Wind of change: the impact of REPowerEU policy reforms on gas security

ABSTRACT

The Russian invasion of Ukraine was a shock to the EU gas market, as Russian gas supply dwindled and prices spiked. Previous exogenous shocks to the gas market resulted in policy reforms aimed at diversification and reducing dependency on Russian gas. However, their effectiveness was reduced. This study seeks to examine the policy changes under REPowerEU in light of gas security post-invasion. To examine this, three indicators – import dependency, diversification, and gas intensity – are used and examined the REPowerEU policy elements – reduced Russian gas, increased renewables and energy efficiency targets, gas storage requirements, demand reduction and a joint purchasing mechanism. This preliminary analysis highlights similarities in approaches, but also find that the severity of the crisis contributed to more support. The early effectiveness of the policy reforms is questioned, as change appear driven by other factors, such as decisions made by Russia and high gas prices.

KEYWORDS:

• Energy policy
• natural gas
• diversification
• European union
• Ukraine
• energy security
• exogenous shocks

Acknowledgements

The author extends her appreciation to the CIREC project on the geopolitics of natural gas supply, which is an energy transition fund (ETF) project, financed by the Belgian Federal Public Service Economy, for funding this research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The intra-EU trade is not included, as this includes re-exports. Examples of re-exports are Switzerland. The re-exports from the United Kingdon (United Kingdom and Gibraltar) are added under “other”, as this is gas from different suppliers. Azerbaijan is the combined volume of Azerbaijan and Turkey (transit country). Likewise, Algeria and Tunisia (transit) to represent the cumulative volume of gas from Algeria and Russia is the cumulative of Russia, Moldova, Belarus, Ukraine.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the CIREC project on the geopolitics of natural gas supply, which is an energy transition fund (ETF) project, sponsored by the Belgian Federal Public Service Economy.

Notes on contributors

Moniek de Jong

Moniek de Jong is a postdoctoral researcher at Ghent University, in Ghent, Belgium. Her research focuses on the geopolitics of natural gas and her previous research has focused on the Nord Stream 2 gas project.