The fourth and final session of the CEPA Forum – “Energy Security: Free Markets vs. Pipeline Politics” – was moderated by Ambassador Dr. Réka Szemerkényi, Executive Vice President of CEPA. During the panel, speakers considered the importance of energy diversification and the political nature in which energy supplies are currently and could be used to manipulate client countries. Sandra Oudkirk, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Bureau of Energy Resources of the United States, opened the panel by sharing the U.S. priority to strengthen transatlantic energy security as a vital pillar to the strength of the Alliance. Žygimantas Vaičiūnas, Minister of Energy of Lithuania, emphasized the significance that infrastructure can play in protecting countries from being vulnerable to one supply chain. He also highlighted the success of this tactic in Lithuania’s own energy market with the Klaipėda LNG terminal and plans for future pipelines connecting the Baltics to the Nordic countries. 

 

Piotr Naimski, Secretary of State for Strategic Energy Infrastructure in the Chancellery of the Prime Minister of Poland, emphasized how energy pipelines are vessels for political action. He underlined the implications for European strength and solidarity when making internal decisions on energy supplies. Finally, Dominik Tolksdorf, Director of Foreign & Security Policy at the Heinrich Böll Stiftung North America, explained Germany’s position on Nord Stream 2 and the competing perspectives within the government on its status. Ultimately, he highlighted the high political cost of Nord Stream 2 for Germany’s energy security and European solidarity if the project is completed.