Energy Security
"This choice between Russian energy and global market volatility is a very bad choice for Europe," Dan Marks, a specialist in energy security at the defence think tank, the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi), told me. He says Europe will still manage to secure energy supplies in the current crisis, despite the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, because the wealthy continent can out-pay other regions in a crisis. But the problem is cost and competitiveness. Long-term, he says, Europe needs to think about how to better build energy stockpiles and reduce or reorganise energy consumption to attain more control over sudden supply changes, like we're seeing now. Marks also warns that continued European reliance on outside actors, like the US, for crucial energy supplies, throws up "wildcards" often not considered. What if Trump suddenly decided to keep energy supplies for US domestic consumption only, in an attempt to reduce petrol prices in the US or as a way to punish European countries for not immediately sending warships to the Strait of Hormuz to keep the waterway open, as he demanded this week. Marks also raises the possibility of the US suffering terrible storms or fires in the future, destroying LNG terminals. "It's a layering of risk. There are no easy answers here," Marks concludes.
