The minimum capacity required by the EU to stock up for the winter, 80.27%, has been reached by Bulgarian Chiren gas, according to statistics supplied by Gas Infrastructure Europe, which tracks the level of reservoirs in various nations. Three weeks before the deadline, Bulgaria was able to meet the requirements, but the European Union (EU) met its objective on August 31. Bulgaria accomplished their gas storage goal ahead of schedule, while some European countries still didn’t complete their target.
The average quantity of natural gas in storage across Europe is at 91.35%, with just Hungary and Latvia still falling short of the required minimums at 76.77% and 54.01%, respectively. Nearly other European nations already keep a reserve of over 90%, and France, Portugal, Belgium, Denmark, and Belgium have all of their gas reserves complete.
Even though EWRC Chairman Ivan Ivanov stated on Monday that this would be expected behaviour, the owner of the Bulgartransgaz storage facility has not yet commented on whether it will continue to fill Chiren even after the European requirement has been reached.
European Commission also passed a regulation in the summer for European nations to keep reserves in their underground gas storages of at least 80% as of November 1. At least 90% starting next fall, to ensure their energy needs during the winter in the event of a complete shutdown of supplies from Russia, which until recently was the primary importer of European natural gas.
The European Commission’s data indicates that, Since the war began in Ukraine, the European nation managed to reduce their gas consumption to 10% and use Russian gas from 40% of their needs last year to 7.5% this fall. On Tuesday, the commission also announced that Norway had replaced Russia as Europe’s leading natural gas supplier. They no longer rely on Russian gas as most European nations do.