Picturesque europe3/2/2023 Others protest more discreetly, suggesting that an enlightened supplier might choose to cap gas prices, at least while the war rages. Poland grumbled first: in May its prime minister denounced the “sick” prices of gas from up north. Facing bail-outs of utilities and consumers, Europe is no longer keen to feather the Norwegian nest. Yet the mood has soured as the energy crisis has deepened. (It sits within the broader European Economic Area, a form of standoffishness it can afford thanks to its oil wealth.) Norway sent money to support Ukraine and joined sanctions on Russia imposed by the eu, a club to which it does not belong. It boosted gas output as much as was possible, even suppressing trade-union strikes to keep the energy flowing. Norway merely demanded that the eu tone down its lectures about the country’s need to move away from fossil fuels faster. For Western politicians, pleading for hydrocarbons from a Norwegian minister is less awkward than doing so from an authoritarian petro-potentate. Any non-Russian energy source was welcome, and the alternatives were mainly in the Middle East and north Africa. Until recently Europeans, Norway’s main customers, did not quibble. Instead, its 5.5m citizens have to make do with a nest egg worth $1.2trn, despite a recent fall in the value of its investments. If not for the fact that it sensibly squirrels away such cash in a sovereign wealth fund, at these prices each Norwegian could get an annual cheque worth around $40,000-roughly the gdp per capita of the eu. Now, thanks to the war, Norway’s energy-export revenues have shot up to a run rate of over $200bn a year. That is enough to turbocharge a Scandinavian welfare state and lots of summer cabins on picturesque fjords. In a normal year sales of oil, gas and electricity bring in over $50bn, or $10,000 per Norwegian. The vast quantities of energy it exports nowadays are merely a balloon-sized cherry on the cake. Norway would be prosperous even had it not stumbled upon offshore oil five decades ago.
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