Germany’s Big Gas Users Urged to Go on Fuel Diet to Avoid Crisis

Companies to get paid for volumes they renounce at auction
Industrial natural gas consumption declined 22% in August

Pipework at a gas compressor station on the Bunde-Etzel pipeline (BEP) in Etzel Germany, on Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2022. The European Union is throwing together a series of radical plans to tame runaway energy prices and keep the lights on across the continent, but governments across the region are going to need to find common ground and fast.Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg

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By Vanessa Dezem

September 15, 2022 at 12:26 PM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

Germany’s energy regulator called on industrial consumers to cut back on their consumption of gas as part of efforts to avoid compulsory rationing.

The Federal Network Agency regulator has developed a gas auction model under which companies can offer a price at which they would be willing to reduce consumption. Starting with the lowest offer, market manager Trading Hub Europe would purchase volumes from the companies until available volumes and consumption were balanced.