The fourth round of a European Union coordinated gas purchase program has matched 7.35 billion cubic meters (259.56 billion cubic feet) of demand with offers by suppliers.

Thirteen international vendors responded to the latest call for the AggregateEU gas matchmaking scheme with a combined offer of 9.13 billion cubic meters (322.43 billion cubic feet). Participating companies in the EU region had registered a total demand of 10.06 billion cubic meters (355.27 billion cubic feet), according to the results announced recently by the bloc’s Directorate-General of Energy.

The buyers and their vendors can now start contractual negotiations, which happen outside the AggregateEU service. The supply under this round is scheduled for delivery between January 2024 and March 2025.

“A combined volume of 42.13 billion cubic meters [1.49 trillion cubic feet] of aggregated European gas demand was matched with offers by reliable suppliers”, the directorate said in a press release, referring to the four rounds.

Under AggregateEU, companies in the 27-member bloc can pool demand, negotiate with international suppliers and coordinate collective purchases.

The matchmaking service, created under Council Regulation 2022/2576 of December 19, 2022, is part of the broader EU Energy Platform for coordinated purchases of gas, liquefied natural gas and hydrogen. The Energy Platform was formed last year as part of the REPowerEU strategy for achieving energy independence from Russia.

“Introduced in April 2023, the EU Energy Platform has demonstrated the EU’s ability to use its collective weight to secure reliable gas supplies from international partners and make our energy supply more diverse”, said the directorate about the latest round of AggregateEU.

EU Executive Vice-President for the European Green Deal Maros Sefcovic had called on the group to consider establishing mechanisms for the joint purchase of other strategic commodities such as clean energy and raw materials. “We must build on the success of the Platform, recognizing the added-value of the joint purchase for the EU’s open strategic autonomy, competitiveness of Europe’s economy and its green and digital transition”, he said announcing the results of the third round, according to a transcript on the European Commission’s website October 6. “This is key to ensuring we can meet the growing demand for hydrogen, a key resource for facilitating the decarbonization of European industry and therefore crucial to our target of climate neutrality by 2050”.

The third round of AggregateEU saw 6.49 billion cubic meters (582.33 billion cubic feet) in aggregated demand, from 39 companies. The volume offered by suppliers, 18.1 billion cubic meters (639.2 billion cubic feet), exceeded the pooled demand, according to results announced October 6.

The first two rounds pooled 27.5 billion cubic meters (971.15 billion cubic feet) of demand, 22.9 billion cubic meters (808.71 billion cubic feet) of which saw offers, the Directorate-General of Energy said in a news release September 21 announcing the opening of the third round.

The Commission recently asked the European Council to extend by one year emergency measures, including AggregateEU, introduced last year to address the energy crisis.

“While the situation on the European energy market is more secure than 12 months ago, the Commission is proposing this extension to further enhance security of gas supply and strengthen market resilience”, the Commission said in a media statement November 28.

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