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Why don’t NATO countries like the US and Norway give Italy a hand on gas? Scaroni’s (formerly Eni) analysis

Why don't NATO countries like the US and Norway give Italy a hand on gas? Scaroni's (formerly Eni) analysis

What should Italy do on gas price increases? “Working to intervene on the Norwegian gas price. And ask the United States for a hand at NATO level to prevent Europe from being the only continent to pay the price for the sacrosanct defense of Ukraine ", according to Paolo Scaroni, former Eni number one, who on Russia, price cap , Germany and beyond says that …

We publish some statements by Paolo Scaroni, former CEO of the Eni group, taken from an interview with the newspaper Il Foglio; here the full version )

WHAT NATO HAD TO DO

“We were wrong, in NATO, not to build a pact, with all NATO countries, aimed at achieving a specific purpose. Together, we give Ukraine a hand to defend itself, as it should be, but no NATO country should get rich in this situation ”.

THE ROLE OF THE USA AND NORWAY

"I think of countries that have benefited from the increase in gas prices, including on LNG, such as the United States and Canada, but above all I think and I would say first of all to Norway, which exports 120 billion cubic meters of gas every year. , in Europe, and which today, while we suffer from the bills, collects six times more than what they collected a year ago ".

THE FAULTS OF EUROPE

It is the market. "No: it is not far-sightedness". Whose? “Of the European political class that has chosen not to do what it should have done: not deal with the price cap later, but deal with the price cap first, before the problem, linking support to the sanctions package to support our economies. Does it seem normal to you? It seems wrong to me not to have said, at NATO, look: we give all possible support to Ukraine, but first you also tell us how evil and goods are divided ”.

TRUE ATLANTISM

“Being Atlantic means protecting the countries that are part of the Atlantic Pact. I do not think it is heresy to say that the protection must be double. Military protection. And the protection of our economies in times of war. Unless you want to consider the protection of national interests as a secondary side of the defense of democracy ”.

PRICE CAP? BEAUTIFUL BUT IMPOSSIBLE

"It was supposed to be the European countries most exposed to deal with the problem, not Germany, which can solve some problems even on its own". “Now we're up to our necks in trouble. And I'm not sure that a possible price cap, among other things, is a solution that can change the cards on the table. Imagine: we say that liquid gas, for example, cannot be paid more than 100 euros per megawatt hour, then in Japan they offer 110. Do you think the market offers LNG to those who pay more or to those who pay less? ”. "The only cap that would make sense is on gas via pipeline, applied to those countries, such as Norway, such as Algeria, such as Azerbaijan, in theory also Libya, which unfortunately exports less and less, that gas does not they can only export it from us ".

THE ROLE OF RUSSIA FOR ITALY

"Russia, for Italy, for Europe, has long been what Texas has represented and represents today for the United States: a low-cost, easily accessible, easily connected supplier of energy and raw materials, and with this system Europe has found its own form of equilibrium. Russia supplied us with energy at low prices, which was what we needed, and Europe offered Russia what they needed, namely technology, innovation. Today we are facing an epochal transformation, which is a must, but I am not sure that we will be able to live, on an energetic level, as we have lived up to now. There will be structural changes in the coming years. Household consumption will change, and in order to pay lower bills they will have to reduce energy consumption. The geography of distribution of large energy-intensive companies will change, which is likely to go outside Europe if expensive energy, as I fear, remains with us for a long time. The structural cost of the energy we will have will also change, because for how much more gas we will be able to import and for how many more renewables we will be able to have, we will never be able to replace the 29 billion cubic meters of Russian gas with other gas. tube, and obviously we pretend not to remind ourselves that the gas that comes from countries like Azerbaijan arrives following political logic not alien to the Russian will. In short, what will happen seems obvious to me. We will import liquefied gas and the very high transformation costs of that liquefied gas will fall on the bills ".

FROM THE FRYING PAN TO THE BRACE?

“It will end, I fear, that the European consumer will pay the bill, electricity and gas, double or triple the American consumer. There would be alternatives, of course, but they are very expensive alternatives, even politically, if we consider that the only neighboring country that could one day supply us with the same quantities of gas that arrived from Russia until recently is Iran . And I said everything ". “You have to be pragmatic to solve problems and if the problems are hiding under the carpet we won't be able to solve them when they come back. I would advise against, for example, not to understand that the governance of Europe, as it is made, unfortunately does not work as it should, and in situations such as those of today, in which everything is dealt with slowly, without an overall vision, one cannot be amazed if states follow national ways of solving problems ”.

WHAT ITALY CAN DO

“Objective number one: to work like crazy to intervene on the Norwegian gas price. And ask the United States for a hand at NATO level to prevent Europe from being the only continent to pay the price for Ukraine's sacrosanct defense ”.


This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/perche-paesi-nato-come-usa-e-norvegia-non-danno-una-mano-allitalia-sul-gas-lanalisi-di-scaroni-ex-eni/ on Sun, 02 Oct 2022 09:00:31 +0000.