Gas supplies from Russia are falling.

The inflow through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline has not only been significantly restricted to Germany, other European countries are no longer receiving any imports.

France announced on Friday that it would no longer purchase Russian gas via pipelines.

Only half will arrive in Italy.

All of this sparked the argument as to how much Germany can get by without or with less gas from Russia - and who should now forgo the supply in an emergency.

Jan Hauser

Editor in Business.

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The Federal Network Agency, the real estate association GdW and the Association of Towns and Municipalities bring into play that the minimum temperature in the apartments should then drop.

The GdW named a lower limit of 18 degrees during the day and 16 degrees at night.

For the Association of Towns and Municipalities, an apartment with 18 or 19 degrees is still livable.

Federal Building Minister Klara Geywitz (SPD) speaks out against this, without naming any limits.

"I think legally prescribed freezing is nonsensical," she said.

During the heating period, usually from October 1st to April 30th, the landlord should set the heating so that the apartment is at least 20 to 22 degrees Celsius warm.

Otherwise, according to the German Tenants' Association, there is a housing shortage: If the landlord does not remedy this, the tenant can reduce the rent.

However, landlords do not have to guarantee these temperatures "around the clock": At night between 11 p.m. or midnight to 6 a.m., 18 degrees Celsius is sufficient.

Every second apartment in this country is heated with natural gas.

Actually, these private natural gas customers are protected from rationing and should only experience longer bottlenecks.

This also applies to operators of critical infrastructure such as hospitals.

On the other hand, a gas shortage should initially make itself felt in companies.

According to a new survey by the IAB, every second company needs natural gas, although many, but not all, could do without it.

The Federal Network Agency is currently preparing the circumstances under which companies should no longer receive gas in an emergency.

Important for the energy supply is how much gas comes from Russia, how warm or cold it gets and how much the storage tanks are filled.

The Russian state-owned company Gazprom has significantly reduced its gas supplies through the Nord Stream 1 Baltic Sea pipeline.

Despite the lower deliveries from Russia, the gas storage tanks have so far been refilled and, according to the AGSI platform, are on average more than 56 percent full (as of June 15).

"If necessary, also by law"

In winter, consumption will increase significantly, especially in apartments.

The new Energy Storage Act stipulates that the storage tanks must be 80 percent full by October 1st and 90 percent by November 1st.

Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) has this in mind: "If the storage volumes do not increase, then we will have to take further measures to save, if necessary also by law."

According to his statement, however, it is unclear what that means in concrete terms.

Habeck wants to look at all the laws.

Regarding the minimum temperature in the apartments, he replied that they had not yet dealt with it intensively.

His ministerial colleague Geywitz, on the other hand, says that anything below the 20-degree minimum could be hazardous to health and would also be too short-sighted in terms of building technology.

Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) called prescribed freezing a declaration of bankruptcy and called for a gas summit.

Germany is threatened with an energy emergency.

According to Habeck, the filling level is above average, but not enough.

“We cannot go into the winter at 56 percent.

They have to be full.

Otherwise we are really open,” said the minister.

He spoke of a showdown with Putin, who wanted to gradually reduce gas volumes in order to keep prices high.

The situation is serious, but security of supply is currently guaranteed.

Without Russian gas supplies, most observers expect energy supply difficulties largely in the winter, when consumption increases and if the storage facilities are not overly full.

The Cologne Institute for Energy Economics (EWI) had investigated what would happen if Russia stopped supplying gas to Europe on May 1st.

In their scenario, the shortage only becomes apparent in the winter half-year, but gas should be saved immediately in all possible places and also in households in order to better compensate for the decline in winter.

Last year, industry required the most natural gas in Germany, with a share of 37 percent, and households, with 31 percent, a little less.

This was followed by industry, trade and services as well as power generation with 13 percent.

Electricity generation from gas in particular should be able to be replaced by other power plants and has already fallen at times since the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine.

In May, however, the proportion of electricity generated from gas was back at 15 percent and thus higher than in the months of previous years.

According to the early calculations by economists on how to implement a gas embargo, this was a quick way to stop Russian energy supplies.

This could have been implemented earlier to save and store gas.

More coal instead of natural gas

Now Habeck is talking about it: “The next step would certainly be that we take out the amounts of gas that are still being burned in power plants.” Coal-fired power plants could take over that, but they cause more greenhouse gas emissions.

Habeck once again appealed to companies and citizens to save energy and gas.

Before the Ukraine war, Germany received around 55 percent of its gas from Russia; now it's still around 35 percent.

Consumption is currently below the values ​​of the previous year, but above the ten-year average.