NEAH: New Energy Advancement Hub

Yesterday at Flame-conference in Amsterdam, I spoke about Russian gas, Europe, and the wider mutation of the gas system. My main point was simple: after several decades of relative peace, growth, and deepening interdependence, we are moving into a period of fragmentation, confrontation, and growing militarisation. Gas is changing with it. The old idea of a global, liquid, competitive gas market is not disappearing physically - it is being filtered politically. We now see blocs, alignments, and exceptions: China taking sanctioned Russian LNG while avoiding US LNG under tariff pressure, Pakistan negotiating separate safe-passage arrangements for LNG tankers through Hormuz, and Europe learning that supply security is no longer only about molecules, but about corridors, shipping, insurance, and timing. Under these conditions, gas systems begin to mutate. They move away from the logic of a normal traded commodity and back toward the logic of state-supervised critical infrastructure. That shift carries a real danger. Under stress, administrative intervention becomes extremely attractive. Price regulation, state management, rationing, mandatory procurement, emergency controls - all can be justified in the name of security. Some state systems can do this effectively. China can, because it has the strategic discipline, speed, and administrative coherence to impose difficult decisions quickly. Europe does not operate that way, and cannot pretend otherwise. This is why the current moment is so important for the European gas industry. Four years after 2022, Russian gas is no longer the backbone of Europe’s system. But the deeper lesson is not about Russia alone. Europe reduced supplier dependence, yet increased system complexity. It moved from pipeline dependence to logistical dependence. That means the real question is no longer whether Europe can secure enough gas for the next winter. It is whether Europe can keep a gas system that is investible, competitive, flexible, and strategically resilient, without suffocating it under the very regulatory reflexes triggered by insecurity. Markets have many failures. But they can adapt. If the European gas industry can reinvent creative risk management, coordination, and investment logic under these new conditions - as it once did with the Groningen formula - it will remain part of the solution. If not, it risks might be slowly replaced by administrative control. Structural takeaway: the gas market is becoming more global physically, but less global politically. The real challenge for Europe is to build resilience without overregulating the market system it still needs. Tim Boersma Anne-Sophie Corbeau Erik Rakhou Geoffroy Hureau

Putin may arrive in Beijing with a stronger strategic case. That does not mean he arrives with stronger leverage. The Gulf shock has obviously made Russian hydrocarbons look more valuable to China. Overland gas, Arctic LNG, and eastern oil routes all gain strategic weight when Middle Eastern supply becomes less reliable. What is far less clear is whether Putin’s visit will produce anything more than incremental progress. On gas, the main constraint remains infrastructure. Power of Siberia 1 delivered 38.8 bcm in 2025, effectively at its original design level. The important new signal is not a breakthrough, but preparation for gradual expansion: as Russian reporting put it, “Gazprom has received permits from Russia’s Ministry of Construction to expand the Power of Siberia 1 trunk gas pipeline to 44 bcm. The construction itself may take 3–4 years, which fits the timeline for increasing gas supplies to China from 38 bcm per year to 44 bcm per year by 2031.” In other words, there is more room than before, but it is still incremental rather than transformative. The Far Eastern route matters in the same way. Supplies are expected to start in 2027 at around 2 bcm per year before rising toward 10–12 bcm annually. That improves Russia’s eastern optionality. It does not change the near-term picture. On LNG, the direction is clearer than the scale. China has become the destination for Arctic LNG 2 cargoes that actually make it to market, and it is increasingly the balancing market for Russian LNG that is harder to place elsewhere. On oil, the Eastern route is becoming relatively more important as western export infrastructure comes under pressure, but ESPO and Kozmino are not unconstrained systems that can absorb unlimited displacement overnight. So I would be cautious about expecting a dramatic breakthrough from the visit itself. There may be new language, some incremental agreements, and stronger political backing for the broader Russia–China energy corridor. But the short-term upside (until at least 2030) remains bounded by infrastructure. That is also why our earlier analysis with Anne-Sophie Corbeau and Erica Downs still holds (https://lnkd.in/dh-C2KN4). The political meaning of Power of Siberia 2 has long exceeded its immediate commercial reality. What is really changing: China is becoming even more central as the destination of last resort for Russian oil and gas. Structural takeaway: сrises increase the strategic value of Russian energy for China faster than Russia can increase physical supply. It does not remove Beijing’s leverage over price, timing, or terms.

