Brussels Opens a Refinery Dialogue on Jet Fuel and Diesel for the Armed Forces — Kubilius Wants NATO's Pipeline Network Extended East

Ursula von der Leyen announced the dialogue among the Commission's responses to the energy crisis. Kubilius said supplies are sufficient today, with the armed forces using about 8 per cent of capacity in peacetime by industry figures, and that how long Europe could last on its current fuel is confidential. He set four priorities: production capacity, a competitive refining industry, fuel transport in a crisis and resilient fuel infrastructure. Jørgensen spoke mainly about supply and prices, said, citing the International Energy Agency, that the global diesel market will stay tight "well into 2027", and called refining "not just a matter of economic competitiveness" but "a matter of security". Industry tabled proposals the Commission will assess; technical work follows, and the dialogue meets again early next year.

The pipes are already a NATO plan; the Commission's part is the fuel that goes through them. In March NATO's support commander, Lieutenant General Kai Rohrschneider, sized an eastern extension of the network at about EUR 21 billion. On 22 July the North Atlantic Council approved a EUR 27 billion Fuel Supply Chain Capability Programme Plan that, NATO says, "will support new facilities, including pipelines, in the eastern and south-eastern part of the Alliance". Kubilius, in the remarks Signal No. 177 reported, is backing what the alliance's July plan already funds rather than opening a new file. What the EU can act on sits upstream: refining capacity that has shrunk for two decades, and access to emergency stocks. The Commission's draft of the revised stocks rules will show whether a military claim on those stocks is written into law, and what triggers it.