Tragedy in the Ukraine and the historic role pipelines have played

To understand the energy dynamics of today’s war in Ukraine, it is necessary to visit the history of the pipeline systems that were built during the Soviet period and within the Warsaw Pact countries. Firstly, most of the production of oil and gas is in Russia and very little in the other former Soviet Union countries and most of that oil production lies west of the Ural Mountains. Pipelines were built to take the crude oil to refineries in the other Warsaw pact countries. These pipelines were named Friendship (Druzhba) pipelines. Figure 1 shows the pipelines that run from Russia into Europe and through the Ukraine. The southern Druzhba feeds the small Ukraine refineries of Drogobych and Nadvorna and then flows onwards into Hungary, the Slovak and Czech Republics and on to the Balkans. The Northern Druzhba goes into Poland and what was East Germany. The other leg of the pipeline supplies the larger Ukraine refineries of Kremenchug and Lisichansk,...