Introduction: Perspectives, Aims and Contributions
Journal: Palgrave Macmillan UK eBooks
Year: 2016

In February 2015, the Commission of the European Union put forward a proposal for an EU Energy Union that signaled a shift in the EU’s use of economic power in external relations. Some of the new policies would amount to the EU’s using market might in the shape of a $17.5 trillion economy and a 400 bcm gas market, not only for setting market standards, but also for political ends such as energy security. The proposal featured five related and mutually reinforcing dimensions—security of supply, a