Germany, Italy, Austria, and the Netherlands all signal that coal-fired power plants could help see the continent through the crisis.
The Dutch front-month gas contract, the European benchmark, was trading around 124 euros per megawatt hour on Monday, down from this year’s peak of 335 euros but still up more than 300% on its level a year ago, before prices started rocketing.The chief executive of Germany’s largest power producer RWE, Markus Krebber, said power prices could take three to five years to fall back to lower levels.
Germany’s economy ministry said bringing back coal-fired power plants could add up to 10 gigawatts of capacity in case gas supply hit critical levels. A law related to the move goes to the upper house of parliament on July 8. German utility RWE said on Monday it could prolong the operation of three 300 megawatt brown coal power plants if required during the gas supply crisis.Austria’s government agreed with utility Verbund on Sunday to convert a gas-fired power plant to use coal should the country face an energy emergency. OMV said on Monday Austria was set to receive half the usual amount of gas for a second day.
Russia’s state-controlled Gazprom cut capacity last week along Nord Stream 1, a major pipeline supplying Germany and others, citing the delayed return of equipment being serviced by Germany’s Siemens Energy in Canada.
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