This section encompasses a wide range of GVC related information:
- “Interview” covers both face-to-face interviews and quotations in third party articles.
- “Publications” includes articles, papers and studies.
Mülheim/Essen, 13 July 2018 | Interview by ‘energate messenger’: Part 1: ’Polen ist von den nordwesteuropäischen Märkten abgeschottet’ Part 2: ‘Es fehlt am politischen Willen für gesamteuropäischen Markt‘
Wolfgang was interviewed by ‘energate messenger’ on his main findings in the recently published study on the Polish gas market. In part 1 (’Polen ist von den nordwesteuropäischen Märkten abgeschottet’) he explains the lock-up and price disconnect of the Polish gas market with the Northwest-European markets meanwhile behaving like a single price area. Moreover, he points out the risk of Poland overcharging neighboring countries if it were to become a ‘pivotal hub’.
In part 2 (‘Es fehlt am politischen Willen für gesamteuropäischen Markt‘), Wolfgang explains that lack of political will stands in the way of achieving an integrated European gas market no matter how many interconnectors you build and how diversified you already are. Particularly Poland is driven by ‘ideological physicality’ disregarding the achievements of fungible ‘anonymous molecules’ freely traded on hubs.
Mülheim/London, 05 July 2018
Wolfgang was quoted by Editor-in-Chief of ‘Natural Gas World’ William Powell in an article titled ‘Poland’s Dystopian Gas Market: Analysis’ published in ‘Natural Gas World’ (https://www.naturalgasworld.com/polands-gas-market-broken-62528). Besides explaining his main findings in the Polish gas market study he commented on the recent partial award of the ICC Arbitration Court in Stockholm in the price dispute between Gazprom export and PGNiG. “If you cannot satisfy the burden of proof that hub-pricing is prevailing in your market and your only argument is that I want to have what my neighbors have, you will most likely fail”, he said.
Mülheim/London, 29 June 2018
Wolfgang was quoted by ICIS energy expert Alex Thackrah in an article titled ‘European Commission probes Qatari LNG deals’ published in ICIS Gas In Focus, the leading gas industry report with an established audience of executives, analysts and traders since 1994. Wolfgang talks about the legacy of Qatari long-term contracts, which were at the time perceived as a ‘seapipe’, i.e. delivery from ‘A to B’ just like an ordinary pipeline.
Courtesy ICIS, you can download your free copy of ICIS Gas In Focus, including the article, under this link: https://www.icis.com/energy/gas/europe/icis-gas-in-focus/
Mülheim, June 2018 | New GVC Market Study on the Polish Gas Market: ’Poland, a ‘failed state’ in gas trading – Poland’s deliberate obstruction of European traded gas market integration and its misguided quest for diversity hinging on ‘ideological physicality’
The study has also been published by Natural Gas World (‘NGW’) and is accompanied by an interview on the partial award of the ad-hoc Arbitral Tribunal in Stockholm in the price dispute between Polish incumbent ‘PGNiG’ and Russian Gazprom denying PGNiG Northwest-European hub indexation (https://www.naturalgasworld.com/ggp-poland-a-failed-state-in-gas-trading-62533).
The study on the Polish gas market features findings and recommendations. Read more
Findings:
- Poland and its state-owned incumbent PGNiG are the loudest when it comes to new gas projects and gas market reforms.
- By claiming ever increasing dependence on Russia, own diversification projects such as the Baltic pipe and an expansion of the LNG terminal are promoted, whilst other projects such as e.g. Nordstream 2 are fiercely opposed.
- Beyond the debate about Nordstream 2, it appears useful to look at the real facts prevailing as to the Polish gas market:
- Poland avails of 5 independent sources of physical supplies and even more interconnection points.
- The 4 non-Russian sources comprise 117% of total Polish consumption and almost 260% of Russian min-take quantities, which renders alleged exposure to political blackmail groundless.
- The Polish wholesale gas market features price disconnects of at times 3 to 5 €/MWh (~1 to 1.8 $/MMBtu) vs. the Northwest-European traded markets (which are pricewise strongly correlated and include, noteworthy, the Czech gas market).
