EU agrees plan to reduce gas use over Russia supply fears

theguardian.com:

The EU has agreed a plan to reduce gas consumption in an act of solidarity with Germany and a response to Russia’s manipulation of supplies as an economic weapon.

The plan, approved by energy ministers in Brussels, will see exceptions and carve-outs as some EU countries blanched at making too deep a sacrifice for Berlin and a few landlocked member states.

But Hungary was the only member state to oppose the plan, which passed on a majority vote, and the ministers’ Council of the European Union hailed the deal a victory for EU unity.

“In an effort to increase EU security of energy supply, member states today reached a political agreement on a voluntary reduction of natural gas demand by 15% this winter,” the council said.

“The council regulation also foresees the possibility to trigger a ‘union alert’ on security of supply, in which case the gas demand reduction would become mandatory,” the statement continued.

“The purpose of the gas demand reduction is to make savings ahead of winter in order to prepare for possible disruptions of gas supplies from Russia that is continuously using energy supplies as a weapon.”

Germany, the EU’s economic powerhouse, is hugely dependent on Russian gas and remains at the mercy of the supply from Gazprom for the years still needed to find alternative sources.

“It is true that, Germany with its dependence on Russian gas, has made a strategic mistake but our government is working … to correct this,” Germany’s economy minister Robert Habeck said.

France said showing solidarity with Berlin would help protect all of Europe, even though Germany takes a major share of the 40% of EU gas imports that came from Russia last year.

“Our industrial chains are completely interdependent: if the chemical industry in