From BusinessWeek: “‘Energy policy is one of the big failures of the European Union in the last fifty years, particularly bearing in mind that we started out as a coal and steel community. But our growing dependence on Russia is going to increase the pressure for a common energy policy, to improve the internal grids and have shared arrangements within the European Union,’ Mr. Bruton said . . .

His remarks were echoed by Nato’s head of the policy planning division, Jamie Shea, who said that it was “not good for Europe to have a situation in the middle of the winter where the eastern half is freezing at minus 25 degrees, while the western half is sunbathing at 25 degrees plus,” especially since it was just a matter of linking up the grid and reversing flows in pipelines.”