Following the Nord Stream gas leak, the Polish operator PERN announced on Wednesday that it had discovered a leak in one of the Druzhba system’s pipelines, which transports oil from Russia to Europe.
After Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, which cut off gas supplies in a protracted standoff, Europe is currently experiencing a serious energy crisis. PERN reported finding the leak on Tuesday evening.
PERN stated that the leak’s causes are still unknown. It was found in a portion of the pipe about 70 kilometres from Plock, a city in central Poland.
One of the biggest oil pipelines in the world, the Druzhba oil pipeline—whose name means “friendship” in Russian—supplies Russian oil to a huge portion of central Europe, including Germany, Poland, Belarus, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, and Austria.
According to PERN, the second line of the pipeline and other components of its infrastructure were operating normally.
The operator stated that all PERN services (technical, operational, internal fire brigade, and environmental protection) are now acting in line with the specified algorithms for this kind of circumstance.
According to a representative for the Czech pipeline operator MERO, there hasn’t been any alteration in the flow of goods into the country.
The federal network regulator, Germany’s economics ministry, and the Schwedt refinery, which provides 90% of Berlin’s fuel, were not immediately available for comment.
Both the West and Russia have laid the blame for the leak in the underwater Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines on sabotage. It wasn’t immediately obvious how severe the pipeline breach in Druzhba was.
