\n<\/p>\n
When a withering financial crisis forced Greece to rethink its economy a decade ago, it bet big on green power\u200b. Since then, Greece\u2019s energy transition has been so swift \u201cit almost feels utopian\u200b,\u201d\u200b one Greek environmentalist said.<\/p>\n
\u200bMountainous ridgelines and arid islands \u200bare covered in wind turbines and solar panels\u200b that \u200btoday provide nearly two-thirds of the nation\u2019s electricity.\u200b\u200b\u200b<\/p>\n
But \u200bnow Greece\u200b is deliberately pivoting back toward fossil fuels, just not to burn at home. This time it\u2019s betting that it can become one of Europe\u2019s main suppliers of natural gas, with much of it shipped from the United States.<\/p>\n
Both Greek and European Union subsidies have funded new pipelines that crisscross the country and connect to a brand-new import terminal that will send gas to a broad swath of Central and Eastern Europe for decades to come.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
The investments in Greece are part of a deluge of investments into natural gas around the world, with significant consequences for climate change. In coming years, nearly a trillion and a half dollars will go into constructing pipelines and terminals, according to Global Energy Monitor. Twenty percent of that spending is in Europe.<\/p>\n
The world\u2019s pivot to gas speaks to a kind of hedging that increasingly defines global climate negotiations: While nations have agreed on the necessity to transition away from fossil fuels<\/a> as quickly as possible, almost all major economic powers are promoting gas as a \u201ctransition fuel.\u201d<\/p>\n Its proponents argue that gas is cleaner-burning than coal and oil, and more reliable than renewables like wind or solar. Critics counter that renewables are increasingly affordable and that gas is anything but reliable, as Europe should have learned through collectively spending trillions of additional dollars on it during the energy crisis that followed Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, draining government coffers and causing electricity prices to soar.<\/p>\n Natural gas is a climate threat in two ways. Burning it produces carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas warming the world. Large but unknown quantities of it also leak into the atmosphere unburned, where it has highly potent but shorter-term planet-warming effects. These concerns prompted the Biden administration this year to pause issuing permits for new export terminals<\/a> while it assesses their effects on the climate.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n In this arrangement, Greece gets billions of dollars of heavily subsidized gas infrastructure, but the bigger payoff is political, not financial. Greece positions itself as central to European energy security, and it plays a key role in the West\u2019s strategy to isolate Russia.<\/p>\n The real money will be made by American gas companies. Since Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, the United States has more than doubled its exports of liquefied natural gas, or L.N.G., to Europe, amounting to nearly $100 billion in trade.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n In Greece, the newest centerpiece is a floating gas terminal off the country\u2019s northern coast. The facility was once an enormous tanker, but today it is stationary, held in place not just by anchors but also by its connection to an undersea pipeline with branches stretching across Europe.<\/p>\n In April, its first delivery of L.N.G. arrived from the Gulf Coast. The operators of the terminal hope that more than half of its supply will come from the United States.<\/p>\n That terminal is \u201cnear and dear to my heart,\u201d said Geoffrey R. Pyatt, the former U.S. ambassador to Greece and Ukraine, speaking this month in New York City\u200b at a private event on \u200bMediterranean energy\u200b supplies<\/a>. Mr. Pyatt is now the State Department\u2019s top energy official.<\/p>\n Mr. Pyatt told attendees\u200b\u200b that the United States is the \u201cunrivaled global champion\u201d of gas exports\u200b, and he assured them that American companies were \u201cstrongly committed to their involvement in the region.\u201d He also said he was \u201ceager to see\u201d American fossil fuel companies partner with Greece and nearby Cyprus to exploit their own offshore gas fields.<\/p>\n Mr. Pyatt, being intimately familiar with both Greece and Ukraine, helped engineer Greece\u2019s new status as an import hub. A major factor was urgency. Ukraine, for obvious reasons, will let a treaty elapse this year that had allowed Russia to pump gas across its territory.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n He and other U.S. officials have lobbied European nations to use Greece\u2019s new terminal and pipelines, promoting American L.N.G. as a natural replacement for Russian gas \u200b(which, unlike Russian oil, hasn\u2019t been banned in the E.U.\u200b).<\/p>\n \u201cIt is unfortunate to say, but war gave us the demand,\u201d said Kostis Sifnaios, who heads Gastrade, the company operating the new floating terminal. \u201cIf I think about the money the U.S. puts into Ukraine, Bulgaria, Moldova, and so on, somehow they will have to get paid back, no? That\u2019s why you see so much American L.N.G. flowing into this region.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mr. Sifnaios recalled Mr. Pyatt and other officials \u201cactively lobbying countries like Serbia, Bulgaria and North Macedonia and encouraging them to make bookings\u201d for gas from the new terminal. Even Ukraine is a potential customer.<\/p>\n But the real market is in the Balkans and Central Europe. Balkan countries like Bulgaria and Serbia are behind the rest of the continent in transitioning to renewable energy.<\/p>\n Energy analysts as well as environmentalists have raised concerns that easing their access to gas may discourage building renewables, and leave the poorer countries among them more susceptible to the price shocks that the gas market has seen in recent years.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Balkans were essentially skipped over for investment by Europe for the past 20 years,\u201d said Antonio Tricarico, a regional expert at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. \u201cWhile it may look like now they are getting attention, they are really just getting skipped again, this time by getting hooked to gas instead of helped with renewable energy.\u201d<\/p>\n On a recent day, in a remote forest near Greece\u2019s border with Albania, workers set off a series of rapid-fire explosions that raced along a wide path cut through the woods. The dynamite was to help excavate a trench for a new pipeline. Only a few dozen yards away, another gash cuts through the forest, where a separate new pipeline crosses Greece on its path from gas fields in the Caspian Sea all the way to Italy. Soon, yet another pipeline will be built, connecting this network to neighboring North Macedonia.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Mr. Tricarico\u2019s organization, as well as the E.U.\u2019s internal energy regulation agency, project that demand for L.N.G. in Europe<\/a> will reach its peak this year, in large part because even though Europe\u2019s biggest economies are investing in gas, they are simultaneously building out renewables at a rapid pace. By 2030, Europe is projected to have nearly three times<\/a> as much L.N.G. import capacity as it will need.<\/p>\n If those forecasts prove to be correct, then Europe is currently channeling public funding toward gas projects it knows it won\u2019t make money, in the name of geopolitics.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n