September 19, 2025

Get ready for a big energy shakeup in Europe! The European Union is cooking up plans to speed up its exit from Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports, pushing the phaseout earlier than the original 2027 deadline. Why now? Just days after former US President Donald Trump urged Europe to tighten the screws on Russia’s energy business, the EU's top leaders are taking action. According to insiders, the European Commission aims to include this in its new sanctions package, which could be announced as soon as Friday. The EU is also eyeing changes to its RePowerEU plan — their big roadmap to ditch Russian energy — to target Russian LNG sooner. A spokesperson for the Commission, Anna-Kaisa Itkonen, said, “Since we presented the RePowerEU plan in 2022, we’ve been saying that a phaseout of Russian energy is better sooner rather than later.” The Trump administration has been pressing Europe to snap off Russian fuel imports faster and even called for heavy tariffs, up to 100%, on countries like India and China that buy Russian oil. However, many EU nations are uneasy about hitting India and China with such tariffs, so Brussels is focusing more on Russian LNG. Good news for Europe’s energy future: the global gas market is expected to have extra supply from mid-2026 onward. This means Europe can phase out Russian gas without risking shortages or big price jumps. Meanwhile, the US is ready to step in and pump more LNG into Europe as new production plants come online. Europe has already been buying a lot of LNG from the US—about 50 billion cubic meters a year—with EU countries like Spain, Belgium, and France leading the imports of Russian LNG. The EU also promised $750 billion worth of US energy purchases over the next three years in a new EU-US trade deal. Russian gas deliveries to Europe tumbled after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but shipments by pipeline through Turkey and LNG still make up nearly 19% of EU gas imports in 2024. Getting everyone on board for the new sanctions could be tricky, since stopping Russian LNG imports by the end of 2027 requires all EU countries to agree. However, changes through the RePowerEU plan can pass with a majority vote. Plus, RePowerEU’s faster LNG phaseout would be permanent, unlike sanctions, which might be lifted later. Paschal Donohoe, who leads euro-area finance meetings, told Bloomberg, “Europe has made huge efforts and been very successful in reducing our reliance on Russian energy and Russian gas. The Commission have indicated that they want to bring forward the proposal to further accelerate the reduced reliance we would have on Russian energy, and I know that efforts will be made to do that.” The stage is set for the EU to break free from Russian LNG faster than anyone thought possible, shaking up the energy game and putting pressure on Moscow’s war chest. Stay tuned!

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Tags: Eu, Russian lng, Energy sanctions, Repowereu, Us lng, Energy trade,