Post factum, London (2026)

24/09/2026

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23/09/2026

🔥🌎 Over 600 undersea communications cables are active, carrying 99% of the world’s intercontinental data.

Around 200 faults happen per year, most from fishing gear and anchors.

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22/09/2026

🔥 How is the EU ending Russian gas?

Europe did not completely stop buying Russian gas and is still importing some of it.

This includes LNG (liquefied natural gas, shipped by tankers).

Ukraine ended transit in January 2025 by letting the contract (signed in 2019) run out.

The last active pipeline route goes through Türkiye, covering under 20% of pre-war imports but most of the demand from Hungary.

An EU law adopted in January 2026 bans remaining imports in stages: short-term contracts ended in April 2026 for LNG, and in June for pipeline gas.

Long-term contracts remain for pipeline gas in Hungary, Slovakia and Greece, and for LNG delivered to France, Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands.

Russian LNG sales to the EU remained stable between 2021 and 2025.

Overall, the EU reduced Russian imports by 76% between 2021 and 2025.

Who supplied instead?

Firstly, the EU reduced its imports of gas by 15%, covering around 40% of lost Russian imports.

Most of the remainder was supplied by the US (as LNG), and around 9 bcm extra by Norway.

The shift to LNG

LNG rose from under 25% of EU gas imports in 2021 to 45% in 2025 (131 bcm), 58% of that from the US.

LNG needs specialised import terminals and other infrastructure.

The EU added 76 bcm of yearly LNG import capacity between 2021 and 2025, and Germany, which had no terminals before December 2022, now has 4.

The EU swapped dependence on one pipeline supplier for exposure to the world LNG market, where cargoes go to the highest bidder.

20% of world LNG trade passes through the Strait of Hormuz.

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21/09/2026

🔥On 26 September 2022, underwater explosions damaged 3 of the 4 Nord Stream gas pipelines between Russia and Germany.

Nord Stream 1, a pair of pipelines, carried 17% of EU gas imports in 2021 (25% of Russian gas exports).

Nord Stream 2, the second pair, was completed in 2021 but never carried commercial gas: Germany halted approval days before Russia invaded Ukraine.

Germany backed the pipeline project from 2005 as a direct route to the supplier, Russia.

Cheap energy from gas contributed to the success of German industry.

Some European politicians also believed that trade with Russia would keep it politically closer.

Nord Stream was an alternative to the route through Ukraine and Poland, which opposed it, as did the US (with sanctions in 2019).

No gas was flowing when the blasts came: Russia had stopped pumping gas through Nord Stream 1 by September 2022, tying a restart to sanctions relief.

The lines were still filled with pressurised gas, releasing up to 485,000 tonnes of methane, a record leak, equal to 2 days of global oil and gas industry methane emissions.

Who did it, and how?

German prosecutors say a group led by a former Ukrainian army officer rented a small yacht in Germany under false identities and placed timed explosives on the connectors between segments of the pipes.

1 of 4 pipelines survived intact, likely because of a mistake made by the divers.

The explosives were placed 70-80 m deep and weighed 14-27 kg each.

The accused officer will go on trial in Germany in October 2026, and a second suspect, a diver, awaits a surrender ruling in Croatia.

The Ukrainian government denies directly authorising the attack.

Read more in our latest free and ad-free report:

postfactum.co.uk

20/09/2026

How is the EU ending Russian gas?

Europe did not completely stop buying Russian gas and is still importing some of it.

This includes LNG (liquefied natural gas, shipped by tankers).

Ukraine ended transit in January 2025 by letting the contract (signed in 2019) run out.

The last active pipeline route goes through Türkiye, covering under 20% of pre-war imports but most of the demand from Hungary.

An EU law adopted in January 2026 bans remaining imports in stages: short-term contracts ended in April 2026 for LNG, and in June for pipeline gas.

Long-term contracts remain for pipeline gas in Hungary, Slovakia and Greece, and for LNG delivered to France, Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands.

Russian LNG sales to the EU remained stable between 2021 and 2025.

Overall, the EU reduced Russian imports by 76% between 2021 and 2025.

