Latvia ranks among the leaders in reducing natural gas consumption

RIGA - Latvia is one of the leading countries in reducing natural gas consumption in the European Union (EU), Latvian Television reported last night.

By December of this year, 30 percent less natural gas was consumed in Latvia than in the 11 months of last year.

Electricity has also been consumed less - from January to November, it was consumed in Latvia by four percent less than last year during this time period.

However, in the first ten months of the year, oil consumption has increased by less than seven percent. At the same time, the retail consumption of this resource has slightly decreased - by less than two percent.

As reported, in August-November 2022, Latvia cut natural gas consumption by 43 percent as compared to the average amount of gas it consumed in the four-month period over the past five years, according to the data released on Tuesday by the EU's statistics office Eurostat.

Across the EU, gas consumption fell by 20.1 percent in August-November 2022.

The sharpest drop in gas consumption was recorded in Finland (-52.7 percent), followed by Latvia (43.2 percent) and Lithuania (41.6 percent).

Estonia reported the fourth biggest reduction in gas consumption, of more than 35 percent.

In the situation where they had to look for alternative to Russian gas imports, EU member states at the end of July decided to voluntarily cut gas consumption by at least 15 percent from August 1, 2022 to March 31, 2023.

Eurostat data shows that 18 member states of the bloc reduced their gas consumption by at least 15 percent between August and November.

Six member states, including the Czech Republic, Ireland, Portugal and Spain cut gas consumption by less than 15 percent, and two countries - Malta and Slovakia - increased gas consumption by 7.1 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively.

Cyprus is the only EU member not using natural gas.