The race to keep the lights on as winter looms
Governments across Europe are scrambling to cushion citizens from soaring energy prices. Pressure has been mounting for joint action beyond a voluntary 15% cut in consumption agreed in July, and the EU was due to hold an emergency summit this week to discuss measures including a blocwide price cap.
European gas prices – which have risen by nearly 400% over the past year owing to lower gas flows from Russia – soared this week after Moscow shut down a key pipeline to Europe. Russia claimed it had discovered a fault during maintenance of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany. European leaders accused Moscow of weaponising energy supplies around the invasion of Ukraine.
The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, said the bloc was working on “an emergency intervention and a structural reform of [Europe’s] electricity market”, whose limitations are being cruelly exposed.
Options include an emergency bloc-wide price cap, and a decoupling of electricity and
