Natural gas already contributes some 25% of SE Europe’s 1 energy demand, according to latest trends, as documented in IENE’s seminal study “SE Europe Energy Outlook 2025”, now in its 4 th edition. According to the above study and in order to facilitate the required mathematical modelling, the region is divided into three large and distinct parts: the Western Balkans, the EU member states of SE Europe and Türkiye. In line with the findings of the “SEE Energy Outlook 2021/2022” (Stambolis, 2022), natural gas demand in the Western Balkans and in the EU member states of the region is set to rise steadily by 2040, while the contribution of natural gas in Türkiye is expected to decrease to 17% of gross inland consumption. In view of rising gas demand, we have also seen an increase in natural gas imports both through pipeline and via LNG. The region is supplied overland by the pipeline through Ukraine which brought Russian gas to a number of European countries, but it was suspended in early 2025 and also through the South Corridor in Türkiye. IENE’s vision of the Expanded South Corridor is fully analysed. The region, primarily Greece and Türkiye, and lately Croatia, are importing substantial LNG quantities through a network of land based and FSRU terminals. Latest figures are presented based on IENE’s original work concerning anticipated gas imports in the region over the next 25 years. The paper also examines the prospects of indigenous gas production based on gas findings and latest production in offshore Israel and Egypt and also findings in Cyprus, Croatia, Romania, Albania, Türkiye and Greece. An analysis is made as to the conditions under which SE Europe could further increase its indigenous gas production with the prospect of increasing the coverage of local needs and what would this mean to the balance of imports versus the utilisation of local hydrocarbon resources.
Stambolis et al. (Mon,) studied this question.