Lithuania ends imports of Russian gas

RIchARD MIlnE norDIC anD BaLtIC CorresponDent

Lithuania has become the first EU country to cut off Russian gas supplies completely, with Estonia and Latvia also temporarily stopping imports in response to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. Lithuanian authorities said that, as of last Friday, they would no longer import Russian gas but instead rely on liquefied natural gas shipped through Independence, a Lithuanian floating storage terminal. “From now . . . on Lithuania won’t be consuming a cubic cm of toxic Russian gas. Lithuania is the first EU country to refuse Russian gas import,” Ingrida Simonyte, Lithuania’s prime minister, tweeted yesterday. The three Baltic states have been among the most vocal in urging the EU to end its members’ dependence on Russian oil and gas as countries pay Moscow for petroleum even after its invasion of Ukraine. Lithuanian officials have said for the past decade that energy independence is the last step in cutting the country’s ties with Moscow. It re-established its formal independence in 1990, joined the EU and Nato in 2004, and opened its own LNG terminal in the port of Klaipeda in 2014. Gitanas Nauseda, Lithuania’s president, said at the weekend: “Years ago, my country made decisions that today allow us with no pain to break energy ties with the aggressor. If we can do it, the rest of Europe can do it too.” Last week, he told other European countries to stop buying Russian oil and gas “because the Kremlin regime uses this money to finance the destruction of Ukrainian cities and attacks on peaceful civilians”. Russian gas also stopped flowing into Est onia and Latvia at the start of the month, the head of Conexus Baltic Grid, a Latvian natural gas storage operator, said at the weekend. Uldis Bariss, chair of Conexus, told Latvian state radio that Russia’s demand for gas payments in roubles showed it could no longer be relied on for supplies and would accelerate the Baltics’ path to energy independence. He added that there was an unusually large amount of gas in storage at present — almost equivalent to Latvia’s entire needs for the winter period — but that the Baltic states needed to build a second LNG terminal quickly to end fully their dependence on Russian gas. The Baltic states are also trying to wean themselves off other forms of Russian energy and are aiming to synchronise their electricity grids with the rest of Europe, rather than, as at present, with Moscow and Belarus, by 2025. The grid operators of Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden last week pledged to help the Baltic states if Russia suddenly stopped exporting electricity to them. “In such a scenario, frequency support from the Nordic system will be needed,” the four operators said in a joint statement. Other European countries are rushing to end their dependence on Russian petroleum. Germany has said it aims to be “virtually independent” from Russian oil by the end of this year and from gas by mid-2024. Last month, EU leaders decided to bulk-buy natural gas jointly from other sources.