G7 energy ministers stopped short of agreeing on a release of strategic oil reserves yesterday and instead asked the International Energy Agency (IEA) to assess the situation before acting.
The IEA said it was convening an extraordinary meeting of its member states yesterday.
Members would “assess the current security of supply and market conditions to inform a subsequent decision on whether to make emergency stocks of IEA countries available to the market,” IEA executive director Fatih Birol said.
“We have asked the IEA to elaborate scenarios for a potential oil stock release, we need to be ready to act at any moment,” French Finance Minister Roland Lescure told journalists after the G7 ministers held a call to discuss soaring energy prices due to the war in Iran.
The G7 comprises the United States, Canada, Japan, Italy, Britain, Germany and France.
Benchmark oil prices surged to almost four-year highs on Monday but prices plummeted 11 per cent yesterday after US President Donald Trump predicted the war in the Middle East could end soon.
Later yesterday, EU leaders were due to discuss competitiveness, including energy prices, on a call with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever and others.
European governments are on edge about the prospect of a repeat of the energy crisis they faced in 2022 after Russia invaded Ukraine, when prices surged to record peaks, forcing some industries to shut down operations.
Even before the Iran crisis, European energy prices were typically higher than those in the US and China and Brussels policymakers were facing calls from industry to step in with emergency measures.
“For fossil fuels we are completely dependent on expensive and volatile imports, putting us at a structural disadvantage to other regions. The current Middle East crisis gives a stark reminder of the vulnerabilities this creates,” European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said yesterday, adding that the reduction in nuclear energy had been a strategic mistake in Europe.
The European Commission yesterday said the European Investment Bank would invest 75 billion euros ($87.32bn)over the next three years in energy infrastructure to unblock power grid bottlenecks and try to curb prices.
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