A senior US energy adviser has warned that “lives are at stake” in Europe this winter as the continent heads into the season with low gas stockpiles and the threat of reduced supply, Report informs.
Russia had “undersupplied the market compared to its traditional supplies” and contributed to the highest prices on record,” Amos Hochstein, senior adviser for energy security at President Joe Biden’s state department, said in an interview with the Financial Times.
“If you get a real cold winter by January and February, you could run out of supplies. And that’s where I get concerned,” the official said.
He highlighted US fears over Europe’s reliance on Russia for energy flows: “This is not just about some geopolitical games. People’s lives are at stake.”
The value of the October futures on the TTF hub in the Netherlands on September 13 reached $740.003 per 1,000 cubic meters, or 60.65 euros per MWh (based on the current EUR/USD exchange rate, ICE prices are presented in EUR per MWh).
According to the head of the national joint-stock company Naftogaz of Ukraine, Yuriy Vitrenko, the record increase in spot prices for gas in Europe is due to the restriction of supplies from Russia’s Gazprom.
In particular, at the auction of the Gas Transmission System Operator of Ukraine (GTSOU), Gazprom bought out only a small part of the proposed additional solid pumping capacities through Ukraine in September, although in previous months it bought out the entire set volume for pumping 15 million cubic meters per day. Gazprom has a long-term reservation of 40 billion cubic meters of Ukrainian capacity for 2021, which is 109 million cubic meters per day.
In August, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken appointed Amos Hochstein as senior adviser for energy security, whose competence also includes work on Nord Stream 2.