New Delhi: Russia has completely halted gas supplies to Europe via Nord Stream 1 pipeline, citing maintenance on its only remaining compressor, said Gazprom, the Russian state-owned energy giant.
Gazprom added that the restrictions on the pipeline, which runs from Russia to Germany via the Baltic Sea, will be suspended from 31 August to 3 September.
European governments have accused Russia of using energy supplies as a weapon of war. However, Moscow denies doing this and has cited technical reasons for supply cuts.
Russia, which before the reductions started accounted for a bit more than a third of Germany’s gas supplies, has also reduced the flow of gas to other European countries which have sided with Ukraine. In recent weeks, Nord Stream 1 has been running at only 20 per cent of capacity, according to report in newsonair.gov.in.
The shutdown had been announced in advance, with Gazprom saying in mid-August that gas flows would be suspended for a three-day period for maintenance works.
According to CNBC report, Gazprom previously said that gas transmission would resume at a rate of 33 million cubic meters per day when the maintenance work is completed “provided that no malfunctions are identified.”
The president of the German network regulator said that Germany would be able to cope with the three-day outage as long as flows resumed on Saturday.
“I assume that we will be able to cope with it,” Reuters quoted Klaus Mueller as saying in an interview. “I trust that Russia will return to at least 20 per cent from Saturday, but no one can really say.”
Further restrictions to European gas supplies would deepen an energy crunch that has already triggered a 400 per cent surge in wholesale gas prices since last August, squeezing consumers and businesses and forcing governments to spend billions to ease the burden.
In Germany, inflation soared to its highest in almost 50 years in August and consumer sentiment soured as households brace for a spike in energy bills.
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