MOSCOW (Realist English). Gas prices in Europe have exceeded $2000/thousand cubic meters in anticipation of stopping another engine on the Nord Stream gas pipeline.
On July 25, Gazprom announced that from July 27 it would stop the operation of the turbine at the Portovaya compressor station. Therefore, gas supplies via the Nord Stream will not exceed 33 million cubic meters per day.
The price of the nearest (August) TTF futures on the ICE Futures exchange rose to $2010. A day earlier, the auction closed at $ 1,852, and the average since the beginning of the month, the quotes amounted to $ 1,713.
Meanwhile, the American business publication Fortune claims that “from a purely economic point of view, [Russian President Vladimir] Putin needs European markets far more than the world needs Russian energy supplies:
“Last year, Europe imported 46% of its energy from Russia–but Russia exported 83% of its energy to Europe!”
The Fortune’s analysts remind that 90% of Russia’s existing pipeline infrastructure flows to Europe.
For comparison’s sake: in 2021, Russia supplied China with 16.5 billion cubic meters of gas compared to 170 billion cubic meters sent to Europe. In the second quarter of 2022, Russia’s foreign trade surplus amounted to a record $70.1 billion.
According to oil hedge fund manager Pierre Andurand, the Russian operation of Ukraine has paradoxically brought more oil to the global market, not less. Strategic reserves around the world have released an unprecedented 240 million barrels–a figure significantly higher than the losses associated with a reduction in oil production in the Russian Federation.
In the U.S., the energy spigots have hardly been turned off – the Joseph Biden administration issued 3,557 permits for drilling oil and gas wells on public lands in its first year, far outpacing the Trump Administration’s first year total of 2,658.
