Fossil Energy – Italy
Gazprom released a statement saying it had suspended the supplies to Italy because the Austrian operator had refused to confirm ‘transport nominations’ after regulatory changes implemented in Austria in late September.
The cut-off appeared to target just Italy, which gets Gazprom’s supplies from a pipeline that passes through Austria. Higher volumes of Russian gas were allocated to Vienna-based OMV AG than recently, said Andreas Rinofner, a spokesman for OMV, which imports Russian gas to Austria.
Austria’s Energy Ministry said Gazprom had failed to sign off on contractual changes that reflect technical rule adjustments typically made at the start of each gas year. Gazprom, like other market participants, had known of the changes for months, Austrian regulator E-Control said in a tweet.
Gazprom said it is working to resolve the issue with Italian buyers. Eni SpA confirmed the cutoff and said it was reaching out to Gazprom. Austria’s government also said it was working on the matter at a technical level.
Italy once relied on Russia for about 40% of its gas imports, but has been aggressively cutting that dependence since the invasion in February. Italy has now sourced sufficient alternative supplies of gas from North Africa to make up for any shortfalls this winter if Russia were to cut off supplies, people familiar with the matter have told Bloomberg.
A boost of expected deliveries from Algeria and Egypt will be able to cover the remaining supplies that Italy was still getting from Russia, they said.
Gazprom Saturday also reduced the daily gas flow levels to Moldova through the Ukraine and blamed the reduction on Ukraine.
