The energy war continues. The Nord Stream gas pipeline, linking Russia to northern Germany, was to resume service on Saturday September 3, but this will not be the case. the Russian giant Gazprom announced on Friday that it will finally “completely” stopped until the repair of a turbine of this vital pipeline for the supply of Europeans. At the same time, the G7 countries have targeted Russia’s energy windfall by agreeing to cap the price of its oil. Follow our live.
“Oil leaks” in the turbine. Gazprom announced in a press release on Friday evening that it had discovered “oil leaks” in the turbine, during a technical inspection related to this maintenance operation in a compressor station located in Russia. The Russian group reports a leak on “cables connected to speedometers of a rotor”. He posted a photo on Telegram showing cables surrounded by a brownish liquid. These technical problems prevent us from ensuring “safe operation of the gas turbine engine”supports Gazprom.
A disputed version. For the German turbine manufacturer Siemens Energy, an oil leak alone cannot justify, from a technical point of view, the shutdown of the gas pipeline. “As a turbine manufacturer, we can affirm that such a finding does not constitute a technical reason to stop operations”Siemens Energy said in a statement, noting that in the past the occurrence of “this type of leak has not caused operations to stop”.
The G7 caps the price of oil. The G7 countries decided on Friday to cap “urgently” the price of Russian oil, a mechanism that is complex to put in place. A “broad coalition” of countries is invited to implement this decision.