Energy Update #2: the new energy security and the tensions in the Middle East

Energy Updates by Energia Corrente × eNextGen — the data, trends and news that really matter to understand the world of energy.

Tensions in the Middle East are once again affecting the global energy system, bringing back to the forefront a theme that seemed to have partly moved into the background: energy security. In a context shaped by electrification, renewables growth and storage deployment, the events of recent weeks are a reminder of how decisive oil, gas, infrastructure and strategic routes remain for economic and industrial stability.

Today the issue is not only about price movements, but about the overall resilience of the system: its ability to absorb geopolitical shocks, maintain continuity of flows and contain the effects of growing international uncertainty.

Energy security returns to the centre of the debate

According to the International Energy Agency, the current crisis represents an exceptional threat to global energy security, to the point of pushing member countries to approve the coordinated release of around 400 million barrels of oil from strategic reserves. In terms of scale, it is one of the most significant interventions ever deployed on emergency stocks.

The signal is clear: despite the progress of the energy transition, the global system remains heavily exposed to tensions involving the oil and gas sector. In the presence of severe geopolitical instability, emergency tools still rely on infrastructure and resources belonging to the traditional energy paradigm.

Not only prices: the infrastructure question

A second important element concerns the physical vulnerability of energy assets. In recent weeks, several international observers have documented damage and attacks affecting sites relevant to the oil and gas supply chain in the Middle East: refineries, terminals, production fields, storage depots and energy ports.

The issue is crucial because risk is not measured only in terms of immediate supply disruption. In a highly interconnected system, even the mere perception of a possible reduction in flows can produce concrete effects on markets, increasing volatility, risk premium and instability in expectations.

Energy security therefore takes on a very concrete meaning again: not only resource availability, but infrastructure integrity, route protection and the response capacity of national and supranational energy systems.

A dependency the transition has not yet overcome

The tensions of recent weeks clearly show a structural aspect: the energy transition is under way, but it has not yet reached a point where it neutralizes the systemic weight of hydrocarbons.

Oil continues to play a central role in mobility, logistics and large parts of the global economy. Gas, in turn, remains an essential source for many power and industrial systems. This means that any crisis involving areas that are strategic for the production, processing or transport of these sources retains a high potential for economic propagation well beyond regional borders.

For Europe, the lesson is particularly relevant: energy security can no longer be interpreted merely as access to sources, but as the ability to reduce dependence on points of geopolitical and infrastructural fragility.

Electrification and risk reduction

Within this scenario, the transition takes on an even broader meaning. Not only decarbonization, but also a progressive reduction of exposure to shocks.

Independent analyses published in recent weeks have highlighted how the electrification of transport can increasingly affect global oil demand, compressing it over time and reducing the strategic weight of one of the components most vulnerable to geopolitical crises.

The point matters because it shifts the discussion from environmental sustainability alone to a perspective of system resilience. Every share of mobility that moves from fossil fuels to electricity represents, going forward, less direct exposure to tensions on oil routes and to shocks linked to the main production and processing hubs. According to an Ember analysis based on IEA data, in 2025 electric vehicles delivered oil savings comparable to Qatar’s annual exports through the Strait of Hormuz, now under geopolitical pressure.

The process is of course not immediate. Vehicle fleet renewal times, the geographical distribution of demand and the still very significant weight of traditional fuels make the change gradual. But the underlying direction looks increasingly clear: electrification can become not only a climate lever, but also an energy security lever.

What to watch now

In the short term, the market will continue to monitor three main aspects:

• the evolution and duration of the conflict, together with any disruptions that may affect strategic energy infrastructure in the area;
• the resilience of the maritime and logistics routes most sensitive to the circulation of crude and refined products;
• the capacity of major economies to absorb this new shock without turning it into a prolonged crisis of prices and confidence.

In short

The tensions in the Middle East are a reminder that geopolitics continues to have a direct impact on energy. But they are also a reminder of something else: that the transition is not only a decarbonization pathway, but also a pathway of structural strengthening of the system.

In the short term, oil and gas remain fundamental to global energy security. In the medium to long term, however, the development of renewables, storage and electrification can help build a system that is more distributed, more resilient and less exposed to fossil-fuel crises.

For this reason, reading what is happening solely as an emergency would be reductive. It is also an indicator of the direction the energy system will have to take: less concentrated vulnerability, more flexibility, more response capacity.

Sources: International Energy Agency; Ember – The energy security fallout: from fossil fuel fragility to electric independence; The New York Times; independent analyses on the impact of transport electrification on global oil demand.

Nicolò Golinucci PhD is co-founder and CEO of eNextGen, an official spin-off of Politecnico di Milano that quantifies sustainability and turns it into a competitive advantage for companies.