Are the lights about to go out across Europe?

Today’s snap decision by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to halt Nord Stream 2 — the new pipeline intended to export vast amounts of Russian gas into the EU — will make precisely no difference to European energy security, at least in the short to medium term. It could force a rethink of Berlin’s longer-term energy strategy, but the bigger question facing energy markets is whether Russia will curtail existing gas flows into Europe.

Scholz on Tuesday instructed Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action not to allow the Baltic Sea pipeline to start pumping gas ‘for now’. Halting the certification process puts the project on hold but doesn’t cancel it altogether, leaving the door ajar to future certification. This might give Berlin some leverage in any future talks with Russia, but that will be for another day; events are moving fast on the ground in eastern Ukraine, where Russian troops are reportedly closing in on the Donbas region after the Kremlin recognised the ‘independence’ of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk breakaway territories.