Groningen to close despite energy crisis. Europe’s largest gas field to produce just 4% of peak output

Gas production at Groningen, Europe’s best-known gas field, will reach just 2.8 bn m³ of natural gas in the gas year beginning on 1 October. Production is expected to end completely by 2024 at the latest, the Dutch government said earlier this week, as quoted by Reuters.

The Dutch government has resisted widespread pressure to increase gas production at Groningen, Europe’s largest gas field. Pressure has intensified in recent months in particular due to the energy crisis.

As a result of limited gas supplies from Russia, gas prices and electricity prices have risen several-fold. EU member states, both individually and within the EU framework, are therefore seeking every means of securing additional gas supplies and thereby reducing its wholesale price.

Nevertheless, the Netherlands is not backing away from its plan to close the field: it will not increase production and expects extraction to end by 2024 at the latest. In response to the current energy crisis, the Netherlands has so far maintained the same position: it will increase production at Groningen only if this is the last option for ensuring gas supplies to Dutch households.

Production at Groningen, once one of Europe’s main natural gas fields, will be limited to 2.8 bn m³ in the gas year beginning on 1 October, down from 4.5 billion m³ this year.

The production volume for the 2022/2023 gas year is also the lowest possible level at which gas can still be extracted. The government said that all 11 production sites will remain operational at least until April next year, enabling output to be increased in an emergency.

The field still holds 450 bn m³ of gas; production is ending due to frequent earthquakes

The Groningen field in the Netherlands is extremely extensive. It is the largest in the European Union and one of the ten largest in the world. Its recoverable reserves of approximately 450 bn m³ are equivalent to the European Union’s entire annual natural gas consumption.

At peak production, output exceeded 70 bn m³ of natural gas per year; it currently stands at roughly 4% of the level seen in the mid-1970s.

However, extensive gas extraction led to increasingly frequent earthquakes in the area. Long before the final decision was made to gradually end gas production, local residents had complained and were compensated for the damage.