According to the participants of the international conference Energy Community – “16th Gas Forum”, held on September 22-23, 2021 in Ljubljana, Slovenia and the joint international event of OSCE and World Energy Council Austria – “The 4th Vienna Energy Security Dialogue” Energy Markets and Security During the Global Recovery” conference, held on October 22, 2021 in Vienna, Austria, a combination of such factors as the start of commercial operation of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline and a possible decline in the importance of Ukraine as the main transit of Russian natural gas to the territory of EU member states, may be the cause of the most significant changes in the topology of gas transmission routes in Europe over the past 20 years, after the commissioning in 1999 of the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline.

According to the RRZ report “On the assessment of compliance with budgetary responsibility and the rules of budget transparency for 2020” (Správa o hodnotení plnenia pravidiel rozpočtovej zodpovednosti a pravidiel rozpočtovej transparentnosti za rok 2020), submitted by the organization’s secretariat to the Slovak parliament, the public debt of the Slovak Republic constitutes 60.5% of GDP, which threatens the economic stability of the country.

On August 3, 2021 at the Slovak-Polish border near the Slovak town Výrava (Medzilaborce region) the physical connection of the Slovak and Polish GTS as the final stage of the project of the interconnector PL-SK. Construction and technical testing of the gas pipeline infrastructure are expected to be completed by the end of this year. The beginning of commercial operation of the PL SK interconnector is expected to launch in the first quarter of 2022.

During 2020 the interest of the world’s leading countries and world energy leaders in the use of hydrogen as an energy source grew notwithstanding the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The EU, India and Canada have adopted national hydrogen strategies, and such important energy market players as Shell, Saudi Aramco, ExxonMobil have initiated plans to consolidate in a promising global hydrogen market. Hydrogen has significant potential for energy transfer and storage, but at the same time has significant technological limitations. First of all, hydrogen is seen as a means of overcoming the functional shortcomings of other alternative energy sources, as well as a promising energy resource for a number of countries, such as Japan, where certain decarbonization options have limited use.