Attempts at »multilateral governance« in international energy relations have faced serious limitations on their efficiency as a consequence of geopolitics. The fact that international energy policy is exercised in a tension between power-based geopolitics and multilateral cooperative governance is even visible in the EU itself, the biggest net importer of energy worldwide and a strong promoter of multilateral governance in general but also of energy trade in particular.

The EU proposed a European strategy for sustainable, competitive, and secure energy in March 2006. However, even internally this strategy has very limited prospects of being implemented because of its already patchy record at the member-state and eu levels. Its internal dimension already reveals a number of weaknesses as member states still – even increasingly – define energy as a national prerogative. Because energy security is a highly strategic issue, the idea of »national champions« is gaining ground in the eu, contradicting a collective approach to energy security. These limitations on multilateral governance already faced at EU level are even more precarious on the global level where a shift can be identified toward state-centered and power-based geopolitics driven by energy relations. The reason for this lies in the ambiguous properties of energy which is
both a commodity and a strategic good, the geographical distribution of which gives rise to geopolitics.

Nevertheless, there is a persistent demand for political cooperation in international energy relations. The growing demand and the tight supply, as well as the latter’s shifting geography, together with various transport issues, increasingly necessitate forms of multilateral governance on which all parties can rely in order to strive for more equitable and sustainable energy security and avoid conflicts over energy. Moreover, the scarcity of hydrocarbons calls for a new, concerted, and profound push to safe energy, to increase its efficient use, and to boost the share of renewables in the energy mix worldwide.

In securing its energy supply the EU must pursue a role which is not in competition with other consumers but based on cooperation and political dialog. There is a strong argument that energy security is not divisible, but can only be achieved collectively, also on the global level.