Francesco Sassi

➡️The Geopolitical Revelation: Unpacking Fragility in the World Energy Outlook 2025
🫴https://intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3558
➡️Kinshasa's Cobalt Coup: DRC Links Critical Mineral Access to Power and Peace in a High-Stakes Bargain
🫴https://intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3424

To explore the geopolitics of the energy transition

The announcement comes also only a few days after the end of #COP30 in🇧🇷Brazil, where parties agreed to a commitment to triple adaptation finance by 2035.
Curiously, in February 2025 Equinor scaled back its ambitions in renewables, returning to focus on the Oil & Gas business.

reserves to exploit and export to the EU market, sensibly shaken by the implications of energy geopolitics in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the destabilisation of the Middle East, but also the politicisation of energy trade by the Trump Administration.

old and new areas are up for business in a fight against "decline on a mature shelf calls for one of the largest industrial plans Norway has ever seen." The country's largest oil and gas player feels the responsibility, and the business opportunity altogether, of finding new

during an annual conference in Oslo, where the company welcomed new investments in exploration and appraisal wells for 2026, most of them located in the North Sea, by far the most explored and developed region by the country's hydrocarbon industry.
The company's management says

The🇳🇴Norwegian state-owned giant Equinor is on the chase of new oil and gas deposits in the North Sea and it is ready to invest over $60 billion until the middle of the next decade to slow down the decline of hydrocarbon reserves.
The announcement came from the same company

🇳🇴Norway's Equinor goes big on Oil & Gas: $60B+ investment announced to secure vital North Sea supply for🇪🇺🇬🇧Europe

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➡️Zelensky's Dilemma: How the 28-Point US Peace Plan Reconfigures Europe's Energy Security Architecture
🫴https://intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3599
➡️US-Qatar Alliance Puts the EU on Notice: CSDDD Threatens Global LNG Supply and Energy Security
🫴https://intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3444

The only certainty seems we won't go back to an era where the globalisation of gas trade meant a depoliticisation of the market.
Instead, where you source your gas and who's your reference market for exports are equally based on price incentives and political allegiances.

Yet, nobody knows how soon the peace agreement could come, what will happen to the European and Ukrainian winters and energy systems while Russian troops continue to advance in Ukraine and the Kremlin could have a thousand motives to reject negotiating a ceasefire or peace.

Moreover, the belief is that the EU, Ukraine, Russia and the United States have never been closer to concluding a peace agreement. Somebody is even thinking this could bring back Russian gas volumes to the European market, putting an additional downward pressure on prices.

🇺🇸US LNG supplies in the Atlantic Ocean and the coming of the supply glut that many anticipated for years is making physical and virtual actors in the gas market believe instability is gone and from now on we will only experience diminishing prices and no disruption.

🇪🇺EU 79,1% vs 88,24%
🇫🇷France 88,64% vs 84,25%
🇩🇪Germany 71,15% vs 92,84%❗️
🇮🇹Italy 89.97% vs 93,15%
🇳🇱Netherlands 68,91% vs 77,2%

On the other hand, the TTF benchmark price in Europe has counterintuitively descended below the €30/MWh threshold this morning.

during this week, to feel an Arctic burst, keeping gas consumption at a high level, with the consequent usage of storages.
On one hand, the comparison with last year storage level on Nov 22 would raise some alarms as in fact this year's average is close to 9% lower than in 2024:

Last week, gas consumption in Europe experienced a dramatic increase compared to the week before and the use of gas stored during the summer became the largest source to balance the system, with temperatures well below the seasonal average.
Continental Europe will continue, also

Years passed since the first Russian gas curtailments to Europe, the immense disruption brought to the global gas market and historical price spikes. Still, as soon as cold weather descends on Europe the level of gas storage comes back as a crucial topic in energy geopolitics.

🚨🇪🇺EU gas storage levels fall below the 80% threshold and again become the most discussed thing in energy markets.
Yes, gas geopolitics is still the most relevant variable, even in a supply glut.

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A direct link to the article
intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3599

💡The 28-point🇺🇸U.S. peace plan forces Zelensky into a tough choice: accept concessions to🇷🇺Russia or risk losing key support. The plan aims to end the war and reconfigure🇪🇺Europe's energy architecture, boosting US influence over🇺🇦Ukraine

Free to read
intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3599

Climate Summit Proposal Omits Plan for Exiting Fossil Fuels The COP30 climate talks are set to run into overtime after a draft deal proposed by host nation Brazil caused widespread anger across the world for omitting any reference to winding down the use fossi...

The COP30 climate talks are set to run into overtime after a draft deal proposed by host nation Brazil caused widespread anger across the world for omitting any reference to winding down the use fossil fuels.
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

A direct link to the analysis
intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3593

🚨Trump granted🇭🇺Hungary an exemption from🇷🇺Russian oil sanctions while supporting🇺🇸U.S. energy interests.
This U.S. "Quadrangular Energy Alliance Politics" protects Orbán, rewards Russia and creates an energy wedge against the🇪🇺EU

Read the analysis
intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3593

To explore the futuro of energy geopolitics
➡️Nuclear, Data Centers, and Renewables: All Political Headaches of the New French PM Lecornu
🫴https://intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3218
➡️The Geopolitical Revelation: Unpacking Fragility in the World Energy Outlook 2025
intelligence.eklipx.io/article/3558

powered to avoid possible blackouts when demand spikes. Though, more than AI and mining facilities, the island is also hosting an Australian military base with drones and other uncrewed weapons systems used to track the movements of Chinese submarines in the area.

with the Middle East witnessing different cases of physical disruptions of undersea cables used for energy and telecommunications over the last two years.
This is also a reason why Google wants to invest in renewables on Christmas Island, letting other infrastructures be

Things are though set to change fast as Google wants to build a small-size data centres on the island and an additional one on the🇲🇻Maldives, linking them with undersea power cables that would stretch from🇴🇲Oman on the bottom of the Gulf of Oman and Indian Ocean called Dhivaru,

🇦🇺Australia, is powered through diesel imports and renewables, generating enough power to sustain local industrial activities such as the Christmas Island Phosphates, mining and processing rock phosphate since 1990 and the project vies with Google for being the largest employer.

In the🇨🇽Christmas Island, energy geopolitics and AI geopolitics meet in an unprecedented way.
Google just announced the construction of a new data centre the company will build on the island, where it is also the most important employer.
The island, which formally belongs to

🚨The New Front Line: Google's AI Data Center Puts🇨🇽Christmas Island at the Nexus of Energy and Military Geopolitics

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