Dhe Federal Network Agency has asked people in Germany to save more gas than they are currently doing. “Currently, the total savings are only 13 percent,” said the President of the authority, Klaus Müller, the “Tagesspiegel” on Monday. However, the Federal Network Agency considers savings of 20 percent to be necessary. “If that remains an outlier, we shouldn’t worry about it just yet. But it will remain cold for the next few days. That’s why it’s important that we don’t let up on our savings efforts and stick it out throughout the winter,” warned Müller.
The gas storage tanks are currently 95 percent fuller than ever. In addition, Germany is much better prepared than in the summer. “We now get gas from different sources, we will soon have three terminals for liquid gas, from Norway and Holland, via Belgium and also via France,” said Müller. A longer cold spell is still risky. “At temperatures of minus ten degrees, gas consumption skyrockets,” he emphasized.
“Wake-up call for the federal government”
According to the deputy CDU chairman Andreas Jung, the risk of a gas shortage “is not off the table despite full storage”. Risk factors are a cold winter, too few liquid gas deliveries and too high consumption. “The frost (…) hasn’t hit hard yet,” said the energy policy spokesman for the Union faction to the newspapers of the Funke media group. Nevertheless, the savings target was clearly missed last week.
“This must be a wake-up call for the federal government. Short-term action must be taken and there must be greater awareness,” said Jung and called on the Federal Chancellor to call on the population to save more energy. What is now needed is “very clear communication from the federal government: every contribution to saving energy counts,” said Jung. “Scholz’s mantra-like self-praise of the allegedly already secured supply weighs in with a false sense of security: We expect plain language from Olaf Scholz instead of carrying on like this.”
However, the Federal Network Agency believes that fears that large numbers of fan heaters could cause power outages have not materialized. “We saw the sales figures for the fan heaters,” said Federal Network Agency boss Müller. “But the good thing is: The devices are not switched on. They’re in the basement,” he added. In November, when it was temporarily cold, people could have had the “stupid and expensive idea of heating with electricity instead of gas. Fortunately, hardly anyone did that,” said Müller.
