The theme of Europe’s energy security is a constant irritant in both EU–Russia relations and in relations among European elites. We should probably resign ourselves to the manipulative nature of discussions about European energy security, which are far from the real economic circumstances. With this manipulation in mind, we should focus on economic reality, which […]
European gas production will continue to fall, according to the latest forecasts from the International Energy Agency (IEA). By 2024, analysts expect European output, including Norway’s, to drop by as much as 48 billion cubic metres (bcm) to just 202 bcm. At the same time, the demand for natural gas will continue to grow. According […]
The environment was a crucial theme in Germany’s 2021 election campaign and predictably, the Greens want to make it central to the coalition agreement. What exactly the country’s new energy policy will look like, taking into account the country’s accelerated switch from coal power is however as yet unclear even to ministers themselves. It is […]
This August President Trump signed a new package of sanctions against Russia, which had been approved by both houses of the US Congress. There had been no doubt that Trump would sign the document making the sanctions mandatory, otherwise accusations of his connections with Russia would escalate. One of the most important components of the […]
Last year, not too long ago, some independent experts called the construction of the Baltic Pipe trunk gas pipeline (TGP) from Norway to Poland via Denmark a very ambitious project for the North Europe region. Precisely a year ago potential participants in the project started another round of the Baltic Pipeline discussions, the third in […]
In recent years production of crude oil in Azerbaijan has been steadily declining. In 2015 Azerbaijan, a former Soviet Transcaucasian Republic and a large global oil- and gas-market player, produced 41.7 million tonnes of ‘black gold’, whereas in 2016 production was a million tonnes less. Over the first six months of this year Azerbaijan produced […]
Against the backdrop of a growing interest in the evolution of the digital economy both in Russia and abroad the future of the development and processing of conventional and non-conventional hydrocarbons tends to fade somewhat into insignificance. In the long term that is fair. However in the medium-term the oil and gas sector may see […]
The world’s biggest gas consumer and supplier, Сhina and Russia respectively, are establishing stronger energy ties. The 3,000km-long Power of Siberia pipeline is just one of their latest joint projects. With anti-Russian sanctions adopted by the US Senate on 27 July and signed by Donald Trump on 2 August, it is likely that Russia will […]
Energy consumption is linked direct to economic activity. According to Eurostat the most significant drop in European energy consumption – 5.8% – occurred in 2009 and is attributed by the agency “to a lower level of economic activity as a result of the global financial and economic crisis”, although in general the consumption of energy continues to grow […]
In the early stages of global economic turmoil, the Russian oil and gas industry misjudged the true scale of coming trouble on hydrocarbon markets. The turmoil appears to have been regarded as a classic over-production crisis and generally seen as a healthy shakeup for the system, which would help deflate the dangerously expanding bubble of […]
Talk in Europe about the steady growth of alternative energy and the potentially vanishing demand for Russian natural gas would appear to derive more from political than from economic considerations. The desire to make Vladimir Putin suffer for his aggressive stance on Ukraine and Syria by stopping energy imports from Siberia – effectively an indirect […]
There are no miracles: survival is for the fittest. Nowhere is this truer than in the global energy market. Toshiba has finally published its third quarter results for 2016, revealing record losses in the history of the Japanese giant of 552.4 billion yen ($4.97 billion dollars at the current exchange rate), or 15 percent up […]
Since Ukraine stopped buying Russian natural gas in November 2015, it has been importing the fuel under sales contracts with suppliers in Germany, Austria, and Luxemburg. With Moscow and Kiev entrenched in a bitter drawn-out conflict, relations between Ukraine’s Naftogaz and Russia’s Gazprom have degenerated into a state of permanent litigation. The global energy community […]
According to its letter of March 28 to the governments of Denmark and Sweden, the European Commission will not block the construction of Nord Stream 2 (NS2). The Commission’s spokesperson Anna-Kaisa Itkonen has stated that Nord Stream 2 (NS2) is not subject to the rules of the EU Third Energy Package. Nevertheless, the European Commission […]
