Skip to main content
  • Sections
  • Search

Center for Strategic & International Studies

User menu

  • Subscribe
  • Sign In

Topics

  • Climate Change
  • Cybersecurity and Technology
    • Cybersecurity
    • Data Governance
    • Intellectual Property
    • Intelligence, Surveillance, and Privacy
    • Military Technology
    • Space
    • Technology and Innovation
  • Defense and Security
    • Counterterrorism and Homeland Security
    • Defense Budget
    • Defense Industry, Acquisition, and Innovation
    • Defense Strategy and Capabilities
    • Geopolitics and International Security
    • Long-Term Futures
    • Missile Defense
    • Space
    • Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation
  • Economics
    • Asian Economics
    • Global Economic Governance
    • Trade and International Business
  • Energy and Sustainability
    • Energy, Climate Change, and Environmental Impacts
    • Energy and Geopolitics
    • Energy Innovation
    • Energy Markets, Trends, and Outlooks
  • Global Health
    • Family Planning, Maternal and Child Health, and Immunizations
    • Multilateral Institutions
    • Health and Security
    • Infectious Disease
  • Human Rights
    • Building Sustainable and Inclusive Democracy
    • Business and Human Rights
    • Responding to Egregious Human Rights Abuses
    • Civil Society
    • Transitional Justice
    • Human Security
  • International Development
    • Food and Agriculture
    • Governance and Rule of Law
    • Humanitarian Assistance
    • Human Mobility
    • Private Sector Development
    • U.S. Development Policy

Regions

  • Africa
    • North Africa
    • Sub-Saharan Africa
  • Americas
    • Caribbean
    • North America
    • South America
  • Arctic
  • Asia
    • Afghanistan
    • Australia, New Zealand & Pacific
    • China
    • India
    • Japan
    • Korea
    • Pakistan
    • Southeast Asia
  • Europe
    • European Union
    • NATO
    • Post-Soviet Europe
    • Turkey
  • Middle East
    • The Gulf
    • Egypt and the Levant
    • North Africa
  • Russia and Eurasia
    • The South Caucasus
    • Central Asia
    • Post-Soviet Europe
    • Russia

Sections menu

  • Programs
  • Experts
  • Events
  • Analysis
    • Blogs
    • Books
    • Commentary
    • Congressional Testimony
    • Critical Questions
    • Interactive Reports
    • Journals
    • Newsletter
    • Reports
    • Transcript
  • Podcasts
  • iDeas Lab
  • Transcripts
  • Web Projects

Main menu

  • About Us
  • Support CSIS
    • Securing Our Future
Photo: OLIVIER HOSLET/POOL/AFP/Getty Images
Commentary
Share
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Email
  • Printfriendly.com

A Europe-Russia Energy Divorce Begins

March 1, 2022

This quick take is part of our Crisis Crossroads series, which highlights timely analysis by CSIS scholars on the evolving situation in Ukraine and its security, economic, energy, and humanitarian effects.

The war in Ukraine will reshape energy markets. The old energy relationship between Europe and Russia is no more—a relationship that survived the Cuban missile crisis, the Soviet invasions of Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan, martial law in Poland, and myriad other shocks that never stopped Europe from buying Russian hydrocarbons. The European willingness to depend on Russia has shrunk, a change most visible in Germany. Within a week, Germany halted the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, announced an investment in two terminals to import liquefied natural gas, and said it would build strategic reserves in gas and coal. Western companies, meanwhile, are abandoning Russia. These changes are monumental.

Europe is also doubling down on the European Green Deal. The multi-decade project to transform the European energy system always had foreign policy overtures. But those benefits are viewed in a new way—the German finance minister spoke of renewable energy as “freedom energy,” a remarkable turn for a country that once saw the gas trade with Russia as a means to build peace. Russia’s prospects to participate in this new energy system look grim right now—Russia risks being shut out of Europe’s energy transformation. Russia may still be an energy superpower, but Europe now wants to cut the period during which this remains true.

And yet, much as Europe and Russia are headed for an energy divorce, they still depend on each other. Most of Russia’s hydrocarbons still go to Europe. Europe cannot live without Russian gas right now. In the fog of war, many previously unimaginable possibilities are possible: a Western embargo of Russian energy; or a cutoff by Russia, preemptive or retaliatory. So while the long-term picture takes shape, what happens in the next five days, five months, and even five years is impossible to state with any certainty.

Nikos Tsafos is the James R. Schlesinger Chair for Energy and Geopolitics with the Energy Security and Climate Change Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. 

Commentary is produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a private, tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy issues. Its research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take specific policy positions. Accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions expressed in this publication should be understood to be solely those of the author(s). 

© 2022 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. All rights reserved. 

Nikos Tsafos
Media Queries
Contact H. Andrew Schwartz
Chief Communications Officer
Tel: 202.775.3242

Contact Paige Montfort
Media Relations Coordinator, External Relations
Tel: 202.775.3173
Related
Commentaries, Critical Questions, and Newsletters, Energy Security and Climate Change Program, Energy and Geopolitics, Energy and Sustainability, Europe, European Union, Russia, Russia and Eurasia
Footer menu
  • Topics
  • Regions
  • Programs
  • Experts
  • Events
  • Analysis
  • Web Projects
  • Podcasts
  • iDeas Lab
  • Transcripts
  • About Us
  • Support Us
Contact CSIS
Email CSIS
Tel: 202.887.0200
Fax: 202.775.3199
Visit CSIS Headquarters
1616 Rhode Island Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
Media Queries
Contact H. Andrew Schwartz
Chief Communications Officer
Tel: 202.775.3242

Contact Paige Montfort
Media Relations Coordinator, External Relations
Tel: 202.775.3173

Daily Updates

Sign up to receive The Evening, a daily brief on the news, events, and people shaping the world of international affairs.

Subscribe to CSIS Newsletters

Follow CSIS
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
  • Instagram

All content © 2022. All rights reserved.

Legal menu
  • Credits
  • Privacy Policy
  • Reprint Permissions