Guest Piece: Russian Natural Gas and Geopolitical Realignment—a reverse domino theory

[Note: This is the first of a series of pieces from George McMillan, CEO of McMillan Associates, a geopolitical and analytical energy company with extensive global studies and expertise. You can watch or listen to his discussion with Stu Turley on this and other topics in Episode #160 of the Energy News Beat Podcast linked here.]

With the Cold War in the rearview mirror for over three decades, it turns out that cheap Russian natural gas delivered by pipeline is the biggest threat to the United States’ superpower status.

Natural gas delivered by pipeline is significantly cheaper than any other form of energy, and any industrial power center with natural gas pipelines to Russia will have significantly lower energy costs, boosting the price competitiveness of their machine tool, heavy equipment, automobiles, advanced electronics, consumer products, and agricultural fertilizer products in the global markets.

Those not connected will be less competitive industrially and will experience higher levels of inflation associated with declining living standards.