The warnings were loud and clear – but they were still ignored. Energy Minister Leonore Gewessler (Greens) has been criticized for months for oversleeping the developments in Ukraine and not ensuring that Austria was adequately stocked. On Wednesday, E-Control reported: “A slight drop in gas flow is currently being recorded in Baumgarten, but the situation has no impact on the gas supply at the moment”. “At the moment” seems to be the key word here…
The domestic gas tanks are currently only 23% full. If the deliveries fail completely, the supply will last for five weeks. After that it’s over! Austria’s industry and commercial enterprises could no longer be supplied. What is often forgotten: the three domestic gas power plants supply 18 percent of our electricity! If Putin doesn’t get any gas, there will also be a shortage of electricity.
In Germany, too, the Federal Ministry of Economics declared: “The security of supply is currently guaranteed”. Lower delivery quantities would probably only be noticed with a delay of a few hours.
Due to the war, Ukraine is stopping the transit of Russian gas in the Luhansk region in the east of the country. This saves up to 32.6 million cubic meters of gas per day – eXXpress reported. And that’s more than explosive: that’s almost a third of the maximum amount that can be transported via Ukraine to Europe every day, the Ukrainian gas network operator announced on Tuesday.
