Gas, so Italy replaced all imported volumes from Russia with regasifiers

Decisive is the contribution from the USA, which confirms itself as the leading supplier of gas by ship for both the peninsula and the whole of Europe. Scornajenchi: '150 ships have already arrived to date, half from the States'

by Celestina Dominelli

12 September 2025

Il rigassificatore galleggiante di Snam ormeggiato al largo delle coste di Ravenna

2' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

2' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

Liquefied natural gas arriving in Italy, mainly from the US, has played a crucial role in enabling Italy to diversify its supplies by completely replacing the gas once supplied by Russia.

Highlighting the contribution of LNG and the infrastructures that have allowed the country to accelerate on this front was, a few days ago, on the sidelines of Gastech 2025, the CEO of Snam, Agostino Scornajenchi, according to whom 'LNG is growing in the share of our imports: 150 ships have arrived so far, half of them American, and we will go up in the latter part of the year'.

The US contribution

The contribution of US LNG, therefore, was and is very important to completely replace what were the flows from Russia, is the reasoning of the CEO of Snam. 'We of the total 70/75 billion cubic metres, which was the national consumption, we imported 40% from Russia. LNG is already above that quota and therefore we have completely overturned that system; and it has not been easy. Gas today comes from many parts with many different technologies, they must be integrated and managed'.

European data

And, in fact, the numbers provided by Snam certify this 'substitution' effect between Russian gas and the volumes arriving by ship today. If 151 LNG cargoes had landed in Italy during the whole of 2024, in the period between 1 January and 11 September this year alone, the figure has already been equalled, as Scornajenchi himself explained.

The 151 cargoes arrived mainly from the United States (73 cargoes; 48.3%) Qatar (34; 22%) and Algeria (29; 19.4%), as well as from other countries. In addition, thanks to the increase in regasification capacity, which reached 28 billion cubic metres per year when the Ravenna terminal became operational (the third largest in the EU after Spain and France), the volumes imported from Russia have been balanced until 2021

Import increase

Looking then at Europe, in the period January-August 2025, the demand for gas expressed by the 6 main markets (Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, France, Spain, UK) was 186 billion cubic metres, a growth of 3% (5 billion cubic metres more) compared to the previous year, driven mainly by Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK.

The increase in consumption was matched, also at the European level, by an increase in gas imports. Considering the EU-27 and the UK, August alone marked an increase in inflows of 4.5 billion cubic metres (+18%). The increase in LNG arrivals (+67%) was particularly influential, mostly from the US but also from Africa, the latter led by Angola and Nigeria.

If, on the other hand, one considers the first 8 months of the year, the increase in European gas imports was 8 per cent. LNG is always the driving force: that which arrived in the Old Continent, from January to August, amounted to 116 billion cubic metres, an increase of 38 per cent (+32 billion cubic metres) over the same period in 2024. This confirms the role of the USA as the main supplier of LNG to Europe: in the first 8 months, the States alone covered 59 per cent of the volumes of imported liquefied natural gas.

Celestina DominelliCaposervizio
Luogo: Roma
Lingue parlate: Inglese, francese
Argomenti: finanza, energia, società pubbliche quotate
Premi: Alfiere del Lavoro (1996)
Scheda autore
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