In the context of an increase in negative expectations of a serious crisis developing in the global financial market, ensuring energy security in socially and industrially key markets has become a question fundamental to preserving economic stability. These key markets now comprise East Asia, whose economic nucleus is China, and the European Union market. The […]
Oil and Gas
In giving up Russian gas for political reasons, Ukraine made the fatal error of not making contingency plans, and is now buying re-exported fuel from Europe at higher cost. Kiev tried to counteract this gross mistake with loud declarations that gas, including shale, would soon start to be extracted from its own deposits. According to […]
In order to control the specifics of supplies, the European Commission initially tried to obtain a mandate from EU countries for negotiations with Russia on the conditions for building the gas pipeline – but without success. According to EU legislation, these decisions remain with member countries and Brussels only has a consultative voice in this […]
When it was announced a few years ago that Europe would soon begin to receive gas from Mediterranean deposits, proponents of diversifying the energy sector rubbed their hands with glee. Plans for creating an effective competitive base to offset Gazprom’s virtual monopoly on European gas supply have long occupied the hearts and minds of those […]
Problems with laying the Baltic Pipe gas pipeline, which were already substantial enough, became even more acute as soon as Denmark held its first public consultation on its potential construction. More than three hundred residents and official representatives of the Danish municipalities through whose area the gas pipeline should pass took part in the consultation. […]
The Southern Gas Corridor (SGC) project and the related Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline (TGP), which have been in the process of implementation since 2011 have again become the subject of discussion in energy and political circles, in which this is connected to the latest intensification of the gas conflict between Ukraine and Russia and a growing […]
Despite the ending of the winter peak in fuel consumption in European countries, the situation with gas supplies to Europe via Ukraine remains acute; this is apparent not merely in the fact that from 26 February to 1 March there was a real threat of Ukrainian gas reserves falling below 8 billion cubic metres (bcm), […]
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 […]
One of the key questions for securing Europe’s energy security is the possibility of organising the transportation of Iranian gas to the EU and thus alleviating the EU’s dependence on gas supplies from Russia. In the last year and a half this question has acquired a key and apparently disproportionate significance for Europe’s energy security. […]
Poland and Denmark have announced their decision to bring the Baltic Pipeline into operation in 2022. This troubled project, which has already been delayed twice since work began on it 16 years ago, should, according to its architects, supply the Poles and other European consumers with a significant volume of gas extracted in Norway. The […]
However much Kiev may try to disown everything that in any way – even metaphorically – gives Ukraine the brutal charm of its powerful neighbour Russia, there are certain things that President Poroshenko’s team are unable to hide. One of these is the catastrophe that is the country’s gas transportation system, whose condition European energy […]