The “Huntorf” gas storage facility in Elsfleth in Lower Saxony
Image: dpa
The EU Commission is reacting to the high dependency on Russian gas. In autumn, the EU storage should be at least 80 percent full. How the members achieve this is largely up to them.
DAgainst the background of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Commission wants to oblige the member states to fill their gas storage tanks at least 80 percent by the end of the summer. This emerges from a current unpublished draft for a strategy paper on energy policy that Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson intends to present in the middle of next week. The paper is available to the FAZ. As can be heard from the Commission, it is currently being revised again and again. The target for the minimum storage levels could ultimately be even higher – up to 90 percent. The target is an average value that the EU should achieve by September 30th.
The paper does not yet contain exact figures on the storage status that each individual state should achieve. It only says that the size of the storage facilities and the role they play in the EU’s security of supply are taken into account. In Germany, which has large storage facilities, this could result in even higher minimum levels. The German gas storage facilities could be needed, for example, to protect countries such as Poland or the Czech Republic, which have hardly any storage facilities worth mentioning and have so far relied on the large storage facilities in Ukraine. The federal government is already working on legal requirements. A minimum filling level of 80 percent is planned by the beginning of October. The storage tanks must be 90 percent full in December and 40 percent in February.