Requirements for fossil fuels (natural gas and crude oil) have risen over recent years. Besides their direct application to transport and domestic use, these primary energy sources are also needed in power stations to generate electricity, the demand for which rises in line with economic growth. Long-term users such as the United States, which swallows up 25 per cent of global oil imports, have now been joined by new macro-consumers including China, whose growth now siphons off 9 per cent of crude oil sales.⁽¹⁾

Responses to such requirements are mainly found to the east of Europe. They are divided between two regions: the Russian Federation, which has reserves estimated at 16.8 billion tonnes (bnt), and the area covering the Middle East and Central Asia with reserves estimated at 101.2 bnt. The same applies to gas, with 64.9 bnt (oil equivalent) in the Middle East and 52.5 bnt in the ex-USSR.⁽²⁾ Production and consumption sites differ and the fuels have to travel between the two. Transporting oil is relatively easy compared with gas which, in addition to pipelines, needs compression stations to maintain the pressure required for its transfer. In all cases, the infrastructure is at the mercy of geopolitical disruption and direct action. Everything must therefore be done to anticipate the risk of conflict before deciding on pipeline routing and then to implement appropriate security measures.

The European Union (EU) needs to ensure its strategic supply of fossil energy regardless of regional disputes. The rapid rise in requirement and the accelerating depletion of reserves is generating rivalry between consumer nations. Some countries do not hesitate to use their energy advantages as political weapons, as in 2006 when Russia put pressure on Georgia and Ukraine because their policies ran counter to the desires of Moscow. The EU is not shielded from such pressure, especially as Russia is continuing to develop alliances that resemble a kind of gas cartel. An agreement on exploration, extraction, transport, gas infrastructure development and export was signed between the Algerian company Sonatrach and the Russian company Gazprom in August 2006. This agreement led to nothing concrete, but others are likely.⁽³⁾ To limit the risk of coercion, there must be diversification in gas and oil suppliers to the EU.