Alert in European countries after a leak in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline

The Danish Maritime Authority announced the registration of two gas leaks in the exclusive economic zone of Denmark, in the gas pipeline “Nord Stream 1” linking Russia with Germany in the Baltic Sea.

This came the day after the announcement of a gas leak in the “Nord Stream 2” line. A 5-nautical-mile buffer zone was imposed along the two new leak sites, while the Danish authorities declared alert in the energy sector.

Earlier, the pipeline operator, Nord Stream AG, announced that the pipeline had experienced an emergency situation in Danish waters near the island of Bornholm as well. The company explained that this leak may be the cause of the pressure drop in the pipeline.

For its part, RIA Novosti quoted Alexei Grivash, deputy head of the Russian National Energy Security Fund, that the emergency in Nord Stream is similar to sabotage by well-known opponents of Russian gas in Europe, and that it will take months to fix it.

Meanwhile, the Swedish Maritime Administration said – on Tuesday – that it issued an alert about two leaks in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline in Swedish and Danish waters, shortly after a leak was discovered in the nearby Nord Stream 2 project. “There are two leaks in Nord Stream 1, one in the Swedish economic zone and the other in the Danish economic zone, they are very close together,” an administration spokesman told Reuters.

The spokesman added that the two leaks are located to the northeast of the Danish island of Bornholm, and it was not immediately clear why they happened. But Nord Stream said the simultaneous destruction of three pipelines was an unprecedented event, and it was impossible to estimate how long the repair would take.

Nord Stream 1 is the largest Russian gas pipeline to Europe in terms of the amount of 55 billion cubic meters annually. It was officially opened in November 2011, and this double pipeline extends across the Baltic Sea to Germany.

In the past two years, it increased the volume of its gas pumping, reaching 59.2 billion cubic meters in 2021. Nord Stream 2 is a second double pipeline of the same size, which was completed in 2021, but Germany refused to authorize its operation after the outbreak of the Russian war on Ukraine on February 24, 2022.