The cut came on the same day Gazprom shut down the Nord Stream1 gas pipeline to Europe for 10 days, officially for maintenance.
The Nord Stream1 pipeline is closed ‘for maintenance’, says Russian energy giant Gazprom on Monday. The company also cut its supplies to Italy by a third, Italian energy company Eni said.
Germany and France, as well as the EU, voices fears of a total stop to Russian gas supplies amid the Ukraine war. Gazprom cut its flow of gas into Italy to 21 million cubic metres, a third down on the average of the last few days.
Gas prices fell last week
Gas prices fell markedly in Europe thanks to Canada’s decision to allow the delivery of a turbine. It should enable supplies to Germany to return.
In Amsterdam, quotations lost as much as 12%, only to rise to a 7% loss, at €163 per MegaWattHour.
Italy has been pressing for Europe to introduce a price cap. Prime Minister Mario Draghi extracted a pledge from the June 23-4 EU summit to draft a report on the issue. It is due to be examined by the end of September.
Oil and gas infrastructure operator Snam said Monday that gas stocks were now up to 6.1 billion cubic metres or 64% of their target.
Water and gas savings campaign
Italy’s Ecological Transition Minister Roberto Cingolani the government was discussing a campaign to save gas and water. The campaign will be launched shortly.
“We are discussing with other ministries about a rapid information project on two major sectors: water and energy. Among other things, they are closely connected. We are thinking of constructing a series of messages to give suggestions for behaviour and sobriety in the use of resources.
“It will be fundamental to launch these messages shortly, seeing that the period in which consumption grows will start after the summer”.
Reducing Italy’s reliance on Russia
The Italian government has been working hard to end the nation’s reliance on Russian gas since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. It has reached a number of agreements to boost supplies from elsewhere.
The proportion of Italy’s gas supplied by Moscow has already fallen from 40% at the start of the conflict to around 25% now. Algeria’s share has risen to over 30%.
The Italian government has “moved rapidly” to diversify suppliers. Alternatives have been sought with Algeria, Angola, Congo, Libya, Egypt, Israel and Mozambique, Premier Mario Draghi said recently.
Eni recently joined the world’s largest Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) project in Qatar.
