Gas, price caps and joint purchases: Europe does things by halves

The gas price cap is not just ‘dynamic’. For now it is a handbrake to be applied in case of emergency, without a certain level beyond which to trigger it. There will be joint purchases of gas but the EU Commission will not make them, as happened with the anti Covid vaccines, and neither will the Member States. The energy companies will have to come to an agreement. Europe, barring unforeseen accelerations in the next two days, will still take halfway decisions, the result of compromises that try to circumvent vetoes that resist despite the risks being increasingly concrete. There has been talk for months of a ceiling on the price of gas. Italy, along with 14 other countries, would have liked it to be generalized, on all gas. The other hypotheses, to do it only on Russian gas or only on the gas used to produce electricity, have been set aside. To break the deadlock could be another Italian proposal, the ceiling on the price of ‘dynamic’ gas. In its ‘authentic’ version, it should predict a reference value calculated using external parameters, such as the price of crude oil, coal and / or gas prices in North America and Asia, and allow for fluctuations, for example of 5%, up or down, relative to the central value. At the moment, however, there is no indication of either the reference value or the tolerated fluctuation. So, to date, we are still in the field of hypotheses. Joint gas purchases have also been talked about for months, at least since last March. Nothing has been done about it so far for a simple reason. As French President Emmanuel Macron explained, companies had the priority to replenish stocks at all costs, which resulted in higher prices as European buyers competed with each other by bidding. So far, in an understandable way, the particular interest has prevailed over the general one. To prevent the same resistance from returning to prevent a more orderly supply next spring, when stocks will be replenished in view of the winter of 2023-24, the EU Commission proposes to impose a mandatory participation in the aggregate purchase mechanism of a share of purchases. , the 15%. But neither the Member States nor the Commission will guarantee joint purchases. Companies are invited to proceed with the formation of a European purchasing consortium. A different model from the one used, with success, to purchase vaccines during the pandemic. At that time Europe treated united and with a single voice, today the final decisions, with this scheme, remain with the energy companies. It will be up to them to decide whether and how much gas to buy, whether to stipulate the contracts individually or collectively, whether it will be better to create a single consortium or several consortia. In short, calling them common gas purchases, for now, is a difficult risk to take. (by Fabio Insenga)