Europe’s largest economy is facing up to the prospect that the bulk of its natural gas and coal supplies could get choked off, ripping through its industrial base and sparking economic upheaval. Companies including utility Uniper SE and chemical giant BASF SE are particularly exposed, and with gas reserves low, the pain would quickly spread to manufacturers and households already buckling under ever-rising bills.

“If either the Europeans no longer want to buy the gas or Russia cuts them off, that would be a very significant shock,” David Folkerts-Landau, the chief economist at Deutsche Bank AG, said in a Bloomberg TV interview this week. “You will have a very serious recession.”

Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government has said the country’s gas needs are covered until next winter. But Europe’s gas storage facilities are now less than a third full, well below the average for this time of the year. To compensate for lost Russian gas, Germany would need deliveries from the world’s entire 600-vessel fleet of liquefied natural gas tankers, business lobby DIHK estimates.