energy
Russian gas deliveries to Austria have been stopped
After losing a legal dispute, Russia has stopped its gas deliveries to Austria as announced. Nobody has to freeze, the government assures us.
Austria no longer receives gas deliveries from Russia. The deliveries were stopped in the morning, the spokeswoman for the energy company OMV, Sylvia Shin, confirmed to the German Press Agency. But the country has taken precautions, assured Chancellor Karl Nehammer on Friday evening on Platform X: “Nobody will freeze in winter,” he said.
The Russian company Gazprom announced the delivery stop for Saturday at 6 a.m. with just over twelve hours’ warning. The background for the abrupt end is a legal dispute between the two companies over delivery interruptions.
An arbitration court awarded OMV 230 million euros in damages this week. The company said it wanted to offset the sum against ongoing Gazprom deliveries. However, it was expected that Gazprom would respond by stopping deliveries.
The Austrian gas storage facilities were therefore well filled, said Nehammer. “We won’t allow ourselves to be blackmailed,” he said. Moscow wanted to put Austria under pressure because of EU sanctions against Russia in the wake of the Ukraine war. Along with Hungary and Slovakia, Austria was one of the few countries in the EU that still purchased gas from Russia. For Austria it was a total of 80 percent of gas imports.
Alternative supply sources
Austria had found other suppliers and the gas storage facilities were around 90 percent full at the beginning of winter, it was said. This amount alone would last Austria for around a year. The alternative gas should come from Norway, from our own production or in the form of liquefied natural gas by ship via Germany or Italy.
According to the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection, the storage facilities in Germany are over 95 percent full.
dpa
Source: Stern
