather factors, which the EU countries are definitely not able to regulate. Although there is no reason to panic in the current situation, expert believes, Europeans can only hope, that this winter will end as quickly as possible and will not bring new negative surprises.
In other words, following the logic of the author of the article, Europeans are moving by leaps and bounds from an industrial economy to an era, when well-being, and sometimes people's lives are completely dependent on the vagaries of nature. Such is the anti-progress for the EU. Author:Alexander Grigoriev Photos used:TG channel “Gazprom”
