The International Energy Agency (IEA) cautioned on Thursday that global natural gas supplies will remain limited this year due to a variety of concerns.
The IEA said in its latest Gas Market Report that the pressure on global gas markets has eased for the time being because of a reduced requirement for storage withdrawals in Europe and the United States due to the mild winter.
Spot prices for liquefied natural gas (LNG), which has replaced Russian pipeline gas, dipped below levels seen in the summer of 2021 in the first quarter of the year, while they remain significantly above historical averages.
The current position, however, provides “no guarantee against future volatility,” and efforts to manage risks, such as severe weather variables, lower LNG availability, and a potential further decline in Russian pipeline gas deliveries to the EU, should still be implemented, according to the IEA.
Western sanctions against Moscow caused a massive gas supply shock in the European and worldwide gas markets last year, resulting in an 80% decline in Russian pipeline gas exports to the EU over the course of the year.
Since then, the EU has increased its purchases of LNG from the United States, which is expected to become the world’s biggest LNG exporter this year.
Russia continues to supply natural gas to the EU via Ukraine’s gas transit network and the TurkStream pipeline, which bypasses Ukraine and transports Russian gas to southern Europe.
Hungary, the EU’s top importer of Russian gas, stated last month that it has received guarantees from Moscow that gas imports via the TurkStream pipeline will continue uninterrupted.
