German gas sector's rocky prospects threaten EU energy security

Germany’s natural gas supply faces “ongoing precarity” due to a huge drop in Russian gas imports, and this could impact neighboring countries and last into 2024, according to a report by academics in the US.

"New liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports and additional pipeline supplies from producing regions are insufficient to make up for the nearly 40% market share that Russian gas volumes recently occupied,” said the report’s authors, Kenneth B. Medlock III, Anna Mikulska, and Luke (Leelook) Min.

Germany is therefore faced with having to find new sources to meet its energy needs and ration its own gas demand, according to the report, Natural Gas Balance in Europe: Germany as a Case Study.

Until Russia’s spop on Ukraine starting this February, Germany accounted for 25% of all natural gas imports to the EU and one-third of all imports to the EU from Russia.