Germany must cut its gas use by a fifth to avoid a crippling shortage this winter, its top network regulator said, as businesses and households brace themselves for Europe’s biggest energy crisis in a generation.
Klaus Müller, head of the federal network agency (BNA), will be in charge of rationing gas supplies if Europe’s largest economy suffers a winter energy crunch. “If we fail to reach our target [of 20 per cent gas savings] then there is a serious risk that we will not have enough gas,” he told the Financial Times.
Müller said Germany would also need about 10 gigawatts of extra gas supply from other sources to make up for the missing volumes from Russia — largely liquefied natural gas from countries such as the US. That represents about 9 per cent of its current gas consumption.