The German Minister of Economy and Climate, Robert Habeck, stated that there are no guarantees for next winter, although he celebrated the signing today of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with energy companies on the supply of floating liquefied natural gas terminals.
“There is no guaranteed scenario for next winter. For this, the situation, the challenge, is too dynamic,” he told the press after signing the MoU with the energy companies Uniper, RWE and EnBW/VNG on the Brunsbüttel terminals and Wilhelmshaven, which will come into operation between the end of this year and the beginning of next.
The minister said he saw “progress” in a difficult situation, and naturally also “setbacks” over and over again, referring to the “erratic behavior” of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and pretexts such as that of the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline turbine, to reduce the flow of Russian gas.
“I expect that we will have to face new challenges again and again, but we have managed to respond to them again and again in the past with intelligent preparation, but also with joint action,” he added.
He stressed that there are areas of work that allow progress towards greater energy security, such as infrastructure construction, gas supply, the efforts of the majority of citizens and companies to save gas and all measures in this regard.
He insisted on the need to continue working in this direction to achieve robustness for this winter and beyond.
The signing of the MoU today is an “important date in the sequence of steps we have been taking since the beginning of the year to make ourselves independent and less susceptible to blackmail from Putin, from Russia’s gas supplies, and to provide Germany with an infrastructure robust and resilient gas pipeline,” he said.
In this sense, he described today’s signing as a “sign of confidence in the success of this development under high pressure of an alternative infrastructure” and, at the same time, a sign that Germany will receive during the winter the gas that these companies will provide through from the floating terminals in Brunsbüttel and Wilhelmshaven.
With the Memorandum of Understanding, the signatory companies declare their intention to make the most of their delivery windows from the end of this year and the beginning of the coming year until March 31, 2024, added the Ministry of Economy and Climate.