Ukraine risks send gas prices soaring
Fears that a Russian invasion of Ukraine could disrupt energy supplies over the winter have caused European and UK gas prices to hit another record high this week on Tuesday, say Tom Wilson and Neil Hume in the Financial Times. With an estimated 100,000 Russian troops already on Ukraine’s border and Moscow ignoring calls “to de-escalate and pursue a diplomatic solution”, US officials say that Russia “could be planning to invade Ukraine as soon as early next year”. Such a move “would further delay the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline as well as risk disrupting other supplies”.
Even if Russia doesn’t invade, it could be some time before Nord Stream 2 comes online, says Jillian Ambrose in The Guardian. This week, Germany’s new government enraged Moscow by saying that the pipeline “could not be given the green light in its current form because it did not meet the requirements of EU energy law”. Berlin is coming under huge pressure to block the line: critics argue that the project, which would deliver gas directly from Russia to Germany, would “make it easier for Russia to increase its military aggression towards Ukraine”.
Putin is mistaken if he thinks that he can use gas as a leverage to bend Europe to his will over Ukraine, says Liam Denning on Bloomberg. True, “roughly 40% of Europe’s gas imports... come from Russia”, with Europe’s storage tanks “only 62% full — lower than the 80% average level for this time of year”. However, condemning Europe “to a mixture of hypothermia and recession” would “unite his opponents, undoing the divisions he has managed to exploit thus far”.