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Opinion
Julian Lee

Russia Can’t Replace the Energy Market Putin Broke

A network of gas fields and pipelines developed at a cost of hundreds of billions of dollars has been effectively thrown away. 

Getting gas to India will be even more costly than laying this pipe to China.

Getting gas to India will be even more costly than laying this pipe to China.

Photographer: Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg
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Russia spent almost 50 years building its energy market in Europe. President Vladimir Putin destroyed it in under 50 weeks. Finding a replacement will be almost impossible.

While Russia has found alternative markets for its crude oil, mostly in India, switching sales of refined products and — perhaps even more so — natural gas will take years and come at huge cost. That’s if it’s even possible to create markets as the world turns away from fossil fuels.