Europe relies on Russian energy. (The picture shows the natural gas pipeline in the middle section of the Sino-Russian East Line) Picture: Retrieved from Xinhuanet (file photo)
Europe has long relied on Russian energy. According to Newsweek, the European Union has paid Russia $16 billion (regarding 453 billion Taiwan dollars) in fossil fuel imports since the start of the Russian-Ukrainian war.
The report pointed out that according to the European Commission data, in 2019, 41.1% of the natural gas imported by Europe came from Russia, 46.7% of solid fuel and 26.9% of crude oil. Before the war, the EU was expected to spend more than $1.1 billion a day on energy imports from Russia.
According to Lauri Myllvirta, chief analyst at the Centre for Energy and Clean Air Research (CREA), natural gas has the highest proportion of imports, followed by oil and coal. While shipments of oil and coal both fell following the war, natural gas continued to rise.
According to the latest statistics from CREA, since the start of the war between Russia and Ukraine, the EU has paid Russia 16 billion US dollars in fossil fuel imports. Among them, oil accounted for more than 5 million US dollars, natural gas accounted for regarding 9.5 million US dollars, and coal accounted for more than 385 million US dollars. CREA is currently tracking how much money is flowing into Russia from the EU.
In order to reduce the EU’s energy dependence on Russia, the EU recently announced that by the end of 2022, the amount of natural gas imported from Russia will be reduced by two-thirds, and it hopes to be completely independent of Russian fossil fuels by 2030.