According to an analysis cited by BBC News, while energy costs in Europe are skyrocketing, Russia is burning massive amounts of natural gas.

Experts say that under normal conditions, gas would be exported to Germany.

The plant near the border with Finland is said to burn about $10 million worth of gas every day.

Rystad Energy’s analysis shows that about 4.34 million cubic meters of gas are flared directly into the atmosphere every day.

It comes from the new liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant at Portova, northwest of St. Petersburg.

Portova is located near the compressor station at the beginning of the Nordstream 1 gas pipeline, which transports gas under the sea to Germany.

Thoughtful decision

This dormant gas burning began in June, when researchers noticed a significant increase in heat coming from the plant.

Mark Davies, chief executive of gas flaring solutions company Capterio, says flaring is not an accident, but rather a deliberate decision made for operational reasons.

“Operators are often very reluctant to actually close facilities for fear that restarting them might be technically difficult or expensive, and that’s probably the case here,” he told BBC News.

Others believe that there may be technical problems in managing the large volumes of gas supplied to the Nord Stream gas pipeline.

Meanwhile, gas volumes in the EU are approaching record levels

Wholesale natural gas prices in the Netherlands and the UK rose to their highest levels since March on Thursday.

The price of Dutch gas for September delivery, the European benchmark, rose 15.95 euros to 315.95 euros per megawatt-hour (MWh), the highest level since March 7, from 30.55 euros in December above, up to EUR 319.75/MWh.

Recently, Gazprom cited faulty or delayed equipment as the main reason for the reduction in supplies by Nord Stream, which operates at a fifth of its total capacity.

Germany said it was a pretext and that Moscow was using the gas as a weapon to raise prices and weaken the European Union’s resolve on sanctions.

Russia denies this and says that the reason for high gas prices is Western sanctions.

Russian gas supplies to Europe have fallen by about 75 percent this year due to economic conflict over European sanctions imposed on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine.

European gas storage was 78% full on Thursday, close to the European Commission’s target of 80% by October 1, according to Gas Infrastructure Europe.

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