As forecasts of a mild winter in Europe and nearly full gas reserves ease Germany’s immediate worries about fossil gas shortages, energy experts are nonetheless warning against complacency.
That this winter “could be among the warmest since 1991, with an average temperature of at least 2°C, more than 0.5°C above the reference period’s average,” is helping to ease concerns about how Germany will weather the next months without Russian gas, reports Clean Energy Wire.
National grid agency Bundesnetzagentur (BNetzA) said milder temperatures could reduce demand for gas heat by at least 20% over the next few months.
But Germans must not get complacent, BNetzA head Klaus Müller warned. “Thanks to full gas storages, we have a running start but must not slow down now,” he said. “Just a few cold days are enough to bring up demand and empty the storages quickly.”
While the warmer temperatures are part of a shorter-term forecast, said DWD, Germany’s weather agency, the long term is hard to predict, with much colder periods quite possible.
Warning that “the worst-case-scenario must not be forgotten,” Achim Wambach, head of the ZEW research institute, recommended the government act now to prepare for a natural gas shortage. “If companies assume they’ll continue to receive gas as a priority customer at moderate prices, there’s little incentive to prepare,” he said. And “the continuously high consumption then increases the likelihood of a shortfall.”
Meanwhile, IEEFA reports that the European Commission has laid out an emergency regulation to unlock permitting for renewable energy projects. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU is on track to add 50 gigawatts of new renewable capacity by the end of 2022.
“And we could accelerate even more,” she said. “There are countless renewable projects that are just waiting to be approved,” with some ready to go online “in a matter of weeks and months” pending accelerated permitting processes.
