European gas storage facilities only 39% full

Gas filling of underground storage facilities (UGS) in Europe fell below 40% on January 27, according to the data of Gas Infrastructure Europe (GIE), Report informs citing TASS.

For the first time since 2011, this has happened so early since the beginning of the year.

On January 27, gas withdrawal from UGS facilities in Europe amounted to about 660 million cubic meters. European underground gas storages are already 39.65% full - this is 15.7 percentage points lower than the average for this date over the past five years. Previously, the fastest decline in storage stocks below 40% since the beginning of the calendar year occurred on February 3, 2017. This year, this figure was reached a week earlier.

There are currently about 42.8 billion cubic meters in European storage facilities - by 15.9 billion cubic meters less than last year. The lowest UGS occupancy rates are in Austria (23.26%), the Netherlands (27.49%) and Bulgaria (32.92%). Storage facilities in Germany are filled by 38%, France - by 37.4%, Italy - by 50.9%, UK - by 67.2%.

In total, as of January 27, since the beginning of the month, the flow of LNG into the European UGS has amounted to just over 10 billion cubic meters. As of January 28, the record of January 2019 will be renewed, and by the end of the month, probably, the absolute record of gas receipts from LNG terminals into the UGS of Europe in November 2019.

LNG stocks in European liquefied gas storage tanks are also quite high for mid-January, but have already almost fallen to the five-year average.