BEIJING, Dec. 19 (Xinhua) According to Reuters, on the 19th local time, EU energy ministers met in Brussels to try to reach an agreement on a natural gas price cap of 180 euros per megawatt-hour (MWh).
According to reports, the European Union has been discussing the natural gas price ceiling for several months and held two emergency meetings, but still failed to reach an agreement.
They are now considering a new compromise proposed by the Czech Republic, which holds the EU presidency.
According to the new plan, the trigger condition for this natural gas price limit mechanism is that the natural gas futures price of the Dutch Title Transfer Center (TTF), which is the benchmark price of European natural gas, exceeds 180 euros per megawatt-hour for three consecutive days, which is much lower than that of the European Commission last month. Proposed €275 per MWh.
It is reported that 12 countries, including Belgium, Poland and Greece, demanded that the natural gas cap be lowered to less than 200 euros per megawatt-hour in order to solve the surge in public energy bills under the European energy crisis.
But countries such as Germany, the Netherlands and Austria fear the cap could disrupt Europe's energy markets and lead to large losses of gas from the bloc.
They want stricter measures, with an automatic moratorium on gas caps if they have unintended negative consequences.
"Nobody in Germany is against low gas prices, but we know we have to be very careful not to do bad things with good intentions," said German Economy Minister Robert Habeck.
"If that happens, we're going to have to live with it."
