Germany, Russia’s largest energy customer, took a big turn on Monday (2nd), saying it was ready to support the European Union’s immediate embargo on Russian oil, which means Russia may lose a huge source of revenue within days. On the other hand, the European Union is trying to find alternative sources from Africa in response to the possibility of Russia cutting gas supply to more countries.
Archyde.com reported that the European Commission will present a sixth set of sanctions this week, with Germany bucking its earlier stance and saying it may support an immediate embargo. German Economy Minister Robert Habeck said: “Germany has reached the point where it is able to remain under an oil embargo.”
Energy remains Russia’s largest source of income, but has so far been largely unaffected by international sanctions.
Germany has reduced the share of Russian oil in total oil imports to 12 percent from 35 percent before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Europe’s largest economy had previously said it would take several months to phase out Rosneft to lessen the impact on the domestic economy, and was criticized by various circles for the sanctions being insufficient.
Reducing dependence on Russian oil is less difficult for Europe than for Russian gas. Moscow has asked European customers to buy gas in rubles and cut off supplies to Bulgaria and Poland last week. EU ministers have warned that complying with the Russian central bank would go against the EU. sanctions.
Natural gas imported from Africa?
The EU is trying to find ways to reduce its reliance on Russian gas. According to a draft EU document obtained by Bloomberg, African countries, especially those on the western side of the continent, such as Nigeria, Senegal, Angola, have large amounts of untapped LNG ( LNG).
According to the document, the EU plans to import 50 billion cubic meters of LNG from African countries and increase the supply of natural gas pipelines from non-Russian countries by an additional 10 billion cubic meters. This represents the need for the EU to forge new relationships with traditional suppliers and to include new ones.
The specific approach includes fully implementing the agreement with the United States to deliver an additional 15 billion cubic meters of LNG in 2022, and another goal is to sign a tripartite memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Egypt and Israel to supply LNG as soon as this summer, according to the document. The Executive Committee will use the document as part of its natural gas policy review later this month.