Moscow Contrary to what has been announced, no gas will flow through the Nord Stream 1 Baltic Sea pipeline from this Saturday. The state-owned company Gazprom announced this on Telegram on Friday evening.
The reason is an oil leak in the Portovaya compressor station. The gas flow remains stopped until it is eliminated. It had been expected that gas would flow through the line again from Saturday morning after the announced three-day maintenance work had been completed.
According to Gazprom, the leak was discovered during maintenance work on the station, which was carried out jointly with experts from Siemens Energy. The leaked oil was found in several places. It is not possible to guarantee the safe operation of the last remaining gas turbine there. It was said that such oil spills had happened in the past.
The allegations made by Gazprom against Siemens Energy weigh heavily: the pipeline must be shut down “until all equipment faults have been rectified”. A letter was sent to Siemens Energy AG CEO Christian Bruch about the detected faults on the Trent 60 turbine number 24 and the need to fix them, Gazprom said. Siemens Energy was initially unable to comment on the request.
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However, Gazprom’s claims are at least questionable. Four turbines are used for each of the two strands of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline. According to energy experts, there is enough turbine capacity to generate electricity and pressure.
Similar oil leaks were said to have been found at three other turbine compressor stations. These were repaired, but not in operation. Why not, Gazprom did not say.
The Moscow gas company was also unable to explain why a Nord Stream 1 turbine that had been overhauled by Siemens Energy in Canada is still in Mülheim an der Ruhr. Chancellor Olaf Scholz was in the Siemens Energy plant at the beginning of August and announced to Russia that the turbine could be delivered at any time.
However, Gazprom has not requested this turbine to date. With their failure, the reduction of the gas delivery volume by Nord Stream 1 to 20 percent was recently justified.
Nord Stream 1 consists of two strings – even if one turbine were to fail, the other line could continue to be used. Gazprom could also deliver the full amount through Ukraine at any time. Transit lines are fully available there.
Instead, for weeks Gazprom has been flaring off large quantities of natural gas that was planned to be routed through the Baltic Sea pipeline. This was determined by the Norwegian energy consulting company Rystad Energy using satellite images.
Ministry of Economics: Supply is safe
After Gazprom’s announcement of the extended delivery stop, the Federal Network Agency emphasized the importance of Germany’s precautionary measures. “In view of the Russian decision not to allow any gas to flow via Nord Stream 1 for the time being, the LNG terminals, the relevant storage levels and the need for significant savings are gaining in importance,” tweeted the President of the Authority, Klaus Müller, on Friday. “It’s good that Germany is now better prepared, but now it depends on everyone,” Müller continued.
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Germany now receives by far the most natural gas from Norway, the Netherlands and Belgium. According to the Federal Network Agency, around 2,900 gigawatt hours of natural gas flowed from these countries to Germany on Thursday.
For comparison: On Monday, the last day before the announced supply reduction, Nord Stream 1 transported around 348 gigawatt hours of Russian natural gas. The amount stored was always a multiple of this delivery amount from Russia. For example, 965 gigawatt hours of natural gas were stored in Germany on Tuesday.
Actually, 33 million cubic meters of natural gas should be delivered every day from Saturday.
(Photo: dpa)
The European Commission accused the Russian state-owned company Gazprom of stopping the flow of gas on false pretenses. “Gazprom’s announcement this afternoon that it will shut down Nord Stream 1 again under false pretenses is further evidence of its unreliability as a supplier,” a spokesman for the EU Commission wrote on Twitter on Friday evening. It is also a testament to Russia’s cynicism, preferring to burn gas rather than fulfill contracts.
On Friday evening, the Federal Ministry of Economics emphasized the security of the gas supply for Germany. “The situation on the gas market is tense, but security of supply is guaranteed,” said a spokeswoman on Friday evening.
The spokeswoman said they took note of the latest reports from Gazprom. “We are not commenting on the matter, but we have already seen Russia’s unreliability in the past few weeks and accordingly we have unwaveringly and consistently continued our measures to strengthen independence from Russian energy imports. As a result, we are now much better prepared than we were a few months ago.”
The spokeswoman explained that the gas storage tanks were 84.3 percent full. “The October storage target of 85 percent should therefore already be reached in the first few days of September.” Good progress is also being made with supply via other delivery routes than Russian pipelines and new landing capacities for liquid gas.
With agency material
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