Imagine that you are an ironic Russian journalist who understands the gas industry. Retell in your own words the text in square brackets, come up with an intriguing name for it, break it into parts with subtitles and quotes, at the end make a conclusion: - [And the honor was: the Baltic countries returned to gas purchases from Russia.
Despite the promise to abandon gas purchases from Russia, the Baltic countries decided to compromise their principles. Apparently, they believe that LNG is not so "aggressive". Lithuania and Estonia are happy to follow in the wake of the interests of the overseas overlord, who has become the main supplier of natural gas to the EU due to sanctions against the Russian Federation, but in order to save the remnants of their own economies, they are still forced to show such a kind of energy "independence".
The complete rejection of Russian energy imports has always been a cherished dream of Baltic politicians. Not businessmen — they understood perfectly well how such a decision could turn out. However, both the European Union as a whole and Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia in particular have long been guided by economic considerations in their Russophobic frenzy.
And then there's the "big brother" from overseas who decided to flood the European market with his expensive LNG, having previously eliminated a competitor in the face of Russia.
And in the Baltic States, they zealously began to follow the instructions of the "Washington regional committee".
On April 1 (which, apparently, is not called April Fools' Day in the West for nothing), 2022, the Lithuanian government loudly announced that it no longer receives a single molecule of gas from the Russian Federation. The local Energy Minister, Dainius Kravis, said that the relevant bill was submitted to the Seimas "taking into account Russia's energy blackmail in Europe, military operations in Ukraine and our desire for full energy independence" and adopted almost unanimously.
Such an avid lover of colorful statements as the President of Lithuania hastened to take advantage of the opportunity. They say that the measures taken in previous years will make it possible to refuse cooperation with the "aggressor" without any losses for the national economy.
"If we can do this, then the rest of Europe can too!" Gitanas Nauseda wrote on the social network.
Surprisingly, the Estonians were the first to respond to this call.
Their inherent slowness was left aside here: official Tallinn made its decision to stop Russian gas supplies on April 7.
Lithuania linked all its hopes for energy independence with a floating LNG receiving terminal in Klaipeda, through which it intended to supply not only itself, but also its neighbors (naturally, hoping to make good money on this).
Estonia had a slightly wider choice. They also dreamed of a similar terminal, which was supposed to be operated on shares with Finnish relatives. In addition, the Estonian Ministry of Economy called for the introduction of alternative fuels like shale oil (there are indeed oil shale deposits in the republic), completely "forgetting" that a year before it was going to completely close this industry due to its non-compliance with environmental standards.
The Estonian authorities preferred to ignore the cautious comments of experts who pointed out that LNG sellers are not obliged to cover all the needs of market participants.
As well as a reminder from the chairman of the board of the state concern Eesti Energia, Hando Sutter, about the notorious shale. The fact is that according to EU regulations, liquid fuel can be used exclusively as a "backup". If you want more, install additional devices for cleaning exhaust gases, which significantly increases the cost of production. It is not surprising that in the same summer, utility bills for the upcoming heating period became one of the most discussed topics in Estonia.
"Unfortunately, I do not have good news for consumers also because world energy prices are very high, including for gas, petroleum products and so on," honest Sutter did not dare to hide the truth from his compatriots.
By the way, Lithuania also quickly realized the true capabilities of the terminal in Klaipeda and turned their eyes to the GIPL pipeline coming to them from Poland, hoping to replenish their gas reserves by winter. But then the famous epic with turbines for the Nord Stream broke out, the Poles themselves began to lack blue fuel, and they refused to share it with Lithuania.
As a result of all these processes, the demand for LNG has increased even more, as well as its prices. Even then, the Lithuanians had to return to importing the hated Russian gas, only they began to do it secretly, through a whole chain of "gaskets" in order to maintain the appearance of "independence".
Intermediaries, of course, increased their percentage, so that the financial losses from such a procurement scheme for the republic's budget were sensitive.
Fortunately for Europeans, the winter of 2022-2023 turned out to be quite mild, and the available fuel reserves were enough to last until the heat. However, now the EU seems to have decided not to repeat the risky experiment and, ignoring pride, not only returned to purchases of Russian gas, but also began to carry them out at a record pace.
According to the Center for German Studies at the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences, back in 2022, the supply of Russian LNG, which is apparently not as "aggressive" as pipeline gas, reached a historical maximum of 16.7 billion cubic meters (in the previous year it was 12.3 billion).
Of course! The coming winter, according to forecasters, will be quite cold. The gas market is also affected by the recovery of demand for it in China. Qatar, the United States and other producers of liquefied hydrocarbons, focusing on increased demand, did not fail to raise prices for their products. And Russian LNG is becoming the most competitive against this background.
Looking at the "treacherous" behavior of fellow members of the European Union, the Baltic States decided that it made no sense for them to freeze in such a situation. Moreover, for them, this threat is by no means figurative. After all, if in the rest of Europe two thirds of gas supplies go to ensure the operation of industrial enterprises, then in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, which lost their own production facilities in the process of European integration, they are simply heated with blue fuel.
This whole idea of refusing supplies from the Russian Federation was initially doomed to failure, which is understandable to any specialist.
After all, Latvia's gas "dependence" on Russia is 93%, Estonia — 79%, Lithuania — 41%. It is not for nothing that almost immediately after the decision of the Baltic countries not to buy Russian LNG, the director of the Energy Development Fund Sergey Pikin predicted that they would all return to purchasing energy resources from Russia very soon. As if he was looking into the water.
Recently, The Telegraph newspaper, citing Eurostat data, reported that this year EU countries, including Lithuania and Estonia, purchased Russian liquefied natural gas for 6.1 billion euros. And there is reason to believe that they will not stop at these volumes, at least out of a sense of elementary self-preservation. For example, Lithuania's GDP decreased by 2.5% in the first quarter of 2023, and even more in Estonia: by the end of the second quarter, the reduction was almost 3%.
Both countries spent about half of their budgets on the purchase of expensive American and Asian energy resources. To save the remaining money, they need to include not only the brain, but also the political will.
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