Britain Surrenders Energy Sovereignty
by
Michael C. Ruppert
March 15, 2006 0900 PST (FTW) - ASHLAND -The first time I was asked whether I thought that Britain would join the European Union and surrender the pound was after a lecture in Amsterdam in 2002. I was as certain then as I am now that Britain’s fate was sealed and that it would be sealed by energy issues. I have consistently maintained that position in lectures and videos ever since. A point of no return has been crossed as, last week, the United Kingdom let it be known that it would no longer negotiate for natural gas (and oil) as a sovereign state but as a member of the European Union.
Last May, short-sighted European nationalists cheered as France and Holland rejected the EU constitution, believing they had killed it. Yet Britain’s Telegraph told us on July 17, 2005, “You may have got the impression that the European constitution was dead - that the French had felled it, and the Dutch had pounded a stake through its heart. If so, think again. The constitution is being implemented, clause by clause, as if the No votes had not happened.”
We may be seeing the same scenario play out with the Dubai Ports deal as well. (We’ll address that in a separate article.)
Energy is the primary reason why the EU is looking a little like Dracula. As the below Times of London article notes:
At present Europe has to import about half of its energy but that is due to rise to 70 per cent in the next few decades. On current trends, by 2030 more than 80 per cent of Europe's gas will come from three countries - Russia, Algeria and Norway.
Norway, well on the way to implementing plans for post-Peak sustainability, cannot meet Britain’s needs. Algeria (with much smaller reserves than Russia) is too far away and there are no pipelines. LNG terminals, tankers and ports are not in existence. Any help from Algeria is a long way off with many capital pitfalls. The UK must buy gas from Russia to stay alive.
FTW has not forgotten how Russia rattled Europe with a one-day interruption of gas supplies through the Ukraine a few months ago. Britain obviously hasn’t either. This is no longer about “he who has the gold makes the rules”. This is about “he who possesses the energy.” Money represents the ability to do work and energy is the ability to do work. One is a symbol. The other is reality.
Energy, especially electricity and heating, is the ability to run government offices, parliament, police stations, banking institutions, and traffic lights. It is primary requirement for any society to function. To surrender, even partially, control over energy to another sovereign, is to gut the power of the state. Now that this has happened, Britain’s ultimate entry into the EU is a fait accompli. While Peak Oil and Gas will inevitably dictate the end of globalization, in this clash of new versus old paradigms, it is actually being accelerated over the short-term in Europe.
Because Britain’s North Sea fields are in dramatic decline and Britain has (as I and many others have predicted) become a net natural gas importer, it has no other choices. Britain is at the end of an energy supply train that starts in Russia. That gas must pass through the Ukraine or Baltic States, Poland, Germany, and the Low Countries (or France) to get to England. So the choice for Britain is either to negotiate on its own in competition with Europe or to derive the benefit of the purchasing power and allocation system of a huge trans-national economy. Rising natural gas prices are hobbling many economies even as the real shocks are yet to come. Britain has no other cards to play.
Britain cannot negotiate or compete with both Europe and Russia at the same time.
Geography is proving to be one of the ultimate trump cards in the deck. Geographic regional alliances are clearly an irreversible trend as we start the down slope of oil and gas production. What this augurs for China and Japan, or India and China, or South America, or Micronesia remains to be seen. Not all surrenders of sovereignty will be as polite, peaceful or as unheralded as this one. You can be sure of that.
"Reprinted with permission, Michael C. Ruppert and From The Wilderness Publications, www.fromthewilderness.com, P.O. Box 6061-350, Sherman Oaks, CA, 91413. 818-788-8791. FTW is published monthly, annual subscriptions are $50 per year."
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