energy
In winter, despite rising prices, more heating was used
A gas storage facility in Teutschenthal in Saxony-Anhalt. Photo: Christian Modla/dpa-Zentralbild/dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
Significantly more energy was consumed in the cold winter months. While prices continue to rise at the same time due to the global political situation, there is no sign of a gas supply stop from Russia.
Cooler temperatures and the economic recovery caused energy consumption in Germany to rise last year.
According to the annual report published in Berlin by the Working Group on Energy Balances, consumption reached 12,265 petajoules or 418.5 million tonnes of hard coal units. This corresponds to an increase of 3.1 percent compared to the previous year, but is still below the level before the outbreak of the corona pandemic.
During the heating period in the winter half-year, it was significantly cooler than in the previous year, according to the Energy Balance Working Group. Adjusted for the weather effect, energy consumption in 2021 would have increased by only 0.6 percent. The economic recovery also caused consumption to rise – but hardly so in the last quarter, when supply bottlenecks, declining construction activity and fading catch-up effects weakened the economic recovery.
According to the Working Group on Energy Balances, consumption has been significantly depressed by rising energy prices. The import prices for crude oil, natural gas and hard coal rose by 67 to 139 percent on average over the year.
Russia continues to deliver
Four and a half weeks after the start of the war, Russia is continuing to deliver gas through Ukraine at an undiminished rate. On Monday, 109.5 million cubic meters of gas would be pumped through the neighboring country’s pipeline system, energy giant Gazprom spokesman Sergey Kupriyanov said, according to the Interfax agency. This corresponds to the contractually possible maximum utilization per day.
Ukraine receives important transit fees from the transit of Russian gas for its own state budget. Since the beginning of the war on February 24, well over three billion cubic meters of natural gas have been transported west from Russia, according to the Ukrainian state operator for the gas transmission system.