Spain has positioned itself as the second largest buyer of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) preceded by Russia, second only to China, according to data from the Kpler consultancy collected by the report by the NGO Global Witness published on Wednesday.
Specifically, between January and July 2023, during this period Spain acquired 18% of the total sales of this raw material from Russia and China 20%. In third place was Belgium, with 17% of Russian production. Before the outbreak of the war, Spain was in fifth place and Belgium in seventh.
The data is striking not only because of the difference in size of the countries, but also because while in China there is no impediment to these acquisitions, the European authorities have indeed demanded that the countries limit their acquisitions to the contracts signed before the war with Ukraine. and not expand them.
The extreme dependence that the countries of the Old Continent have on natural gas has prevented its commercialization with Russia from being prohibited, as has happened with other raw materials such as oil. But despite this warning, purchases of Russian LNG in the Union as a whole increased by 40%.
According to Kpler data, EU countries have spent almost 5.3 billion euros buying more than half of all LNG from Russia during the first seven months of 2023. Money that would be financing against political action war.
The traditional operators of the European market have spent months assuring that they are complying with the recommendation of the authorities and that the volume of LNG imports from Russia does not vary in the annual computation of the one that was signed in the contracts prior to the outbreak of the war. What can change are the monthly amounts.
The entry into operation of various regasification plants throughout the most needy countries such as Germany and, in the Spanish case, the entry into operation of the El Musel plant may also influence this increase.
In any case, sources from the European Commission, cited by the European Press, attribute this increase in purchases in European territory to third-party purchases. "Most likely, what is happening is that there are other traders who have found it convenient to store in the EU, mainly in Belgium and Spain, due to the favorable characteristics of their regasification and port discharge infrastructures," they say. It is the same argument that the big companies transmit.
Between January and July 2023, EU countries bought 22 million cubic meters of LNG, compared to 15 million cubic meters during the same period in 2021, an increase of 40%, which is a much higher increase. pronounced than the world average increase in imports of Russian LNG, which amounts to 6%.
"EU countries now buy most of Russia's supplies, propping up one of the Kremlin's most important sources of income," says the NGO, which calculates that, between January and July, the EU bought 52% of the exports from Russia, up from 49% in 2022 and 39% in 2021.
Using Russian LNG prices estimated by the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air based on spot and monthly trade values, Global Witness projects that EU purchases in 2023 will be worth €5.29 billion.
"Buying Russian gas has the same impact as buying Russian oil. Both finance the war in Ukraine and every euro means more bloodshed. While European countries condemn the war, they are putting money in Putin's pockets. These countries should align their actions with their words banning the Russian LNG trade that is fueling both the war and the climate crisis," says Jonathan Noronha-Gant, senior fossil fuel campaigner at Global Witness.
After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Union had set itself as a goal to end dependence on Russian gas, in all its piped and liquefied versions by 2027. In Spain, the vice-president and minister for Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, said has demonstrated on numerous occasions calling on the European Union for unity of action to end all forms of Russian trade.
The energy companies recall that thanks to this type of acquisition, gas prices in Europe have been able to attenuate compared to those set at the beginning of the war and they assure that "there is not enough natural gas in the world to compensate for that supplied by Russia". Only the promotion of renewable energies can allow the goal of ending the country's dependence on Vladimir Putin.
