The energy geopolitical risk premium has returned. Russia is surrounding vital Ukrainian cities and launching “devastating grid attacks.” Ukraine has terminated Russian gas into Europe causing European power prices to skyrocket. Further strain exemplified by European trading firm Guvnor mothballing its 75,000 b/d Rotterdam refinery over high operational costs; lifting oil prices. We also discovered the energy transition-concept is flawed and dangerous, emphasizing the world’s increasing need for fossil fuels.
However, the “absolutely sh-t situation,” according to Norway’s energy minister, Terje Aasland is the European grid. Critics of exporting electricity between countries were ignored – in this case – Norway to the UK, Germany, Denmark and others more concerned about climate change than reliable electricity, affordable power prices, and economic growth. The health and stability of European and Western power grids are being forcibly strained by disastrous net-zero policies, leading to deindustrialization.
The UK’s economy contracted for the 4th quarter of 2024 along with Germany’s over unwise energy policies. The economic hardship caused by illogical, imposed climate change policies and a "manufactured consensus" is absurd—especially as "King Coall" thrives in China, India, and other nations, driving up global emissions.
Factor in the U.S. economy in “shambles” over monetary lies from the Biden administration, and affordable energy emerges as the critical hope for averting a recession—highlighting the essential role of energy in our lives.
Things are challenging for the incoming President, but don’t ever underestimate Germany’s ability to make things even worse with its “green delusions.” Germany is putting its plans to build new gas-fired power plants on hold as their wind energy production is collapsing. Known as Dunkelflaute this common occurrence is the latest wind drought providing more evidence of the foolishness of Germany’s $746 billion Energiewende, “which is Germany’s effort designed to force the country off hydrocarbons and onto alt-energy.” During each wind lull, the shortfall was made up by gas-fired generation.
Seemingly, Europe is disintegrating “over trace elements of human-caused CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere.” Meanwhile, these energy policies driven by global warming and climate change initiatives have failed to alter the reality that:
“Wood provided almost twice as much energy in 2023 as in either 1900 or 1800.”
But its data center growth where Trump will require every molecule of fossil fuel and uranium available. According to the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, “peak US electricity demand is projected to increase by 132 gigawatts (GW) over the next 10 years in the summer and 149 GW in the winter, a 15 percent and 18 percent increase, respectively.” This growth dwarfs the capacity of new reactors at Plant Vogtle in Georgia and more than the entire nuclear reactor fleet in the U.S., which is approximately 95 GW.
Goldman Sachs similarly “finds that US power demand, driven by AI, electrification, and industrial reshoring, will spike, with data centers projected to consume 8% by 2030, up from just 3% in 2022.” Notably, since 2022, “5-year load growth forecast has surged more than fivefold, from 23 GW to 128 GW,” according to Grid Strategies.
What these paramount realities haven’t considered is the grand energy bargain needed in Syria even more so than Ukraine. With Biden abandoning Afghanistan enabling the Taliban to “create a new terrorist super state,” and the emergence of a new Caliphate forming in Syria, this fostered little known Turkish gas ambitions by “allowing them to take advantage of the European natural gas crisis.”
With Syria at the forefront, Turkish troops now mass on the border for an invasion; and energy is possibly the best recourse against further Syrian destruction since no one is coming to stabilize Syria.
Then why did Syria collapse? Because a geopolitical-energy level drama unfolded when:
“An epic Pipelineistan saga – and one of the key reasons for the war on Syria, building the Qatar–Türkiye gas pipeline through Syrian territory to provide Europe with an alternative to Russian gas. Assad had rejected that project, after which Doha helped fund the Syrian war to depose him.”
Energy dominance is the key reason behind this collapse. Ankara stands to benefit from this pipeline and being one of “only two remaining routes for Russia gas (via Turkey and the Black Sea).” However, there is no evidence to suggest that Saudi Arabia and the UAE will tolerate Qatar's emerging geoeconomic influence if the pipeline is constructed.
Rather than deploying divisions of U.S. troops in the Middle East to protect geopolitical and energy influence, leverage the soft power of exported U.S. LNG for baseload electricity generation and industrial applications. Export U.S. nuclear power to counterbalance adversaries like Russia and China, and utilize the nation’s vast recoverable coal reserves—the largest in the world—to provide energy-starved regions like Africa and countries such as Egypt with the geoeconomic and energy leverage needed for growth and stability.
The incoming Trump administration has a unique opportunity to leverage the United States’ position as an energy superpower to address global challenges without resorting to military intervention. The days ahead are fraught with domestic and international geopolitical risk. Using energy to shape events as they unfold will have a lasting impact on all markets, most noticeably energy.
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