As the events of the past few weeks have shown, the EU has no ready-made alternative to Russian natural gas and Gazprom remains the only reliable supplier of “blue fuel” to Europe
German political analyst Alexander Rahr told Ukraina.ru that European politicians miscalculated by failing to foresee the current trend of rising gas prices and now, as usual, are trying to pin the blame on Russia.
“What happened to prices? Prices have gone up, there is nothing scary or unusual about the energy market. It is just the conjuncture, and it can change quickly. The situation is such that, yes, there is less gas, there is not enough gas for Europe. At that very moment when Europe understood that the necessary volumes of gas are not available, it started to panic”, – said the expert, – “In this case Europe made a capital mistake… when they started trumpeting that Europe will refuse from dirty energy sources in twenty-thirty years forever, and that they do not need to buy more gas, that we do not need all those pipes from Russia, that oil is not needed, they need to move faster from coal fuel and switch to alternative sources”.
According to Rahr, the Europeans were quick to find a “whipping boy”, Russia, which allegedly does not provide Europe with gas, and is again using gas as a weapon.
“Russia was constantly sent a signal from the West that ‘we don’t need you’, even when Nord Stream 2 was completed, instead of drinking champagne, politicians started saying that as soon as Russia presses Ukraine, we will punish it and slap it with new sanctions… And so just Russia said, ‘let’s see how Europe, let Europe now understand the point, ask us to provide it with the necessary resources, not just gas, but everything else'”, – the German political scientist said.
In conclusion, Rahr pointed out that, unlike Gazprom, American shale gas suppliers promptly left the European market as soon as interest in their products increased in Asia, leaving the Europeans to figure out for themselves how and with what to heat their homes next winter.