In the past, gas was like water – we turned the tap and gas flowed out. It didn’t interest us where it came from. But since the Ukraine crisis, we know only too well where our natural gas is produced. Today, a quarter of Germany’s gas is supplied by Russia.
How secure is our energy supply? If Russia suspends the delivery of natural gas, how can we guarantee gas supplies for the 18 million German households that cook and heat with gas? How extensive are our gas reserves, and how much longer will they last?

In search of answers to these questions, Harald Lesch takes us on a journey to dried-up primordial oceans, where gigantic tanks are constructed to store natural gas, he accompanies tankers that transport boiling liquefied gas across oceans at minus 230 degrees, enough to cover the annual natural gas requirements of a small town. He follows the pipeline race that aims to end dependence on Russian gas and in the process encounters the explosive legacy of two world wars. And he travels to the heart of domestic natural gas production in Lower Saxony, where an algal bloom that grew millions of years ago is to thank for the fact that shale gas extraction by means “fracking” could be so productive.

WRITER & DIRECTOR: Eva Schötteldreier     CAMERA: Dieter Stürmer     EDITOR: Claudia Spoden     MUSIC: James Reynolds     COMMISSIONING EDITOR: Christiane Götz-Sobel