- The only reason for such is that Poland has locked up its market by creating commercially prohibitive entry barriers for international trading companies. The European Commission has, therefore, instigated proceedings against Poland on grounds of anti-competitive practices i.a. hindering free-cross border trade.
- Also the liberalization of the Polish retail market is poor: A subsidiary of PGNiG supplies houseseholds and small-medium enterprises at regulated tariffs, which are considerably below the sourcing prices offered by PGNiG, essentially the exclusive seller of respective supplies to new entrants.
Recommendations:
- Consider, beyond the pending EC procedure pertaining to the so-called storage obligation for international trading companies, scrutinizing further potentially anti-competitive aspects of the Polish gas market at wholesale as well as retail level.
- Reconcile Poland’s multi-billion diversification projects and respective EU funding as to whether:
- The high costs (of some of them like e.g. the Baltic pipe) might strengthen Poland’s resolve to continue locking up its market and ‘compensate’ such costs by benefitting from cheap purchases from German and Czech hubs without passing them on to the market.
- Poland’s aspiration to become the ‘pivotal hub’ for Central Europe, the Baltic states and possibly Ukraine could mean putting ‘the fox in the henhouse’ if this would enable Poland to charge an ‘above market’ premium to these countries as is its present practice in the Polish market.
’Implications of a global gas market for traditional gas economical paradigms’, in February 2018
The article is the – updated and expanded – English version of the ‘Gastkommentar’ (guest commentary) in GVS’s monthly ‘Gasmarkt-Telegramm’ (www.gvs-erdgas.de) published in January 2018. I.a., Wolfgang additionally documents the destinations of US American LNG cargoes since February 2017, underpinning that deliveries would go where the highest net-backs could be achieved (‘money talks…’). Moreover, Read more Wolfgang demonstrates by means of the January 2018 price spreads between East Asian M+1 vs. TTF that a permanent (as opposed to an occasional, e.g. in case of market tightness) reliance on LNG supplies would have required a TTF price of 31.60 €/MWh instead of the settled January price of 20.29 €/MWh, i.e. more than 50% higher, to compete for LNG. The pipeline gas volume pressure on the European traded markets ensures low prices to the benefit of European end consumers, whilst the marginal quantity of LNG supply sets the maximum price achievable. This ‘end-user welfare benefit’ has convincingly been demonstrated by the renowned ewi Institut in its report ‘Impacts of Nord Stream 2 on the EU Natural Gas Market’ (ewi Energy Research & Scenarios gGmbH; www.ewi.research-scenarios.de).
’Gastkommentar: Implikationen eines globalen Gasmarktes für überkommene gaswirtschaftiche Paradigmen’, in ‚GVS Gasmarkt-Telegramm‘ in January 2017
GVS had asked Wolfgang to write a ‘Gastkommentar’ (guest commentary) in its monthly ‘Gasmarkt-Telegramm’ (www.gvs-erdgas.de). The article puts in writing the messages from the most recent presentations, e.g. at the ’23. Euroforum-Jahrestagung (Erd-)Gas 2017’ in Berlin, on 15 November 2017 and the 5th Frankfurt Gas Forum’ in Frankfurt on 13 December 2017: Read more The emergence of a global gas market, with destination flexible LNG supply able to respond to price signals, liquid European hubs capable of sending price signals and ample unutilized LNG regasification capacity to receive LNG thus attracted, has transformed previous bi-lateral physical dependencies into a functionality of price signals. Hence, the previous ‘Putin-phobia’ (an expression coined by Jonathan Stern: ‘The future of gas in decarbonizing European energy markets: the need for a new approach’, by Jonathan Stern, January 2017, OIES Paper NG 116, www.oxfordenergy.org) was no longer warranted and the traditional gas-economical paradigm of security of supply needed to be re-visited.
“Interview with Dr. Heiko Lohmann in ‚ener|gate gasmarkt‘“ in September 2016
The renowned expert on gas markets, Dr. Heiko Lohmann, conducted an interview with Wolfgang (available both in German and English) on a long list of subjects, Read more straddling long-term contracts in the face of oil- and gas price decoupling, the emergence of hubs, but also the reasons for the failure of Nabucco and, last but not least, Nordstream 2 and, in this context, the need to apply the rule of law in Europe instead of politicizing.