With all the world media attention concentrated on Madrid, Spain shows its chest. Not only is it capable of organizing, successfully and safely, a historic NATO summit, but it is also exhibiting itself to the world as a power with the capacity to mitigate, at least in part, one of the economic problems caused by the already official enemy Russia. and their gas cuts.
It is no coincidence that among the headlines of the NATO summit the premiere, for the first time in history, of the north-south channeling of the Maghreb-Europe gas pipeline that connects Spain with Morocco through Tarifa and that until November of 2021 allowed the passage of up to 12.5 bcm of gas from Algeria.
With Biden as a witness, Spain demonstrates its strategic capacity to supply Morocco with the annual gas supply it lost when Algeria, a country aligned with Russia, cut off its tap last November. The Maghreb-Europe gas pipeline began pumping gas from Spain to Morocco on Tuesday, as reported by La Vanguardia, and continued to do so yesterday throughout the day with a flow of around 153,000 cubic meters during peak operating hours, according to data from Enagas.
Spain thus becomes the channel that will allow Morocco to supply its gas needs. This supply capacity in strategic situations by Spain joins the one it has been exercising since April with France. Since then, Spain has operated at full capacity the only other two gas connections enabled in the north of Spain. The one that connects through Irún, with a capacity of 2.1 bcm per year, and the one that connects through Larrau, with another 5.3 bcm per year.
France has had to use these connections, for years with minimal utility, as its nuclear potential has slipped at the most contentious moment. Half of its 56 nuclear reactors are shut down just as Russia is cutting gas supplies to Europe. The problem is far from being temporary or responding to technical stops.
Half of the shutdown plants in France have corrosion problems in reactors that in principle had an operating expectancy, without reforms, of more than 20 years. This has left the country with the lowest level of nuclear electricity production in 20 years and has forced it to maximize its electricity and gas imports from Spain.
But the Spanish contribution is affected by its limited infrastructure. The CEO of Enagás, Arturo Gonzalo, assured in the last presentation of the results of the infrastructure manager, that the six regasification plants that Spain has give it an export capacity of at least 20 bcm per year.
Obtaining France's commitment to finance the connection through the Catalan Pyrenees, known as Midcat, is key to consolidating Spain's role as an energy exporting power in this delicate geostrategic context.
