* Norway to raise gas exports to Europe
* Britain says: the lights will not go out
* UK suppliers seek state support - sources
* Carbon dioxide shortage threatens food supplies
* Yara brings ammonia supplies from outside Europe
By Nerijus Adomaitis, Guy Faulconbridge and Susanna Twidale
OSLO/LONDON, Sept 20 (Reuters) - Norway agreed on Monday to
increase natural gas exports to the rest of Europe as record
high wholesale natural gas prices prompted suppliers in Britain
to seek state support and raised fears of a food supply crunch.
Wholesale gas prices have soared in recent months as
economies reopened from COVID-19 lockdowns and high demand for
liquefied natural gas in Asia pushed down supplies to Europe,
leading to a shortage of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the food
industry.
Britain's biggest energy companies have asked the government
for support to help cover the cost of taking on customers from
firms that have gone bust due to soaring wholesale gas prices,
sources in the companies said.
Equinor, Europe's second-largest gas supplier
after Russia's Gazprom, said on Monday that Norway was
allowing a combined 2 billion cubic metre (bcm) increase in
exports for the gas year starting Oct. 1 from the Troll and
Oseberg fields.
The increase corresponds to nearly 2% of Norway's annual
pipeline gas exports, according to Reuters calculations.
British Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng welcomed the move
by Norway, which supplies just under a third of Britain's gas,
but sought to reassure consumers that there would be no crisis.
"We have sufficient capacity and more than sufficient
capacity to meet demand, and we do not expect supply emergencies
to occur," Kwarteng told parliament.
He said there would be no return to the 1970s when Britain
was plagued by power cuts that made the economy the 'sick man of
Europe', with three-day working weeks and people unable to heat
their homes.
"This winter, there's absolutely no question, Mr Speaker, of
the lights going out or people being unable to heat their
homes."
European consumers though are facing the prospect of soaring
winter heating bills due to a confluence of global factors that
have raised questions about how vulnerable Europe remains to
swings in global energy prices.
Benchmark European gas prices have risen by more than 250%
since January due to low storage stocks, high European Union
carbon prices, soaring demand in Asia, lower gas supplies from
Russia, low renewable output and nuclear maintenance outages.
Surging gas prices have led to an array of stresses in other
markets, including a shortage of carbon dioxide after fertilizer
plants had to shut.
Some of Britain's meat processors will run out of CO2 - also
used to put the fizz in beer, cider and soft drinks - within
five days, forcing them to halt production, the head of the
industry's lobby group warned.
Yara, the world's largest trader of ammonia, is
bringing supplies to Europe from production facilities in
Trinidad, the United States and Australia to support fertilizer
capacity after wholesale gas prices surged, its CEO said.
(Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Jan Harvey)
