The Nord Stream pipelines appear to have stopped leaking, according to the Danish Energy Agency, while accusations are thrown over responsibility.
The Nord Stream company reported the two Nord Stream 1 pipelines appeared to have reached stable pressure, the Danish authority said. This suggests the gas blowout from the lines has ended.
Nord Stream has said each of the two pipelines had 300 million cubic metres of gas. Nord Stream 2 has 178 mcm of gas.
The agency, also known as Energistyrelsen, has reported that emissions from the four pipelines that make up Nord Stream and Nord Stream 2 may be equivalent to 32% of Denmark’s annual CO2 emissions.
In a worse case scenario, where Nord Stream emitted all the gas, this would be equivalent to 14.6 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent. Denmark emitted 45mn tonnes of CO2e in 2020.
There are two leaks in Denmark’s waters and two in Sweden’s.
The United Nations Security Council met – and clashed – on the Nord Stream leaks last week. A statement from the UN said the explosions were equivalent to 500 kg of TNT.
Tough talks
The US and Russia have accused each other of being behind the attacks. Russia requested the Security Council meet to discuss the events of last week.
US LNG exporters would be celebrating the destruction of the pipelines, Russia’s Dmitry Polyanskiy told the council, while President Joe Biden had threatened Nord Stream in February.
US representative Richard Mills said Russia had had a “bad day”. There have been a number of instances where Russia has attacked civilian infrastructure in Ukraine, Mills said, and engaged in disinformation. The US categorically denied involvement in the Nord Stream sabotage.
Gazprom representative Sergey Kupriyanov said it was taking steps to return the Nord Stream to service. The attacks, Kupriyanov said, had “indefinitely deprived [Europe] of a key route for the delivery of a crucial energy resource”.
Director of the Center for Energy and Climate Marc-Antoine Eyl-Mazzega ruled out an accident. He described the pipelines as a “sunk cost investment”. Nord Stream 2 would have never been put into operation, Eyl-Mazzega said, given Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Kupriyanov took issue with Eyl-Mazzega’s perspectives on the gas market and was hauled up by Council President Nicolas de Rivière.