A very crucial step was taken on Friday that will pave the way for a more strategic and strong Türkiye: Ankara and Moscow are working together to establish an energy hub on Turkish soil. The site where natural gas and liquified natural gas (LNG) from Russia will be transformed will be located in Thrace.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said in a speech Friday that he held important meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin on making the European part of Türkiye an energy hub. He also touched on the nuclear power dimension and said, “We are working on this with our energy partners. When we add nuclear power, which is invested in with $20 billion, to the table, we will rise to a completely different level in energy.”
The Erdoğan government wants to reduce Türkiye’s external dependency on primary resources of energy from 71% to 13% by 2053.
Meanwhile, as President Erdoğan addressed plans concerning an energy line passing from Thrace, his Russian counterpart Putin issued a statement verifying the initiative.
“The price of natural gas for European consumers will largely be determined in the center of Türkiye. What happens in Europe’s own centers is crazy,” Putin said, highlighting that he believes Türkiye’s natural gas infrastructure has significant potential.
That is true and will become even more so with the Silivri Underground Natural Gas Storage Facility, which is now the largest in Europe with a capacity of 4.6 billion cubic meters (bcm).
Türkiye has 160 million tons of equivalent oil energy supply and its financial value will reach $81 billion this year.
Türkiye has the 17th largest supply in the world and President Erdoğan said, “Our investments will continue until we bring our country to the safest level in the field of natural gas exploration and operation as well as its storage. We will continue to take every precaution to prevent the problems caused by the energy crisis in Europe.”
This aim is achieved through Türkiye’s policies toward Ukraine and energy. While Ankara chose to be a bridge and mediator in the war, it has not been affected as badly by the energy crisis stemming from the sanctions on Russia. On the one hand, with Türkiye’s cross diplomacy, Moscow-Ankara relations have grown even stronger, which opened the way for Türkiye to become an energy hub.
On the other hand, Türkiye became a key actor for Europe in this war when it came to freeing grain supplies and mediating dialogue. It is a difficult role that Türkiye has undertaken but it is the only way to solve the problem. Sanctions did not bring the outcome that the West was expecting. A different type of pressure should be applied to Russia to stop its invasion of Ukraine and President Erdoğan is probably the only leader who can convince Putin to reconsider his brutal policy.
