World gas demand grows

In 2019 gas consumptions grew by 1.8% (70 billion cm), reaching its historic maximum, gaining a 23% share in the world energy mix. In Europe, gas demand grew by 2.5% with respect to the previous year, thanks to the strong growth of power and coal to gas switching, favored by low gas prices and a high CO2 cost.

 

Natural gas becomes more and more strategic in Italy

After three consecutive years of growth, Italy’s primary energy demand decreased by 1.3%. However, natural gas contribution grew from 34.8% in 2018 to 36.1%. National natural gas demand in 2019 was 74.5 billion cm, with a growth rate in line with the European one (+2.5%, meaning, for Italy, 1.8 billion cm). Import met 93% of the demand (71.1 billion cm, growing 4.7% with respect to 2018) while 7% was met by national production (4.85 billion cm, decreasing by 10.9%).

 

Where does imported gas in Italy come from?

Gas pipelines provided 80% of the import (57 billion cm, a decrease of 2.2 billion cm), with Russia as steady supply leader (29,9 billion cm), followed by Northern Europe (growing by 43.3% to 11.1 billion cm), Algeria (which recorder a 40.3% decrease to 10.2 bln cm) and, finally, Libya (+27.6%, to 5.7 billion cm). Liquefied natural gas (LNG) provided the remaining 20% of import, growing by 59.8% on a yearly basis, thanks to the increased global liquefaction capacity which favoured the activities of the three Italian regasificators. Among these, Adriatic LNG recorded in 2019 an 17.7% increase with respect to the previous year, totalling 7.9 billion cm delivered to the grid.

 

Domestic consumption

In 2019, natural gas met 50.3% of of Italian families’ domestic consumption. An Italian household, made by 4 people living in an E climate zone – meaning in cities with a degrees-day index between 2.101 and 3.000 and with 47% permanently occupied dwellings – consumes 1.400 cm of gas, 2.700 kWh of electricity and 1.000 litres of petrol per year to meet it energy needs.

For the first time, the Ministry of Economic Development’s Report includes a chapter dedicated to the added value brought by the natural gas chain which contributed to 2017 national GDP with 9.6 billion euros, meaning 0.6%.

The 2019 Report on National Energy is available online.