BRUSSELS - The European Commission has not seen any signals indicating that Russia will experience complications in supplying gas to Europe during the upcoming winter, official EC representative Marlene Holzner said at a Wednesday briefing in Brussels.
If it becomes clear that gas supplies have met with difficulties in
the next few months, the EC is much more prepared for such a possibility
right now than it was in the past, she said.
There was a crisis in this area in 2009, but since then the EC has
changed its legal arsenal, the chief provision of which lies in each
European Union country being required to position itself so that its
enterprises have at least 30 days worth of gas reserves in case of
emergency, she said.
During the previous gas crisis, Western Europe did not possess the
needed number of gas pipelines to urgently deliver gas to a number of
countries; for example, Bulgaria. Today Western Europe has these
pipelines and is in a much better position to confront difficulties on
the gas market, Holzner said.
The EU is conducting negotiations with Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan in
order to secure gas supplies from these countries as well, thereby
guaranteeing more diversified supply sources in the future. If the EU
comes up against trouble with one of its partners, it can simply turn to
another, she said.
Holzner also drew attention to the fact that bilateral gas agreements
signed by EU countries sometimes fail to comply with European law,
especially energy law. She said that the EC can ask and has already
asked its member states to alter these international agreements.
The EC would like to go even further. When such agreements are being
discussed in negotiations, the EC would like to know what they will
entail, Holzner said. The EC has crafted such a proposal, and the
European Parliament should vote on it next week, after which it will
have to be approved by the EU Council.
At this stage, the EC can monitor the gas agreement, for example,
between Bulgaria and Gazprom once it is signed and verify whether or not
it complies with European law. If not, the EC can ask Bulgaria to
change it; otherwise, it will initiate a procedure on legal violations,
she said.
The EU is interested in competition on the domestic market so that
consumers can take advantage of the most favorable prices, and
infrastructure for this purpose is being studied. If a gas pipeline has a
single owner, then it is unlikely that others will be able to use it.
This is why legislation also extends to pipelines. There is a general
rule for this that must be applied, Holzner said.
Prices for gas pipeline use and all of the accompanying conditions
should be identical for all companies that want to take advantage of
them. A situation in which the operator of a gas pipeline provides one
company with better conditions than it offers another company cannot be
tolerated. All of the same services should have the same price, Holzner
said.
