2024-04-18 09:30:22
Russia’s decision to invade part of Ukraine has prompted European Union countries to reduce their dependence on Russian gas. Despite this, LNG imports are increasing and France is planning the installation of several import terminals, while demand is falling.
France and LNG are a relationship full of paradoxes. While gas today represents 16% of the French energy mix, and that France is on the tortuous path to carbon neutrality by 2050, it is difficult to see how this fossil resource will be replaced in the decades to come. Widely used in particular for heating homes and businesses, as well as in industry, gas plays a preponderant role in the French energy mix, even if demand has fallen, particularly since the start of the crisis between Russia and the ‘Ukraine.
This geopolitical crisis made it possible to see that if France was less dependent on Russian gas than its German neighbor for example, doing without it is complicated. France, which decided to turn to LNG to limit pipeline imports from Russia, had to resort to importing LNG from American shale rocks, but also LNG from Russia. Premiers paradoxes.
Indeed, if gas consumption in Europe reached its lowest level in ten years in 2023, LNG consumption, particularly from Russia, remained at a very high level. Remember that the embargo once morest Russia concerns oil and not gas, even if the EU is pursuing a policy intended to reduce or even eliminate its dependence on Russian gas as quickly as possible.
Thus, if Europeans bought, in 2023, mainly LNG from the United States, up to 47% of the imported volume, Russia still comes in third position, with almost 11% of imports, just behind Qatar (around 12% of total imports). The main beneficiaries of these imports are France, followed by Spain and the Netherlands.
Regarding the hexagon, the Russia even ranks as the second supplier behind the United Stateswith an increase in LNG imports from the Eastern European giant of more than 40% in 2023.
Thus, the reality of the European energy mix, and in particular the French one, comes into contradiction here with the geopolitical intentions of the EU, which seeks to isolate the Russian invader as much as possible, and if possible weaken it economically, as much as possible.
Another situation which raises questions is the French desire toincrease its gas import capacities, particularly LNG, while domestic consumption and demand are falling. In 2023, France will have a fifth LNG terminal, in Le Havre. It is in this case a floating LNG carrier, the Cape Ann, owned by TotalEnergies, which has set up in the port of Le Havre: its storage and gasification units will offer France greater room for maneuver in storing and distributing imported gas. But to what extent is this fifth terminal essential, when France wants drastically reduce your gas consumptionto be consistent with the still current trajectory of carbon neutrality in 2050?
The sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines (1 and 2) which linked Russia to Germany, barely a year ago, created among some of our European neighbors – Germany, Spain, Italy, Poland – a surge of panic and the hasty establishment of LNG terminals intended to deal with the most pressing needs. It seems that the installation of the Cape Ann in Le Havre follows the same impulse. The government has also announced that the LNG tanker will remain in Le Havre temporarily, until 2028. To the maximum.
In any case, if the Russian crisis embodied for a few months theopportunity for Europe and France to end their dependence on gasRussian in this case, to fully immerse itself in a constrained but desired energy transition, reality today shows a new dependence on LNG, for the coming decade in any case.
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