“This was not an impossible mission,” announced the EU presidency, currently held by the Czech Republic. “The ministers reached a political agreement to reduce gas consumption before the next winter,” she said on Twitter.
“At this stage it is a political agreement, so there was no formal vote. However, there was overwhelming consensus and only one member state expressed its opposition,” diplomatic sources said.
The political agreement was reached at the extraordinary Energy Council in Brussels, in which the 27 reached a compromise on the proposal presented by the European Commission with a view to reducing gas consumption by 15% by the spring, but with new exceptions. to cover the “geographical or physical situation” of countries.
In a statement released in the meantime, the Czech Presidency of the Council of the EU notes that “in an effort to increase the security of the EU’s energy supply, the Member States reached a political agreement today on a voluntary reduction in demand for natural gas”. by 15% this winter”, and the “possibility of triggering a ‘Union alert’ on security of supply, in which case the reduction in gas demand would become mandatory”.
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