On the 21st of October the Activities Committee of the Jason Institute organized a lecture in The Hague about the geopolitics of Nord Stream 2. We discussed the impact of Nord Stream 2 on the relationship between the EU, Russia and the United States and how energy can be used as a geopolitical weapon.
For this we were delighted to welcome two experts who shared their views on the topic with us: Can Ögütcu and Irina Patrahau. Mr. Ögütcu is the lead analyst for energy security at NATO SHAPE and has an extensive background working for international organizations and in the private sector on energy. Ms. Patrahau is a strategic analyst at the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies (HCSS) where she specialized on the energy relations. Her previous research projects included European dependency on Russian natural gas and European depend on Chinese critical raw materials.
A central point of debate was the emerging dependency of Europe on Russia. This can be seen by the current explosion of gas prices. Both speakers saw this as a potential problem but Mr. Ögütcu also stressed the double dependency as Russia needs the EU as a market for the gas it produces. Despite current debates in Germany both Ms. Patrahau and Mr. Ögütcu believe that Nord Stream will become operable soon, partly due to the high manufacturing costs of the pipeline. We are looking forward to seeing how events regarding Nord Stream 2 unfold since this topic is still highly topical and our two guests made sure to emphasize that all we can do currently is to speculate.
We would like to thank Mr. Ögütcu and Ms. Patrahau for taking their time and sharing their expertise on the matter and Isabel Schulze Froning from the Jason Institute for hosting this event. Lastly, we want to thank our audience – in the Hague and online – for participating in this event. Unfortunately however, this event was not recorded.