Energy security

What does it mean?

4th July 2011
Petra Kuchynkova
 Energy security
Different definitions
5 Ss: supply (having resources, such as fossil
fuels, alternative energy and renewable energy);
sufficiency (adequate quantity of fuel and
services from these sources); surety (having
access to them); survivability (resilient and
durable sources of energy in the face of
disruption or damage); sustainability (reducing
waste and limiting damage to the environment)
4 As: availability, accessibility, affordability,
acceptability
 Energy security - definitons
European Commission: Uninterrupted physical availability
of energy products on the market at an affordable price
for all consumers.
International Energy Agency: Adequate, affordable and
reliable access to energy fuels and services, it includes
availability of resources, decreasing dependence on
imports, decreasing pressures on the environment,
competition and market efficiency, reliance on
indigenous resources that are environmentally clean,
and energy services that are affordable and equitably
shared
World Bank: Access to secure supplies of fuel, a
competitive market that distributes those fuels, stability
of resource flows and transit points, and efficiency of end
use
D.Yergin: Reliable and affordable access to energy
supplies, diversification, integration into energy markets,
and the provision of information
 Energy security - definiton
Usually 3 components are included:
Reliability
Affordability
Environmental friendliness
Different perspectives of the consumer,
supplier and transit country
 Energy security
Perspective of the consumer
How to achieve energy security?
Diversity of energy resources
Diversity of suppliers
Storage of energy and strategic petroleum
reserves
Redundant energy infrastructure
Flexibility to shift fuels
 Energy security
Producers and resource exporters
Economic characteristics danger of Dutch
Disease?
Political regimes especially major oil exporters
display a strong common tendency to be
governed by non-democratic regimes (rentier
effect, repression effect, modernization
effect)
Stability of regimes
Middle East X states of former Soviet Union
 Energy security
Producersperspective
Energy and foreign policy
Resource nationalism
Possibility to use oil or gas weapons?
Different characteristics of oil and gas markets
and trade
Gas dependence or interdependece between
the exporter and the consumer?
Energy weapon or commercial considerations?
 Energy security oil and gas
Role of transit states
Could they use energy weapon?
Direct linkages (e.g. Kazakhstan-China
pipeline) X big international projects
(Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan, Nabucco?)
Landlocked states-producers: rise of the
importance of that phenomenon after
USSR disintegration
Role of transit states: Georgia, Turkey
 Energy resources conflict
potential
Energy potential both for interstate conflict and
cooperation
Border-delimitation conflicts
Border hotspots: Iran-Qatar (South Pars field);
Spratly Islands in the South China Sea (China X
Vietnam); East China Sea (China X Japan)
Peace potential of pipelines?
Potential conflict areas?
Arctic Circle
Caspian Sea
 Energy security vulnerability of
transport routes

Vulnerable energy transport chokepoints

Strait of Hormuz
Strait of Malacca
Bosporus Strait
Terrorism and vulnerability of energy
infrastructure
 Energy security - Nuclear energy
Rising popularity during periods of rising prices
of oil (after 1970s oil crisis etc.) X Three Mile
Island, Chernobyl, Fukushima
Electricity production (cca 16 % of world
production) X Cannot replace oil in transport
(potentially production of hydrogen)
Low emissions of climate-altering gases
Advocates and opponents among the EU
member states
X
Proliferation of nuclear weapons (commercial
fuel-making facility = latent nuclear bomb
factory?; opportunities for terrorists)
 Nuclear energy
Factors of
Price (more expensive than other
conventional sources of electricity
Safety and environmental concerns
(difficulties in disposing of nuclear waste)
Weapons proliferation concerns (Iran UN
Security Council sanctions)
Nuclear reactors as objects of terrorist
attacks
 Energy security and climate
changes
Worlds continuing dependece on fossil fuels
Climate change no longer considered only an
issue relating to quality of life and the
environment, but also directly affecting human
and global security (2007 UN Security Council
climate change as an international security
threat)
Energy consumption patterns and policies have
become international security issue
of of worlds CO2 emissions produced by
burning fossil fuels (rest deforestation etc.), oil,
coal X natural gas
Events like Hurricane Katrina in the USA
 Energy and climate changes
1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
(Earth Summit) in Rio universal membership X no
concrete government commitments for limiting emissions
1997 Kyoto Protocol 38 industrialized nations agreed
to cut emissions of 6 greenhouse gases to an average of
5.2% below 1990 levels by 2008-12 X only partially
applies to economies in transition and developing
countries (China, India) are not obliged
2007 China overtook USA in greenhouse gases
emissions
System of emissions trading using market mechanisms to
reduce greenhouse gas emissions (inspiration with U.S.
emissions-trading program for SO2
2005 EU emissions-trading system x effectivity in
reducing emissions in EU
Kyoto only a symbol for the public? Lack od effective
legal and enforcement framework
 Energy and climate changes
Post-Kyoto
2007 Bali road map document adopted
framework for the negociations about
the new treaty X no fundamentaly new
framework or binding emissions
reductions
Unanimous endorsement (incl. USA, EU,
China, India)
X failure of Copenhagen conference in 2009
(attempt to adopt framework replacing
Kyoto)
 Energy and climate changes
The future rather the consensus of top emitters than wide
encompassing agreement?
Biofules? (Danger of deforestation)
Climate change policy requires current populations to
make material sacrifices to avert danger to future
generations (Brenda Shaffer)
Ethical problem of emissions-trade mechanisms
Responsibility of developing countries, access to new
technologies
Addressing climate changes create a significant challenge
to the sovereignty of the state in international system
state security can become dependent on the actions of
other states; demands to radically change organization
of stateseconomies and lifestyles
Actors of energy security in Eurasia
- Russia
Worlds largest natural gas reserves
Second-largest coal reserves
Eighth-largest proven oil reserves
Major producer of nuclear energy (export of
technologies, reactors, fuel, waste processing and
storage)
Revenues from energy export are largest source of
foreign earnings
More diversified economy than most of the worlds major
energy producers (Persian Gulf states)
20 25 % of Russias GDP from oil and gas, revenues
from this sector cca 37% of state budget (before
financial crisis)
 Russia geopolitical dimension of
energy security
Close to two major energy markets (EU, China)
At the same time in a sense a landlocked state most of
the ports are not operational for the whole year for
weather conditions (Novorossiysk on Black Sea +
Bosporus Strait)
Important feature of foreign energy policy: to reduce
dependency on exports through transit states
Energy Policy Strategy until 2020 (from 2003) Russia
sees energy resources as a strategic resource for
economic development and as a geopolitical tool
Russias export infrastructure must be sufficiently
diversified to allow exports to all directions
X Limited sea access for oil export and relying on gas
pipelines
Dependece on transit states
 Europe
Role of energy in the process of European
integration
Energy resources
1% of worlds proven oil reserves
2% of worlds proven natural gas reserves
4% of the worlds proven coal reserves
By 2020 2/3 of European energy consumption is
expected to be imported X EU is the 2nd largest
consumer of energy in the world
 EU
TPEC Electricity mix
42% oil 31% nuclear
24% natural gas 30% coal
14% nuclear energy 20% natural gas
13% coal 4% oil
6% renewables Member states split on
Portion of natural gas in the issue of nuclear
TPEC rose rapidly energy
over last 3 decades
 Future challenges
Rising role of China as a world economy
and energy consumer
Changes in the world gas market
GECF
Shale gas extraction
Influence of LNG and spot market on gas
prices and long-term contracts
 Sources
Sovacool (2011): The Routledge
Handbook of Energy Security. Routledge.
Shaffer, B. (2009): Energy Politics.
University of Pennsylvania Press