Writing on the website of the Atlantic Council, Amin Mohseni-Cheraghlou, a macroeconomist at Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center and an assistant professor of economics at the American University in Washington, DC., argues that “Europe needs a new energy option that isn’t Russia. It should turn to North Africa.”
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent sanctions regimes have made one fact very clear: the world, particularly Europe, is heavily dependent on Russian crude oil and natural gas exports and will be for at least the next three to six decades, according to my analysis.
Russia accounts for 12.1 percent of crude oil production with a reserve-to-production (R/P) ratio of 27.6 years, while Europe is responsible for just 4 percent of global oil output and has a much smaller R/P ratio of 10.4 years . Additionally, Russia accounts for 17 percent of natural gas production with an R/P ratio of 58.6 years, while all of Europe is responsible for only 6 percent of global gas output, with an R/P ratio of just 14.5 years. Therefore, it is no surprise that 47 percent and 25 percent of Europe’s natural gas and oil imports, respectively, are sourced from Russia.
Europe’s energy security landscape will become direr in a decade. Its proven oil and gas reserves will be depleted in just 10.4 and 14.5 years, respectively, making the continent even more dependent on energy imports (Figures 1 and 2). The United States cannot provide much assistance in this regard as its R/P ratios for oil and natural gas are very similar to that of Europe. Canada could provide an oil lifeline for Europe. However, according to my calculations, this would require Canada to triple its production in the next decade—a highly unlikely task—leading to the depletion of its reserves in less than 30 years. Even then, Canada can only meet a portion of Europe’s oil demand and not its natural gas demand.
The combination of production rates and R/P ratios points to the fact that, for the foreseeable future, Europe will remain highly dependent on Russia for its crude oil and, most importantly, natural gas imports. However, Russia has proven to be an irresponsible and unreliable actor. The Persian Gulf region is also not completely reliable and the competition over its fossil energy resources, especially natural gas, is only going to increase as easily-accessible reserves deplete elsewhere in the world—such as in the United States, Canada, and China—and global demand continues to grow. This leaves Europe with one reliable strategy for its energy security in the long run: renewables.
As of 2020, renewables—hydropower and other renewables—constituted roughly 20 percent of Europe’s total energy consumption (Figure 3), an increase from 10 percent in 2005. This figure is slightly higher for European Union countries. By 2030, the EU plans to have 40 percent of its total energy consumption sourced from renewables and reduce the share of oil and coal in its energy mix. Although this is an ambitious target, fossil fuels would still account for half of the EU’s energy consumption a decade from now. When Europe and US reserves are about to be depleted, it leaves the EU highly vulnerable to Russia’s weaponization of oil and natural gas and the Persian Gulf’s relatively unstable political and security dynamics. Hence, Europe must get more aggressive and ambitious on increasing the share of renewables in the continent’s energy mix, which is also in sync with its 2050 net-zero greenhouse emission target. North Africa’s massive solar energy potential is a crucial component of this strategy.