Good morning. Welcome to Axios today. It's Tuesday, January 25th. I'm Nyla Boudou. Here's how we're making you smarter today.

Understanding yesterday's stock market boomerang. Plus, making babies in outer space.

But first, today's one big thing. Russia's energy leverage over Europe.

The US has worn Russia of crippling sanctions if they invade Ukraine.

But as Europe's main natural gas suppliers, it might be hard to get Europe to support that.

Because Russia provides almost 40% of its natural gas supply.

Axios Energy Reporter Ben Geeman has been reporting on how Europe's energy reliance is a crucial shield for Vladimir Putin.

Hey Ben.

Hi. Thanks for having me back on.

Ben, 40% reliance on Russia for natural gas for Europe. Seen significant. Can you put that in context for us?

Yes. So the situation in Europe vis-a-vis energy and natural gas in particular was already very fragile and difficult for the Europeans, even before this crisis with the Ukraine.

So last year, for a whole variety of reasons, we saw these record natural gas prices in Europe.

So the reasons range from weather to demand bouncing back from the pandemic to Russia already having lower supplies.

And for all those reasons, Europe has already been feeling a lot of economic pain.

So this is a really fraught time from an energy standpoint for Europe.

And that is one reason why gaining unity on how to respond to this Russian aggression is going to be very difficult given the tough position that the Europeans are in.

Because approximately 40% of Europe's natural gas does come from Russia, which is just a gigantic mega supplier.

And how did Europe become so reliant on Russian energy? Why haven't they been able to diversify?

So to some extent they have, right? So Europe has significantly increased its use of renewable electricity and Europe has also been increasingly to some extent importing natural gas from other countries including from the United States,

which has emerged as a significant supplier of liquefied natural gas exports.

But look, I mean, Russia and the US and a few other countries are just the kind of big gas heavyweights.

So despite efforts to diversify Europe is still quite reliant.

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