Inaugurated this Thursday, May 5, “a strategically very important gas pipeline is starting to operate between Lithuania and Poland”, raises the daily Business News. The installation, which has actually been running since 1is May, includes 500 kilometers of pipes which cost a whopping 500 million euros. “This is the answer to the Kremlin’s energy blackmail”, said Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda, quoted by the economic newspaper.
Now the three Baltic countries are connected to the rest of the European Union. As the European Commissioner for Energy points out, “Member States now have access to alternative sources of supply”, via liquefied gas terminals and gas pipelines that can operate in both directions. “This is the best show of solidarity that states have shown with Poland and Bulgaria last week,” she continued.
At the end of April, Russia cut off its gas supplies to Bulgaria and Poland, the latter having refused to pay in roubles. For a long time, Polish President Andrzej Duda pointed out, “Europe didn’t want to hear who Gazprom really was”, explains the Lithuanian public media LRT. “We have proven that we can be wise before the arrival of a misfortune”, he rejoiced. Poland plans to diversify its sources of supply, in particular with the commissioning in the fall of an undersea gas pipeline linking it to Norway.
This new connection will allow countries dependent mainly on Russian gas, but connected to Poland, such as the Czech Republic or Slovakia, to see a way out.
The official launch of this gas pipeline heralds other major regional energy projects: the electricity system of the three Baltic countries, for example, is still not connected to the continental European electricity system. This gas pipeline, inaugurated ahead of schedule, “could serve as an example for a faster connection of electricity networks with the European Union”, indicates Gitanas Nauseda, quoted in another article by LRT.