IEA plan shows Europe can and must reduce gas dependency

3rd March 2022, London ­– Commenting on the International Energy Agency’s 10-point plan to reduce the European Union’s reliance on Russian gas, Murray Worthy Gas Campaign Leader at Global Witness, said:

"The IEA's plan today sets out what a short-term response to this crisis could be, but ultimately the solution must be a Europe that is free from gas. What this plan clearly shows is that the EU can significantly reduce its dependence on Russian gas, and with it the money flowing to Putin's war in Ukraine in the course of just one year.”

"It makes clear that the EU has huge amounts of existing spare import capacity, meaning that recent calls to build new pipelines and LNG terminals are not needed. These new proposed projects also cannot be built in time to make a difference to the crisis Europe now finds itself in and would only lock in reliance on fossil gas and undermine the EU's climate goals. Unfortunately, this plan still relies on damaging technologies like bioenergy - it's absolutely vital that any short term crisis response to use other fuels is limited and rapidly scaled back"

"Crucially more than half of this reduction of Russian gas can come from reducing demand for gas - which is also the ultimate long-term solution to this crisis. Emergency measures to reduce gas demand now must be matched by a massive scaling up of energy efficiency, renewables and clean heating to cut Europe's gas addiction, and with it consumers gas bills. The current draft of the EU's energy security plan falls far short of what is needed to achieve this.”