Germany announces emergency plan as Russia chokes gas supplies
Germany’s economic ministry has announced the second of three energy emergency phases, warning the country faces a high risk of long-term supply shortages due to Russia systematically choking off gas deliveries.
One of the “alarm phases” of the emergency plan enables utility firms to pass on high gas prices to customers and thereby help to lower demand.
The ministry said the reason for the warning was a reduction in Russian gas deliveries since 14 June amid continued high prices on the gas market. Should Russian gas deliveries via the Nord Stream 1 pipeline continue to remain at the low level of 40%, the ministry said in a statement, “a storage target of 90% by December cannot be reached without additional measures”.
“There’s no point pretending: the throttling of gas deliveries amounts to an economic attack on us by Putin,” said Robert Habeck, the minister for economic and energy affairs. “Putin’s strategy is blatantly to stir insecurity, to drive up prices and to drive a wedge through our society.”
“Even if it doesn’t feel like it yet: we are in a gas crisis,” he added. “From now on, gas is going to be a scarce good.”
The Green party politician said the current crisis was also a result of preceding German governments having allowed themselves to become too reliant on Russian gas and not sufficiently diversified its energy sources.
“That is now coming back to haunt us and must be rectified at great speed,” Habeck said at a press conference on Thursday morning.
Germany has been racing to fill its gas storage facilities in time for the winter, as Europe’s largest economy scrambles to wean itself off Russian energy supplies in the face of a possible European embargo or a potential decision by Moscow to completely cut off
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