The Next Global Energy Crisis Won’t Come From Just One Direction
Natural Gas Prices Haley Zaremba is an energy journalist and researcher with more than a decade of professional experience covering global energy systems, land and natural resources, and… The next global energy crisis is just around the corner.
If the past four years have taught us anything, it’s that an energy crisis can be brought about unexpectedly and by a number of factors – often in tandem.
Changing weather patterns, increased grid stress, geopolitical tensions, and conflict have converged in different ways in different moments to send global energy markets into extreme volatility and have caused sweeping blackouts even in some of the world’s most developed nations, such as thegrid collapse across Spain and Portugal in 2025.
Back in March of this year, the BBC reported with dismay that Europe had“sleepwalked into yet another energy crisis." At the time, the report was in reaction to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which left global oil and gas markets in crisis and laid bare, once again, how dependent the continent continues to be on oil imports.
We promised things would change but here we are," a ‘highly frustrated European diplomat’ was anonymously quoted in the BBC report.
"Instead of concentrating on much-needed long-term plans - about how to make Europe more competitive in this increasingly volatile world, [European] prime ministers and presidents are now in a panic over [energy] prices, worried about angry voters and scrambling for short-term solutions," the source went on to say.
"Just like the crisis after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Same European divisions; same dilemmas over energy.
We can’t keep going round in these circles.
Something’s got to give." The real kicker is that this report came out far before the real clincher of Europe’s energy crisis had even occurred – the hottest European summer in the history of recorded temperatures.
The blistering heat wave that swept the continent pushed energy grids to the absolute brink of collapse and forced France and Hungary totake nuclear reactors offlinedue to lack of cooling ability just when energy was needed most to prevent heat-related deaths.
What is more, new reporting indicates that Europe’s next energy crisis will be from a completely new threat: peak oil.
| Product | Price | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Brent Crude | $102.14/bbl | +0.34% |
| WTI Crude | $96.90/bbl | +0.21% |
| EN590 Diesel | $846/MT | +0.18% |
| Jet Fuel A-1 | $1090/MT | +0.55% |
| Mazut M100 | $450/MT | -0.15% |
| Bitumen 60/70 | $470/MT | +0.08% |
| Sulphur Gran 99.5% | $470/MT | -0.44% |
| Urea 46% Gran | $650/MT | +1.12% |
| NPK 16-16-16 | $460/MT | -0.28% |
| Nat Gas TTF | $15.42/MMBtu | +0.92% |
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