Welcome to the European Parliamentary Research Service podcast.

In this podcast, we'll talk about the EU's efforts to strengthen energy security

in view of existing challenges and concerns,

especially regarding our current dependence on Russia for gas and oil.

Want to know more? Stay with us. As Russia begun to cut off European

countries from gas supplies in June this year, fresh urgency was injected into the EU's

efforts to cut dependency from Russia and strengthen its own energy security.

The problem is that we in Europe are still critically dependent on imports. In 2020, these

covered well over half of our energy needs and the figure rises to 97% for oil and 84%

for natural gas.

But dependency makes us vulnerable.

Indeed.

The post-COVID recovery pushed energy prices up in 2021, and they've shot up even further this year

as a consequence of Russia's war on Ukraine and Putin shutting the gas tap on some EU countries and reducing

supply in retaliation for EU sanctions. This has exposed our dependence on unreliable third

countries to meet the EU's energy needs, prompting the Commission to take drastic measures

as part of its repower EU plan.

Here's the Commission's Vice President Franz Timmermans.

By the end of this year, we can replace 100 BCM of gas imports from Russia.

That is, two-thirds of what we import from them.

This will end our over-dependency and give us much-needed room to manoeuvre.

It's hard, bloody hard, but it's possible.

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