Opinion | US sanctions on Nord Stream 2 pipeline cloud Biden-EU honeymoon

Twelve years ago this month millions of Europeans huddled in their heat-less homes in the midst of a frigid winter after Russia shut off natural gas transmission supplies.

While the 2009 cut-off stemmed from a pipeline pricing dispute between Ukraine and Russia, which the EU was trying to arbitrate, it underscored just how far Russian President Vladimir Putin was willing to use the nation’s natural gas exports as a political weapon.

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The anniversary of that bleak crisis is particularly salient as EU countries and companies struggle for a policy response in the face of U.S. extra-territorial sanctions adopted in 2019 and enhanced in 2020 against any company that participates in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. The $11 billion, 3,100-kilometer project, a private venture led by Russian-state-owed gas monopoly Gazprom that will transport Russian gas under the Baltic Sea to Germany, will be an alternative to Russia gas exports to the EU that currently transit Ukraine.

With nearly 80 percent of the pipeline finished, leading European oil, logistic and insurance companies including the Dutch-based Shell, French utility Engie, Germany’s Wintershall, Austria’s OMV and others face hundreds of millions of euros in losses if the work is not completed. And by all accounts the U.S. sanctions, which include asset confiscation and access loss to U.S. financial markets if they continue to participate in the project, has put the pipeline work on hold.

As a result, many EU countries led by Germany have high hopes new U.S. President Joe Biden will reverse the U.S. Nord Stream 2 sanctions proposed by the Trump Administration and approved by the U.S. Congress. After all Biden has made it clear that restoring the transatlantic alliance will be an immediate task.

EU leaders have targeted a spring summit when Biden will travel to Brussels for a European Council meeting as a ceremonial relaunch of an alliance that has played a crucial role in bolstering global economic growth and democratic values over the last 75 years. .

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