On February 24 last year, Russian troops invaded Ukraine. Shortly afterwards, Russian President Vladimir Putin cut off the flow of gas to the EU. This then led to the gas price rising sharply, and thus also Norway’s income. In their master’s thesis (external link), Eirik Hjalte and Ida Elisabeth Uberg Gaasland have found out approximately how much Norway “earned” from the war in Ukraine in 2022: NOK 334 billion. – It is an insanely high number, says leader Arild Hermstad of the Green Party (MDG). Arild Hermstad, head of MDG. Photo: Øystein Otterdal / news He calls Norway a war profiteer. – It is reprehensible that Norway should profit from other people’s misfortune. The government makes it embarrassing to be Norwegian, says Hermstad. The sum made up 27 per cent of the income from Norwegian gas exports that year, if we disregard exports to Great Britain. The income thus led to 2022 being a record year for Norwegian gas (see graph). Dagens Næringsliv (external link) has also mentioned the master’s thesis. Does not take a position Both SV, Naturvernforbundet and the Norwegian Climate Foundation have used the word war profiteer in this context. But several – including Oil and Energy Minister Terje Aasland (Ap) – have pointed out that Norway supplies badly needed gas to a Europe in crisis. The two former master’s students at the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH) do not want to say anything about what they have found. – We want to be neutral about the issue, but contribute our results to the debate. Some will call Norway a war profiteer, others will say that this is only about market forces – that Norway can be sold at approximately the market price, says Gaasland. Ida Elisabeth Uberg Gaasland and Eirik Hjalte when they had just handed in the assignment this summer. Photo: Øivind Andre Ullaland Whatever stamp you put on the income: NOK 334 billion is probably too low, according to the former NHH students. The reason is that they have only looked at the gas price from a supply/demand point of view. In other words, how the disappearance of Russian gas has affected the price. But there is good reason to believe that things like fear have also driven the price up. In other words, companies and people have bought more gas than they need out of fear that the war will make gas less available in the future. – This may also have attracted speculators who have seen their average and bought up gas, says Hjalte. The day Norway earned the most The students have calculated how much Norway earned from gas on a daily basis in 2022. On 25 August that year, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a sharp increase in the armed forces. “A sign that the war will be protracted,” wrote the New York Times (external link). The next day, the gas price reached a peak. Troll in the northern North Sea is Norway’s largest gas field. Photo: Ole Berg-Rusten / NTB On 26 August, Norway earned around NOK 8.7 billion from the sale of gas, if one assumes that Norway sold at the spot price (the price of gas on this exact date). That’s a record. 2.5 billion of this was due to the loss of Russian gas, according to the master’s thesis. MDG believes that Norway should allocate the extraordinary gas money to Ukraine and climate measures. – It is ordinary European families who have paid in this money to heat their food and houses. We have therefore proposed in the Storting that the money Norway earns from Russia’s warfare should go back to the reconstruction of Ukraine and the surrounding countries, and to help Europe away from dependence on Russian gas. Unfortunately, the government has flatly rejected that, says Hermstad. This is how they arrived at the number Eirik Hjalte and Ida Gaasland have used a so-called Structural Vector Autoregressive model to arrive at how much the disappearance of Russian gas has affected the gas price. This model takes into account seven factors: The temperature and the number of days heating is needed. Reduction of gas exports from Russia to Europe. The oil price (the spot price of North Sea oil) The coal price (the price of coal in north-west Europe) Imports of liquefied gas (LNG) The degree of filling of natural gas stocks in the EU. The price of natural gas (the spot price quoted in the Netherlands (TTF)) Eirik Hjalte and Ida Gaasland’s values of total Norwegian gas exports deviate slightly from Statistics Norway’s figures. The reason is that Hjalte and Gaasland exclude exports to Great Britain in their analysis, and so they start from the fact that the gas is sold at the spot price. – Reliable supplier According to Oil and Energy Minister Terje Aasland (Ap), Norway is among those who have given the most support to Ukraine – both humanitarian and military. Oil and Energy Minister Terje Aasland (Ap) visiting Kårstø in October last year. Photo: Marthe Synnøve Susort Johannessen / news But first and foremost, Norway is a reliable and predictable supplier of gas to Europe, he points out. – Without Norwegian supplies, energy prices would be much, much higher. Everyone who sold energy profited from energy prices being so high, including the Norwegian state. At the same time, it is important to emphasize that despite large revenues for the Oil Fund, unrest in the world and falls in the stock markets contributed to large losses, says Aasland.
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Norway has earned approximately NOK 334 billion from the Ukraine war – news Rogaland – Local news, TV and radio
