Report: Spain may buy record amount of Russian gas in 2023

MOSCOW, Dec 4 (PRIME) -- Spain is expected to buy an amount of natural gas from Russia in 2023 that would become a record for the entire history of the Spanish gas distribution system, local paper El Mundo reported on December 2.

According to gas system operator Enagas, Spain’s dependency on Russian gas has jumped sixfold over the past five years because the Maghreb–Europe pipeline got closed in 2021 over tensions between Algeria and Morocco, El Mundo said.

“Over the first 10 months of 2023, Russia sent to Spain … 12.8% more gas than during the entire year of 2022. Thus, it is expected that the percentage would grow significantly at the end of the year,” the newspaper said.

Russia’s contribution to the Spanish gas system in 2023 outperformed the contribution of Nigeria, which was the third main market for Spain. The year of 2023 will end with Spain receiving more Russian gas than the country has imported in any other year in its history, El Mundo said.

Enagas said earlier that Russia became the third largest exporter of gas to Spain in January–October. Its exports of liquefied natural gas rose to 60.8 gigawatts per hour in the period from 42.45 gigawatts per hour in the same period of 2022, and accounted for 18.1% of Spain’s total gas consumption.

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