EU entrapped by reliance on US gas – Politico
The EU is becoming increasingly dependent on American natural gas, which is set to account for nearly half of the bloc’s supply by 2030, a shift that risks creating a major vulnerability as relations with Washington deteriorate, Politico has reported.
The bloc’s increasing reliance on US-sourced supplies follows a gradual phasing out of pipeline gas from Russia, once the biggest supplier, following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022 and ensuing Western sanctions.
The US already supplies about a quarter of the EU’s gas imports, a share expected to rise sharply as the bloc phases in a total ban on Russian gas, according to Politico. This trend has created a “potentially high-risk new geopolitical dependency,” Ana Maria Jaller-Makarewicz, lead energy analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, told the outlet.
“An over-reliance on US gas contradicts the [EU policy] of enhancing EU energy security through diversification, demand reduction and boosting renewables supply,” she said.
Alarm over the vulnerability is growing among EU member states. Diplomats warn that the Trump administration could seek to exploit Europe’s rising dependence on US gas for foreign policy gain.
While “there are other sources of gas in the world” beyond the US, the risk that US President Donald Trump could cut supplies to the EU after an incursion in Greenland “should be taken into account,” an anonymous senior EU diplomat told Politico.
Trump has increasingly used energy as leverage in trade talks with the EU. Under a deal announced last July, the bloc agreed to buy $750 billion worth of US energy by 2028 to avert higher tariffs, a pledge critics have branded coercive.
The development comes as Trump has openly floated seizing Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory, a notion that has unnerved European NATO members and pushed EU-US relations toward a crisis, the outlet said.
Tensions escalated further after Trump announced new tariffs on European NATO countries including France, Denmark, Germany and the UK unless a deal is struck to sell Greenland to the US, prompting calls within the EU for tough retaliatory trade measures.
Meanwhile, the sharp fall in cheaper Russian pipeline gas imports after 2022 has had the effect of driving wholesale prices and living costs higher, while undermining industrial competitiveness.
