American Experiment North Dakota releases Energy Leadership report

American Experiment North Dakota has released a new report outlining the need for American energy leadership to make the world a safer place.

Key points of the report include:

• Russia is a major global supplier of energy. The European Union relies on Russia for more than one-quarter of its crude oil imports, making it the bloc’s largest single energy source. Germany, Europe’s largest economy, gets more than half of its natural gas and more than 30 percent of its crude oil supplies from Russia.

• This gives Russia strategic leverage over these countries. As late as March 7, eleven days into Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine, Germany’s Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, suggested that Germany would not support energy sanctions on Russia, explaining that Russian energy imports are of “essential importance” to daily life there.

• But Russia’s dependence on its exports of energy is also a source of potential weakness. In 2021, revenues from oil and natural gas made up 45 percent of Russia’s federal budget and exports of crude oil, petroleum products, and natural gas accounted for 45 percent of its total exports.

• These exports are a crucial source of foreign currency for Russia. The U.S. dollar and euro account for the invoicing of 36 and 31 percent of Russia’s imports, respectively. To get the dollars and euros necessary to fund these purchases, Russia relies on its exports of energy. They are responsible for the entirety of Russia’s current account surplus.

• The imports these exports pay for are crucial to some of Russia’s most important industrial sectors. In 2021, machinery, equipment, and vehicles accounted for 40 percent of total Russian imports, with chemicals and food making up another 24 percent. In certain key manufacturing sectors, imports represent between 55 and 75 percent of the value added in the sector’s final demand. The share of imports was highest in sectors of machinery & equipment and computers & electronics.