Germany industry is unlikely to fully recover from the energy crisis caused by the Ukraine war because of high prices for imported liquefied natural gas, said the head of energy multinational RWE Markus Krebber.
“Gas prices in continental Europe, especially in Germany, are structurally higher now, because we, in the end, depend on LNG imports,” Krebber told the Wednesday edition of the Financial Times.
German industry is at a disadvantage, he added. “You’re going to see a bit of recovery, but I think we’re going to see a significant structural demand destruction in the energy-intensive industries,” Krebber told the paper.
European gas prices have collapsed by 90% compared to the record levels of 2022. However, they are above the average values before the crisis and therefore almost two thirds higher than at the same time in 2019, according to the commodity price agency Argus.
Germany had to say goodbye to natural gas supplies from Russia due to the Russian war against Ukraine.
Krebber believes that the decision by then chancellor Angela Merkel in 2011 to shut down nuclear power plants without replacing the fuel with an energy source other than Russian pipeline imports was a mistake.
“When you know exactly what you want to shut down, you need to immediately start thinking about how do I get the new technology in the ground?” he pointed out.