EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The cost of the Russia-Ukraine gas war to the EU economy is spiralling into the billions, experts warn, with the European Commission encouraging EU companies to take legal action. "European gas companies are not selling gas to the tune of about €150 million a day. Electricity producers are also losing hundreds of millions a day," International Energy Agency (IEA) analyst Ian Cronshaw told EUobserver on Wednesday (14 January). Empty gas vat: EU-wide gas stocks have dropped from 95 percent full to around 60 percent over the past week "In Bulgaria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic industry is being forced to slow down or shut down. This will spread as European [gas] stock volumes drop and the economic cost will go up exponentially at a time when Europe can least afford it." A meeting of the Gas Co-ordination Group - EU member states' energy ministry officials - in Brussels on 19 January is to pool data on the impact of the gas crisis so far. But European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has already indicated that Brussels will back any legal claims.
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The cost of the Russia-Ukraine gas war to the EU economy is spiralling into the billions, experts warn, with the European Commission encouraging EU companies to take legal action.
"European gas companies are not selling gas to the tune of about €150 million a day. Electricity producers are also losing hundreds of millions a day," International Energy Agency (IEA) analyst Ian Cronshaw told EUobserver on Wednesday (14 January).
Empty gas vat: EU-wide gas stocks have dropped from 95 percent full to around 60 percent over the past week
"In Bulgaria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic industry is being forced to slow down or shut down. This will spread as European [gas] stock volumes drop and the economic cost will go up exponentially at a time when Europe can least afford it."
A meeting of the Gas Co-ordination Group - EU member states' energy ministry officials - in Brussels on 19 January is to pool data on the impact of the gas crisis so far. But European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has already indicated that Brussels will back any legal claims.
EU-wide gas stocks have dropped from 95 percent full to around 60 percent over the past week
This was Europe's storage capacity as of a couple of years ago - roughly 60 bcm:
It's the beginning of winter, so storage is pretty much full, as the article suggests. If you consider that storage is going to be significantly depleted by the end of winter (say, by 60% over 12 weeks, with spme reserves for unusual weather or circumstances), the drawdown would be about 5%, or 3bcm, per week.
With Russia not delivering 0.3bcm per day, we've lost about 3bcm in Russian gas for now, or about 5% of storage.
Even if you suppose that winter has been unusually cold, and double the usual volume has been drawn from storage, in addition to the losses from Russian non-deliveries, you get down to the highly conservative figure of 80% of storage - and more likely something still close to 90%.
so that tidbit above is simply impossible, and it is highly irresponsible for the IEA to inflame things like that. Or I'm missing something else? In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
