Produced by AmChamGR and the Atlantic Council, a new report explores how US-Greece energy cooperation can deliver enhanced energy security and integration in Southeastern Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean while promoting regional stability and driving the green transition.
Southeastern Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean region play a critical role in the transatlantic community and ensuring stability and energy diversification here is crucial, with effects that will ripple well beyond the geographic area. Tackling the challenge of a smooth and successful energy transition that also addresses sustainability, integration and security in such a highly energy dependent region that has traditionally been rife with geopolitical tensions is no small feat, yet now more than ever, efforts to achieve this need to be redoubled. While the EU’s green transition was already underway, rising gas prices in the past year and Russia’s war in Ukraine since February this year turned the spotlight on Europe’s significant reliance on Russian oil and gas, highlighting critical shortcomings in the bloc’s energy independence and security, and prompting a renewed push toward a more sustainable energy future. The potential for this is particularly promising in Southeastern Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean where multiple energy sources—including traditional sources and a plethora of renewables—hold the promise of growth and stability.
Anticipating the vital need to push forward with energy transition and diversification in Europe, and in Southeastern Europe in particular, over the past year, the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center, with the support of the American-Hellenic Chamber of Commerce, has explored Greece’s contribution to this effort, the country’s potential to lead the region’s energy transition, and the how Greece and the United States have been working closely together to both increase energy security and accelerate the green recovery by focusing on regional energy integration, establishing a diversified generation mix and developing the region’s own energy sources. The report, titled “Squaring the Energy Transition Circle in Southeast Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean: How to leverage US-Greece cooperation to ensure energy security, while accelerating green recovery,” highlights the alignment of interests and priorities between the United States and Greece on energy in the past decade including the push for a green transition, which has the potential to transform the region. Based on inputs from a year of private interviews, roundtables, and other outreach efforts, author Katerina Sokou, Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center and Washington DC correspondent for Skai TV and Kathimerini, analyzes the important partnership between the two countries and offers a comprehensive set of recommendations on further strengthening US-Greece cooperation on energy.
The American-Hellenic Chamber of Commerce and the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center launched the report during a dedicated event that was live-streamed from the Atlantic Council Headquarters on May 18, 2022, and featured a discussion by Greek and US experts and officials on the issue of energy transition and US-Greece bilateral energy cooperation and the role that Greece increasingly plays for the region’s energy security.
Visit the report’s page on the AmChamGR website to find out more, download the report and watch a video of the launch event, here: https://bit.ly/3NhpEN9