Press

Wall Street Journal

The Modern Iron Curtain Is Made of Gas Pipelines

The prospect of shivering through another January without gas for heating fills many people in Eastern Europe with understandable horror. Yet, a fight is shaping up between Russia and Ukraine that could leave them without vital Russian gas supplies.

Asked this week whether he believed Moscow would again cut off gas to Ukraine and therefore to much of Europe this winter, Andris Piebalgs, the European energy commissioner, said he thought it a "realistic probability." Some 80% of Russian gas supplies to the European Union pass through Ukraine and gas to Ukraine can't be interrupted without also stopping flows further west.

But not everyone views this prospect with the same dread as East European householders. One suspects senior executives at some major European energy companies would be secretly delighted if Russia stopped gas deliveries. The reason: they could buy the gas far cheaper on the world market than they are buying it from Russia. Click here for more.