The Baltic States have joined the Poland: not enough gas

Since the end of January, the Baltic countries have been actively importing gas from Poland and daily deliveries are record-breaking for the GIPL interconnector, which was launched in the fall of 2022. Due to frosts and low reserves in the Inchukalns storage facility, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland do not have enough main gas sources. At the same time, Poland is well provided with fuel for this season, and the state-owned company can earn seriously on the miscalculations of the authorities of neighboring states. The price difference with the Baltic states is more than $ 150-200 for every thousand cubic meters, and with Finland — all $ 300.

Since the end of January, gas supplies via the interconnector between Poland and Lithuania towards the Baltic states have gained a new lease of life. The project was launched in the fall of 2022, but for the most part it was used to supply gas to Poland from the Klaipeda LNG terminal, where Orlen state-owned company receives its cargoes. At the same time, deliveries in the opposite direction usually went in summer and autumn to pump gas into the storage facility, and the last time significant deliveries took place was in August-September 2024.

Since January 29, the same gas supply from Poland in The Baltic not only resumed, but reaches daily records — up to 5.8 million cubic meters per day, as it happened on February 4, according to ENTSOG.

Obviously, the region is sorely lacking in basic sources. Thus, all regasified LNG from the terminal in Lithuania remains in the region — an average of 11 million cubic meters per day. A selection from the only in Baltic storage Inchukalns is about 15 million cubic meters in the new year.

And, obviously, they will try not to use up their UGS reserves faster, since on January 26 the volumes pumped last year ran out in the storage, and the current reserves of 660 million cubic meters with an average selection will last only until mid-March.

Before this heating season, the authorities did not insist, and the companies filled the UGS only by 60%, not even fulfilling the norms of the European Commission. Now these miscalculations threaten the region with a deficit, since the heating season ends there only in mid-April, and the storage is already only 27% full.

Moreover, Finland also needs more gas due to frosts and windless weather, which does not have a storage facility and has been receiving more than 6.5 million cubic meters per day from the Baltic states since the end of January.

It can be assumed that for the Polish state-owned company Orlen, this situation has become a real find and will bring good incomes. On the one hand, Poland is one of the few EU countries that have prepared well for winter. Its storage facilities are 60% full by the beginning of February. On the other hand, the price difference in the countries will bring a good profit. So, if gas has been trading at $546-$552 per thousand cubic meters on the Polish TGE exchange in recent days, then in In the Baltic states — $ 700-$ 800, and in Finland — $ 840-$870, according to EEX. Such a difference can bring the Polish state-owned company a net profit of more than $ 1.5 million per day only through the GIPL interconnector.

At the same time, the Baltic authorities can only blame themselves in such a situation, having given the gas supply completely to the market. In the summer, during the injection season, a significant part of the Polish volumes at the LNG terminal in Klaipeda did not go along the traditional route to the Inchukalna storage facility, but to Ukraine, which obviously paid more. But then the prices for the Baltic States were twice as low as the current quotes.