The European Union's (EU) proposed gas pipeline and liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects, at an estimated cost of €53.5 billion, are at odds with the bloc's climate goals, according to Global Energy Monitor's new Europe Gas Tracker report.
Prior to the war, the EU had a maximum LNG capacity of 167 billion cubic meters per year, which was far from fully utilized.
The tracker finds that the EU has proposed, revived, or fast-tracked 30 LNG terminal projects in response to the gas crisis that began in 2021 and was exacerbated by Russia's war in Ukraine in early 2022.
According to the data, between January 2022 and February 2023, 35.2 billion cubic meters per year of gas import capacity was commissioned across eight LNG terminal projects, as well as another 11.1 billion cubic meters per year of transmission pipelines.
The EU's response to the energy crisis and Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine is expected to increase LNG import capacity by 136%, for a total increased capacity of 227.2 billion cubic meters per year.
The cost of the proposed LNG capacity is calculated at €22.1 billion, with an additional 60.5 billion cubic meters per year of gas pipeline import capacity at a cost of €31.4 billion.
'The proposed LNG import expansion, led by a handful of countries including Germany, Greece, Italy, and the Netherlands, is uncoordinated and ignores EU climate goals, and additional infrastructure will add to existing overcapacity,' the Global Energy Monitor said.
'In the ongoing fallout of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the EU gas panic threatens a massive overcapacity buildout at the hands of a few member states that have harnessed and in some cases ignored EU policy recommendations,' the report said.
If all 227.2 billion cubic meters of LNG import capacity were realized, it could result in 950 million tons of CO2 emissions per year.
'This infrastructure, if commissioned, would be locked in for years and possibly decades, exacerbating an existing gas dependency that is in direct conflict with the bloc’s goal to cut emissions by 55% by 2030,' it said in the report.
The potential emissions increase corresponds to a carbon footprint over one-third of the value of the EU's 2019 greenhouse gas emissions of approximately 3.5 billion tons of CO2.
Under the European Climate Law adopted in June 2021, the EU aims to cut emissions by 55% by 2030 and be climate neutral by 2050.
'The EU has a gas addiction, and the treatment for this disease is not to build more gas import infrastructure. The EU needs to reduce fossil fuel demand by continuing to scale up efficiency measures and renewables,' Baird Langenbrunner, a research analyst at Global Energy Monitor, said in the report.
By Nuran Erkul Kaya in London
Anadolu Agency
energy@aa.com.tr