Next week I’ll be joining a CHARGE webinar on how geopolitical volatility is reshaping energy markets - and the conditions under which energy transitions now unfold. The discussion will go well beyond headlines: from energy as an instrument of conflict to the growing tension between resilience and efficiency, and the widening gap between policy ambition and market reality. My own focus will be on the structural shifts now emerging in global supply chains, pricing mechanisms, and the wider architecture of energy security. Hope to see you there! 📅 May 12, 2026 | 9–10 AM PDT  🔗 https://lnkd.in/d3xQU-3Y

The implications of the #Iran 🇮🇷 War and the closure of the strait of #Hormuz extend far beyond short term volatility. This crisis is beginning to reshape the trajectory of the global #energytransition, decisively shifting the narrative from climate driven policy to one increasingly centered on security, resilience and diversification. In this context, new winners are emerging: from the United States🇺🇸 positioning itself as a reliable alternative supplier, to Russia🇷🇺 benefiting from higher prices and renewed demand. To unpack how this conflict is redefining global energy markets, altering investment priorities and potentially accelerating or delaying the evolution of the energy transition, I spoke to: Tatiana Mitrova – Research Fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy Who suggests that the US #oilandgas industry is a winner, but suspects that the US economy will probably feel the burn of higher energy prices. Whereas she expects that #Russia will only experience a shorterm windfall because of certain structural challenges. 🎥 Watch the full interview in the link below ⬇️ ⬇️ https://lnkd.in/dd2gtbKa

Today, we hosted our webinar “Strait of Hormuz: Part II – What’s Changing in Global Energy Flows and Market Stability”, with BDI - Bundesverband der Deutschen Industrie e.V. bringing together leading experts from policy, energy markets and economics. The discussion - moderated by Carsten Rolle - highlighted how the ongoing disruption in the Strait of Hormuz is reshaping global energy markets, security considerations, and Europe’s economic outlook.   🎓 Geopolitics & Energy Transition Andreas C. Goldthau emphasised that we are not close to a resolution. He outlined several scenarios, with a prolonged conflict appearing increasingly likely. In that case, supply disruptions would persist and the Gulf would no longer function as a reliable global energy hub. Goldthau cautioned that Europe is still underestimating the effects of a long‑lasting crisis on energy markets and stressed the need to better align energy transition and industrial policy with geopolitical risk management.   🛢 Oil Markets & Strategic Reserves Toril Bosoni explained that oil markets are currently pricing in scarcity under conditions of limited transparency. Infrastructure damage in the region will take time to repair, and Europe remains particularly exposed, including in jet fuel supply, where imports from alternative sources have already increased. Strategic oil stocks provide important buffers, but their role is limited in a prolonged crisis – underscoring the importance of temporary and targeted policy measures.   🔥 Gas & LNG Markets Tatiana Mitrova highlighted that even if shipping through Hormuz resumed quickly, LNG flows would take months to normalise. Europe is under physical stress but not facing an immediate breakdown. Prices remain high but manageable for now. However, securing gas for next winter will be difficult and expensive. The message was clear: Europe will need gas from every available source, and industries should prepare for a very challenging remainder of the year.   📊 Macroeconomic Impact Felix Huefner, CFA outlined the macroeconomic consequences of sustained high energy prices. Higher oil and gas prices are weighing on growth and pushing inflation higher, with Germany particularly affected. Energy‑intensive industries are already under strain, while parts of the services sector are also beginning to feel the impact. At the same time, he noted that Europe entered this crisis from a relatively robust position: unemployment rates remain low across Europe, and Germany in particular benefits from a sizeable special investment fund for infrastructure and defence, which could help cushion the economic fallout.   🔑 Key takeaway: Temporary, targeted measures and a faster energy transition remain crucial to reduce Europe’s vulnerability to future energy shocks.   🙏 Many thanks to all speakers for their vauable insights. For more information and a recording of the webinar, please visit the following link: https://lnkd.in/d7XvwpwZ

