Europe’s power supplies are secure this winter under normal conditions, but Belgium and France could face shortages if there are extreme cold spells in January, formal EU gas grid operators’ body Entso-e said Wednesday. Extreme cold for Belgium and France means daily average temperatures of minus 5 degrees Celsius, which is nearly 10 C lower than normal. This is “rather unlikely in the region,” Entso-e said in its Winter Outlook 2019-2020 report. The extreme cold would also have to be combined with low renewable generation and unplanned generation and gridoutages to create a real risk of shortages, it said. In such extreme circumstances Belgium and France would have to rely heavily on imports and may look for regional cooperation to prevent local demand-shedding. “Such conditions would require system reliability to be tightly monitored closer to the operational timeframe with the support of Regional Security Coordinators,” Entso-e said. […]