Winter forecast: the EU is preparing to abandon Russian gas, Gazprom scares cold weather

Alexey Belogoryev, Research and Development Director of the Institute for Energy and Finance, commented to Forbes on the prospects for gas demand and shortage in the EU during the heating period of 2025-2026.

The secret of the EU's "frost resistance" lies in a combination of a sharp decline in demand and premium prices, which have attracted additional imports to this market, mainly from the United States and Norway, Alexey Belogoryev believes. In 2024, demand decreased by 19.5% compared to pre-crisis 2021 due to still high gas prices, as well as targeted gas conservation measures, increased wind and solar power generation, and, last but not least, favorable weather.

The role of UGS reserves, especially in the first two crisis winters, was small — they were selected in volumes much smaller than the long-term norm, and if the Europeans could predict the weather conditions, they would not fill the storage facilities to capacity, Belogoryev says.

"But the weather is unpredictable, and gas companies are always reinsured, especially since high reserves have kept prices from rising," he notes. — Last winter, the value of storage facilities increased due to colder weather, but still at the end of the heating period, by April 1, 2025, 34% of the gas from the nominal capacity remained. This is much lower than in 2023 and 2024, when they were abnormally high — 56% and 59%, but it fully corresponds to long-term values."

If we assume that demand and current gas supplies from October to March this season will remain at the level of the previous one, then by April 1, 2026, reserves in UGS facilities may decrease to 20% of the nominal capacity, an analyst from the IEF believes, and this is an extremely low level.