Miguel Arias Cañete, the European Union’s leading energy representative, addressed the Atlantic Council Tuesday. Photo by Shelbie Bostedt/MNS
WASHINGTON — The European Union needs to cut its dependence on Russian oil and streamline its climate change policies, the EU’s energy chief said Tuesday.
Climate and Energy Commissioner Miguel Arias Cañete is spearheading the establishment of a European Energy Union to increase Europe’s negotiating powers with Russia. Russia exports more than 4 million barrels of oil per day to the EU.
“To be secure, we must first be united,” Cañete said at the Atlantic Council in Washington. “We import [from Russia] one-third of what we use … The Ukraine crisis has showed how vulnerable this dependence makes us.”
Plans for the creation of an energy union are to be presented by the end of February.
President Barack Obama encouraged officials from the EU to reduce dependence on Russian oil further in member countries, even before economic sanctions were levied against Russia early last year in response to the conflict in Ukraine.
Cañete, a Spaniard, stressed the importance of transatlantic cooperation in establishing energy goals for the future and freeing the EU from Russian oil dependence, including finding the most practical combination of renewable and non-renewable energy sources.
“We must diversify our supply,” Cañete said of creating a more open global energy economy. “It is crucial that we have competitive, secure and sustainable supplies.”
The United States is the largest oil and natural gas producer in the world.
Cañete also spoke about the EU climate plan, calling for increasing the proportion of energy consumption from clean energy resources to 20 percent by 2020 and encouraging its allies to do the same. U.S. renewable energy use accounted for only 12.9 percent of its energy consumption in 2013, though Obama’s Climate Action Plan committed to doubling that amount by 2020.
“Today, we stand together on climate,” Cañete said of the relationship between America and the EU. “We need to promote common standards for the energy sector and promote our approach globally.”
Cañete hopes for a formal energy standards agreement with the U.S. ahead of the 2015 Paris climate conference to develop a new international climate change plan.
