The explosion of a major gas pipeline exploding near the Austrian capital Vienna <a href="https://thegoldwater.com/news/13835-Gas-Pipeline-Explosion-Near-Vienna-Austria#13840"> which we reported on earlier</a> has not gone unnoticed. It would appear that Italy as well as various countries in the Balkans have had to declare a state of emergency due to their gas supply running dangerously low now.
The site is known as Baumgarten and is quite important for European distribution of natural gas apparently.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Gas flow to <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Italy?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Italy</a> already reduced (but not completely shut down yet), <a href="https://twitter.com/snam?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@snam</a> rete gas indicates Italian system pretty short at the moment<a href="https://t.co/tOTb4SmgfO">https://t.co/tOTb4SmgfO</a><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Baumgarten?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Baumgarten</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SecurityOfSupply?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SecurityOfSupply</a> <a href="https://t.co/nsqyFtpHO7">pic.twitter.com/nsqyFtpHO7</a></p>— Georg Fischer (@G_H_Fischer) <a href="https://twitter.com/G_H_Fischer/status/940533729310793728?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 12, 2017</a></blockquote>
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The price of European gas has shot up 150% since and the EU is negotiating with the Russian provider Gazprom to increase their reserves.
With winter setting in and many countries already in freezing temperatures, the Italian ministry for energy declared a state of national emergency and said he would ask electricity and nuclear plants to run at full capacity to ensure the system keeps going.
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As it is located near Austria's eastern border with Slovakia, the Baumgarten gas hub which has now been closed, is one of Europe's largest and most important distribution points for natural gas which flows in from Russia, Norway and other Scandinavian countries.
From there, the 40 billion cubic meter of gas that pass through the pipeline per year are redistributed to European consumers in Germany, France, Italy, Slovakia, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria.
Gas Connect, the main operator of the Baumgarten site 's operator, stated that the explosion will not affect the supply of natural gas to Germany, but it warned at the same time that the supply to Italy and the Balkan states “would take a significant hit”.
Source:
Better get used to cold pasta Italy !