Russia-Ukraine war: Kremlin has turned up heat in its high-stakes energy war

Vladimir Putin lost his energy war this year.

The secondary target of his blitz on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure is the EU itself.

The damage deprives Europe of crucial electricity imports from Ukrainian plants.

Russia could cut oil output by 3 million barrels a day without damaging its own drilling infrastructure.

The effect is to shave Europe’s margin of energy security to wafer thin levels and to ratchet up the pain through 2023, pushing industries closer to the wall.

Putin bets he can break Europe before it breaks Russia.

Estonia was denied such support when its critical infrastructure was attacked.

China has been reselling its contract deliveries of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Europe to exploit the arbitrage spread.

This fluke reprieve has allowed Europe to fill gas storage to 96 per cent.

Some 24 BCM (billion cubic metres) kept flowing,” said Thierry Bros, France’s former head of energy security.

On Tuesday, the Kremlin started to cut off the remaining gas flows to southern Europe via Moldova.

JP Morgan says Russia could give us a nasty surprise by cutting oil output by 3 million barrels a day (3 per cent of world supply), which is physically possible without damaging its own drilling infrastructure.

Putin warned at the St Petersburg Economic Forum this year that European sanctions would have “catastrophic consequences on the global energy market”.

Can Europe last as long.

The democracies have not cracked yet but only 42 per cent of Italians and 49 per cent of Austrians now support sanctions against Russia.

Neither can guarantee energy security in a sustained crisis.