Russia denied Finland gas not only as a punishment for its desire to join NATO. We have before us the full picture of the new Russian "gas doctrine"
It is unlikely that Russia would have turned off Finland's gas if she had not confirmed her desire to join NATO, Advance writes. A new Russian energy doctrine has come into force, the author of the article believes. And some countries have already felt its effect on themselves.
Antun Rocha
Today, at exactly five in the morning Finnish time, Russian Gazprom stopped supplying gas to Finland, or rather to the Finnish state-owned company Gasgrid Finland. Russia said that supplies were stopped because Finland refused to pay for gas under the new system, which Russia insists on. We are talking about payment in the Russian currency ― rubles. Russian President Vladimir Putin presented this scheme at the end of March, but so far only a few countries have been "thrown out". Before Finland, this fate befell Poland and Bulgaria.
Does this mean that all other European states "regularly" pay Russia as she wished? Maybe, but not necessarily. In general, data on transactions between companies are opaque, but, apparently, the point here is different. Would Finland have been turned off now if a few days ago it had not officially confirmed its desire to join NATO (together with neighboring Sweden)? Unlikely. Why would Russia punish its neutral neighbor? However, this connection with NATO membership clearly changes the state of affairs.
This tells us that a new Russian energy doctrine has come into force, which acquired features at the end of March, but now we see a more complete picture. It has not been published, but it looks like this in general. Russia, that is, its Gazprom, will gradually "extinguish" one European state after another, depending on how hostile it is to it. So Russia will not cause itself immediate great damage, because Russia still earns a lot of money every day on the sale of oil and gas to European countries. But in this way Russia itself is preparing for the inevitable, taking steps leading it little by little to a new reality. But the affected countries will feel the full force of the blow immediately.
It is not surprising that the implementation of this doctrine began with Poland. Of all European countries, with the exception only of Ukraine, Poland takes the toughest position against Russia. Sometimes it even seems that Euro-Atlantic ties even prevent her (in fact, save her) from directly joining the conflict that is unfolding in her neighborhood. Warsaw's hatred of Moscow has a long history, and therefore it is not surprising that Warsaw asks to place even atomic weapons on its territory. The Poles asked the United States to do this, but Washington, fortunately, is not yet ready for such an escalation.
What will happen to Finland? How much will the gas shutdown affect its economy and the lives of its population? Helsinki doesn't seem too concerned. The General director of the Finnish state company Gasgrid, Olli Sipila, commented on the situation after the Russian gas supplies were stopped. In an interview with the media, he said that Gasgrid has already started buying gas in other places, including in the Baltic States. The transition to new sources has already taken place in the morning, and everything "went smoothly".
"The Finnish system is now balanced, both from a commercial and physical point of view. Of course, there are always some new situations, technical problems in the system, but these are all normal working moments that we control in the best way. We don't expect any problems," he said.
One of the reasons why the Finns remain calm is that, as Gasgrid confirmed today, they were expecting such a step on Wednesday and were not taken by surprise.
The Finnish company Gasum, which is engaged in the import of gas, also participates in the system of work. They said that the Finnish network immediately switched to the Balticconnector gas pipeline. We are talking about a gas pipeline that connects Incoo in Finland and Paldiski in Estonia.
Let me remind you that the termination of Russian gas supplies occurred a week after Russia stopped supplying electricity to Finland (the Russian side covered about ten percent of total Finnish consumption).
Of course, the consequences are inevitable. The Finnish state-owned electricity supply company Fingrid said that it is worth expecting an increase in the price of electricity. Here I remind you that the cost of electricity in Finland has already increased significantly since the beginning of this year.
Finland does not have its own energy resources from fossil fuels, and therefore it is focused on imports. It imported most of its gas from Russia, but this is not such a big problem for it now, because Finland met only ten percent of its energy consumption at the expense of gas. It receives most of its energy from nuclear power plants (33%) and hydroelectric power plants (20%).
I would also like to remind you that Finland has the largest energy consumption per capita in the whole of Europe. The reason is the large consumption of energy by industry, a high standard of living, as well as a cold climate (25% of the energy consumed goes to heating).
Does Finland now intend to use only the gas that comes through the Baltic Sea? For her, this is a risk, especially if the Baltic countries become the next in line according to the "Russian doctrine" (although they have quite large reserves of energy resources that will serve them well in such a situation). Expecting the Russian step, Finland was also guided by other sources, so it has already signed a contract with the American company Excelerate Energy from Texas on the lease of the Exemplar LNG tanker for ten years. The Finns intend to compensate for the gas shortage at the expense of LNG, if it arises.
From the above, we can conclude that Finland "got out" very successfully, but not all countries will be able to survive this crisis as successfully. For example, Italy and Germany have already "capitulated" to Russian demands in advance. Yesterday, Berlin and Rome instructed their energy companies to open ruble accounts in order to continue working with Russia's Gazprom.
It is clear that the German and Italian authorities are in no hurry to talk about this. There's nothing to be proud of. But this only means that now they have no other choice, unlike Finland and some small countries.
Russia has stated that "unfriendly states" should pay in rubles, and, apparently, its plan is being successfully implemented. There are a lot of positive things here for Russia, given the general situation, which is not "fabulous" for it. After all, this is how Russians raise their national currency, which was sinking before the announcement of the new payment regime. It is clear that the demand for rubles has increased now, because the ruble is equal to Russian gas.
In addition, Russia understands that in the new situation, no one will impose the toughest sanctions regarding the refusal to purchase its gas. Europe will try by all means to find alternatives to Russian gas, but even when it studies everything and everyone in the world in detail, many will come to the conclusion that Russian gas is now "irreplaceable", no matter how much anyone hates it.
It is clear that if Russia had now bucked and stopped supplies for the whole of Europe at once, she would not have disappeared, but would have found herself in a very difficult situation. Europeans would have to buy gas only in other regions of the world and at a very high price. Probably, this would have spurred the already existing inflation. Soon, riots and protests against such a policy would inevitably begin.
Therefore, we should not expect the EU to abandon Russian gas. Instead, Europe will "quietly" open ruble accounts and try to continue the policy of "business as usual", as if nothing serious is happening. On the other hand, if Russia is confident in such a development (then Dmitry Medvedev will also be right, who said two months ago that Europe would not dare to abandon the purchase of Russian gas), it will continue its "gas doctrine" and turn off some other country for the edification of others.
