Habeck confirms surprise: German gas storage tanks are filling up faster – despite Putin's brakes
Created: 08/30/2022, 1:55 p.m
But cause for joy?
Robert Habeck (left) and Chancellor Olaf Scholz in the Bundestag (archive photo).
© Kay Nietfeld/dpa
Germany fears a cold winter in Putin's gas stranglehold.
But now positive news is surprising: the storage tanks are filling up quickly(er).
Brussels/Berlin – In the dispute over the gas levy, finally good news for Robert Habeck and the traffic light: the filling level of the German natural gas storage facilities is still approaching the 85 percent mark, despite significantly reduced delivery volumes from Russia.
This emerged on Sunday from data from European gas storage operators.
The filling level was therefore 81.78 percent on Thursday morning (August 25).
A further increase to 82.2 percent was expected for Friday.
"The reservoirs are filling up faster than specified," Economics Minister Robert Habeck told
Der Spiegel
.
The Green politician assumes that the targets he has set will be reached much earlier.
A spokeswoman confirmed that the October storage target of 85 percent should already be achieved by the beginning of September.
Previously,
Spiegel
had quoted an internal memo from the ministry.
The President of the Federal Network Agency, Klaus Müller, recently said that the gas storage facilities were being filled at an “admirable speed”.
According to Habeck, the companies will then be able to "remove" the gas in the storage facilities as planned over the winter in order to also supply industry and households.
Gas crisis: Putin is curbing deliveries – but Germany's storage facilities are filling up quickly
A regulation stipulates that the German storage tanks must be at least 85 percent full by October 1st.
On November 1st it should be at least 95 percent.
The storage facilities compensate for fluctuations in gas consumption and thus form a kind of buffer system for the gas market.
The fill level is always reported with a delay.
Russia recently announced that it would interrupt gas supplies via the Nord Stream 1 Baltic Sea pipeline for three days at the end of August.
From August 31 to September 2, no gas will flow to Germany due to maintenance work.
After that, 33 million cubic meters of natural gas should be delivered daily.
This corresponds to the 20 percent of the daily maximum output to which Russia reduced deliveries a few weeks ago.
Putin's guns blunt?
Only 9.5 percent of gas consumption in August came from Russia
According to the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the purchase of Russian gas has fallen significantly.
In August, only nine and a half percent of gas consumption arrived via the Russian pipelines, the spokeswoman confirmed.
This is also due to the low consumption in summer.
"Most of the Russian pipeline import volumes were compensated for in other ways," the memo says, according to
Spiegel
.
France should now be the new source of supply.
So far, France has also obtained Russian gas via Germany.
In addition, the country imports large amounts of electricity from Germany because of numerous nuclear power plants that have been shut down.
This comes mainly from gas-fired power plants that run especially for French exports.
But according to the ministry, the gas flow should now reverse from autumn.
Liquid gas terminals in France could also be used for the German purchase of gas and significantly ease the supply situation.
"It is a very challenging situation and major savings are definitely still necessary, but we are prepared as a country," said Habeck with cautious optimism.
Meanwhile, the CSU even wants to put the construction of new nuclear power plants on the agenda.
(
dpa/fn
)
