energy
EU Commission wants to completely ban Russian gas imports
There are extensive import bans in the EU against coal and oil, but Moscow’s gas still arrives. According to the will of the EU Commission, however, not long. What is she going to do?
According to the EU Commission’s will, no gas from Russia is to be imported into the European Union by the end of 2027. Because, unlike for such as oil and coal, there are no gas sanctions because of dependencies. This Tuesday, the EU Commission wants to present its specific plans for an end to the gas import. What does the authority plan to do? Questions and answers.
Why does the EU Commission want to stop the import of gas from Russia?
The background is the Russian attack war on Ukraine, which has been going on since February 2022. As a result, the EU issued extensive import bans for Russian energy sources such as coal and oil. So far, there have been no gas sanctions due to dependencies. As a liquid gas (LNG) and via the Turkstream pipeline, gas is currently still getting into the community.
According to the EU Commission, gas deliveries from Russia accounted for almost 19 percent of all imports in 2024. Overall, according to the EU statistics authority Eurostat, the EU statistics authority, according to the natural and processed gas worth 15.6 billion euros, was imported from Russia. For comparison: from the USA, gas worth 19.1 billion euros came.
What exactly does the authority want?
The EU Commission wants to completely prohibit the import of Russian gas into the European Union by the end of 2027 – gradually. For this purpose, on the one hand, it should initially be prohibited to conclude new delivery contracts for Russian gas and to obtain the spot market using existing contracts. The Spotmarkt is the trading center for electricity available at short notice. The prohibition should come into force by the end of the year at the latest.
In addition, the Commission also wants to prohibit the import of gas from Russia through existing long -term delivery contracts. These imports would have to be gradually discontinued due to the larger quantities, the Commission said in May. Such a ban should come into force at the latest at the end of 2027 at the latest. According to the EU Commission, around two thirds of the Russian LNG and Pipeline gas imports are based on existing long-term contracts. The rest is delivered on a short-term spot basis.
What does a ban on consumers mean?
According to the Commission, consumers do not have to worry. The authority wants to ensure that the measures for the stop of Russian energy imports are implemented in such a way that there are only minimal effects on prices and there are no supply bottlenecks.
EU Energy Commissioner Dan Jørgensen recently said that it wanted to proceed in such a way that no member country had problems with security. And: “We want to keep prices as low as possible.”
How should this be legally?
How exactly the Commission wants to ban imports is so far unclear. It would be conceivable, for example, that it uses the possibilities of EU trade law. An import ban on sanctions is unlikely because this would require a unanimous decision by the EU countries and in particular Hungary rejected such a step until the end. Hungary and Slovakia did not join a joint statement on the energy supply security of the EU countries, which contains the exit from Russian energy.
Are German companies affected?
If the import restrictions are proposed as proposed by the Commission, the federal German energy company Sefe could also be affected. Based on an existing, long -term contract, it further imports liquid gas from Russia into the EU. The company Sefe used to be called Gazprom Germania, was a daughter of the Russian state group Gazprom and was nationalized as a result of the Russian war of aggression on Ukraine and the energy crisis.
According to a report from the beginning of the year, SEFE imported more than six times as much LNG into the European Union last year. According to this, 5.66 billion cubic meters from Sefe from Russia imported liquid gas in the French Dunkirk on the English Channel.
So far, Sefe said that there was no legal basis for the termination or suspension of an existing old contract between a Russian supplier and the company. Even if Sefe does not take the gas, the agreed quantities would have to be paid. The non -acceptance would enable the supplier to sell these quantities again, which would support the Russian economy.
dpa
Source: Stern
