Households in the UK are being told to reduce their thermostats to help cut Europe's reliance on Russian gas.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) listed reducing your thermostat by 1 degree Celsius in a 10-point plan of ways to bring gas imports from Russia down by a third.
While Britain only gets around 4% of its gas from Russia, Europe is heavily reliant on the country’s supplies, with Germany and Austria claiming more than 50% of it from the nation.
Both countries have vowed to end that dependence this week in response to Russia ’s invasion of neighbouring Ukraine last week.
The IEA said lowering the temperature by 1C would help reduce Russia's dominance in the market.
It has financial benefits too. Energy experts at uSwitch suggest turning your thermostat down by just one degree could save you £80 a year on your heating bill.
The IEA also said Europe should not sign any new gas supply contracts with Russia.
It added that the UK should replace Russian supplies with gas from alternative sources and accelerate the deployment of new wind and solar projects. This alone could reduce gas use by 6billion cubic metres within a year.
Further advice says Britain should maximise power generation from bioenergy and nuclear and enact short-term tax measures to shelter vulnerable electricity consumers from high prices.
It goes on to encourage the faster rollout of heat pumps which would eliminate the need for gas altogether and accelerate energy efficiency improvements in buildings.
The head of the IEA said that Europe needed to increase alternatives to Russian energy as soon as possible.
“Nobody is under any illusions anymore. Russia’s use of its natural gas resources as an economic and political weapon show Europe needs to act quickly to be ready to face considerable uncertainty over Russian gas supplies next winter,” said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol.
“The IEA’s 10-Point Plan provides practical steps to cut Europe’s reliance on Russian gas imports by over a third within a year while supporting the shift to clean energy in a secure and affordable way. Europe needs to rapidly reduce the dominant role of Russia in its energy markets and ramp up the alternatives as quickly as possible.”
In 2021, the European Union imported an average of over 380million cubic metres (mcm) per day of gas by pipeline from Russia, or around 140billion cubic metres (bcm) for the year as a whole.
As well as that, around 15 bcm was delivered in the form of liquefied natural gas (LNG). The total 155 bcm imported from Russia accounted for around 45% of the EU’s gas imports in 2021.
The UK uses relatively little Russian gas, but it still accounts for about 6% of total imports, and about 4% of UK gas demand, having risen from almost none in 2017, according to analysis of government data by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU).
The vast majority of Britain's gas comes from the North Sea and Norway.
Will Russia’s invasion push up UK gas prices?
The UK gets less than 5% of its gas from Russia but its gas prices are affected by fluctuations in the global markets.
Right now, sanctions by the US and EU is hitting Russian trade and pushing up gas prices globally.
The sanctions imposed by Western nations are designed to stop Russia's banks from doing business in several major economies and cripple how Putin funds the war.
But experts fear that Putin may decide to retaliate by reducing gas supplies to Europe. If this were to happen wholesale costs would rocket and send prices higher everywhere, including the UK.
That would mean a further rise of the energy price cap this October.
Average household bills are already expected to rise by about £700 to about £2,000 in April when the price cap is increased. The autumn review would be even higher if whole prices rocket dramatically again.