The #UAE exit is a first sign of Hhow the #GulfCrisis will reorganize the #OilMarket On the surface, the UAE’s exit looks like a dispute over quotas. But in reality it points to something deeper: the Gulf crisis is beginning to change the institutional architecture of the oil market. For years, Abu Dhabi tolerated the contradiction between rising production capacity and collective quota discipline. It invested heavily in expanding output potential, while remaining bound by a system that limited its ability to monetize those investments. That contradiction had been building for a long time: 3.4 mbd production versus ~5mbd capacity is painful... But Hormuz changed the context in which that contradiction operates. OPEC was built for a world in which spare capacity could be coordinated, transported, and monetized through a relatively stable regional order. The Gulf crisis has broken that assumption. This is why the UAE move matters. With Hormuz still constrained, this is not yet an immediate barrel shock. The UAE cannot simply convert institutional exit into a large surge of exports tomorrow: it is locked in the Gulf and Habshan-Fujairah is already operating at full capacity. So in the short term, this is more signal than supply. But under stress, systems often adapt institutionally before they adapt physically. What we are seeing is not simply one producer “outgrowing” OPEC. We are seeing one of the region’s most ambitious and technically prepared producers adjusting to a world in which capacity alone is no longer enough. What matters now is whether that capacity can actually be shipped, insured, protected, and aligned with a national strategy under conditions of prolonged insecurity. That changes the logic of coordination. When logistics fragment and export optionality becomes uneven, quota discipline stops looking like shared optimization and starts looking like asymmetric constraint. A producer that has invested in flexibility and expansion becomes less willing to subordinate itself to a collective mechanism designed for a more stable market architecture. In that sense, the UAE’s exit is also part of the system’s adaptation to stress. Not because it solves the Gulf crisis, but because it reflects a deeper shift already underway: away from an oil market organized around relatively stable regional order, and toward one in which security, logistics, and strategic autonomy play a much larger role in shaping producer behavior. Of course, OPEC is not disappearing. But the assumptions that once made its discipline more workable are weakening. Structural takeaway: the UAE did not leave OPEC simply because it wanted more freedom. It left because the Hormuz crisis is exposing a deeper reality: when the regional order that underpinned spare-capacity coordination starts to break down, the architecture of the oil market begins to change with it. Kruthika A. Bala FEI Ashutosh Shastri Balakrishnan

🎞️ Event recording- Profiting from Chaos? Russia’s Energy Windfall from a Fragmented Middle East. How is the conflict in the Middle East reshaping energy markets, driving Russia’s gains, and undermining the impact of Western sanctions? Watch the recording of our last week's event featuring: 🔹 Grégoire Roos (Director, Chatham House Europe Programme and Chatham House Russia and Eurasia Programme) 🔹 Timothy Ash (Associate Fellow, Chatham House Russia and Eurasia Programme) 🔹 Dr Vladislav Inozemtsev (Associate Fellow, Chatham House Russia and Eurasia Programme) 🔹 Tatiana Mitrova (Global Fellow, Columbia Center on Global Energy Policy; Founder & Director, NEAH: New Energy Advancement Hub) 🔹 Elina Ribakova (Director of the International Affairs Program and Vice President for foreign policy, Kyiv School of Economics; Non-resident Fellow, Bruegel; Non-resident Senior Fellow, Peterson Institute for International Economics) Full event recording can be found here: https://lnkd.in/eQjzU_mK