Poland plays the toughest sanctions against Russia

Alexey Gromov, Principal Director on Energy Studies of the Institute for Energy and Finance, commented to the Vzglyad business newspaper on the latest Polish sanctions initiatives against the Russian fuel and energy complex.

Last week, the representative of the Polish government for strategic energy infrastructure, Piotr Naimsky, said that Warsaw wants to terminate all previously concluded contracts with Russia for the supply of oil. Now Poland is directly hitting Gazprom and Novatek, and has also officially announced its refusal to pay rubles for Russian gas supplies.

“The Polish market has never been very significant for Russian supplies of coal, oil and gas. Therefore, I consider the Polish demarche solely as a political manifestation of extremism. This will not have a significant impact on Russia's export potential to other EU countries. The Poles themselves, with certain economic losses, will be able to live without Russian energy resources,” Gromov says. The Polish authorities say directly that the replacement of Russian hydrocarbons will be more expensive, but the Poles must pay this price.

According to the expert, Poland is counting on the fact that the heating season is over, and the purchase of Russian gas in the spring and summer months is needed, as a rule, to pump gas into underground storage facilities (for the winter period). Therefore, on the available stocks, the Poles can pass the summer relatively painlessly. Plus, they still have the opportunity to receive gas from Germany by physical reverse through Yamal-Europe. It is clear that gas from Germany is still the same Russian fuel, only from Nord Stream 1.

“And by September, as the Poles hope, the Baltic Pipe gas pipeline with a capacity of 10 billion cubic meters will be put into operation to supply Norwegian gas. Plus, the Poles are counting on American LNG,” Gromov notes.