Who supplied instead?

Firstly, the EU reduced its imports of gas by 15%, covering around 40% of lost Russian imports.

Most of the remainder was supplied by the US (as LNG), and around 9 bcm extra by Norway.

The shift to LNG

LNG rose from under 25% of EU gas imports in 2021 to 45% in 2025 (131 bcm), 58% of that from the US.

LNG needs specialised import terminals and other infrastructure.

The EU added 76 bcm of yearly LNG import capacity between 2021 and 2025, and Germany, which had no terminals before December 2022, now has 4.

The EU swapped dependence on one pipeline supplier for exposure to the world LNG market, where cargoes go to the highest bidder.

20% of world LNG trade passes through the Strait of Hormuz.

Read more on postfactum.co.uk, free and ad-free

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10/09/2026

🔥🧊 Why is the Arctic important?

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09/09/2026

🧊🔥 The struggle for the Arctic seabed

No treaty covers the Arctic as a whole: the UN law of the sea governs its waters, and national laws cover the land.

Under the UN law of the sea, each coastal state controls 3 zones measured from its coast.

1. Territorial sea: up to 12 nautical miles (22 km), with full sovereignty.

2. Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ): up to 200 nautical miles (370 km), with rights to fish, oil, gas and minerals.

3. Continental shelf: countries can make claims beyond 370 km for the seabed if it is a natural extension of the state’s land.

A UN commission checks the science behind shelf claims, but overlaps must be settled between the states themselves.

Russia, Denmark and Canada have filed overlapping claims for the seabed around the North Pole, along an underwater mountain range.

The commission accepted most of Russia’s data in 2023, covering about 1.8 million km²; the Danish (2014) and Canadian (2019) claims are still unreviewed.

The US has not joined the UN sea convention (UNCLOS) and cannot file a claim.

The US declared its own shelf limits in December 2023, which Russia rejected despite having no overlaps with its own claim.

Norway and Russia settled their sea border in 2010, and Canada and Denmark split a disputed island in 2022.

Commercial fishing in the central Arctic high seas is banned until at least 2037 under a 2021 agreement signed by the coastal states, China, Japan, South Korea and the EU.

This is a section of our latest free report:

Arctic Geopolitics, explained

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08/09/2026

🧊🌍 Melting ice and shipping routes

The year’s lowest level of ice cover (ice minimum) has been falling by about 12% per decade, especially quickly between 1995 and 2012.

The lower ice levels in the summer open new shipping routes for global trade.

Russia’s route: Russia issues a permit for every ship, and foreign warships need permission 90 days in advance.

- 37 million tonnes of cargo in 2025 (about 0.3% of global sea trade), mostly oil and gas

- 103 full transits in 2025, thousands of authorised voyages

- Lower summer ice cover opens new route options and lengthens the shipping season

Canada’s route: Canada treats it as internal waters, the US as an international strait; under a 1988 deal, US icebreakers need Canada’s consent to pass.

- 16 voyages in 2025, mostly cruise ships

- Sits closer to the core cluster of ice that does not melt through the summer

- Drifting ice made navigation more difficult in 2007-2021

Transpolar route: a potential route across the central Arctic; models show it opening in September around 2050; no commercial use so far

Existing models project at least 1 ice-free September before 2050.

• Ice-free: under 1 million km² of ice.

The 2025 ice minimum was 4.6 million km², and the maximum was 14.3 million km².

Read our “Arctic Geopolitics” report, free and ad-free

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07/09/2026

🔥🧊 Why is the Arctic important?

• Resources: the Arctic produces about 12% of the world’s natural gas and 4% of its crude oil, over 90% of it in Russia.
Defence: the shortest path for missiles between Russia and the US crosses the Arctic, and Russia’s most powerful fleet deploys into the Arctic Ocean.

• Shipping: summer routes between Asia and Europe through the Arctic are 30% shorter than going through the Suez Canal.

• Climate: the Arctic has warmed 4 times faster than the rest of the world since 1979, with lower ice cover opening new shipping lanes.

All Arctic states except Russia are NATO members since Finland joined in 2023 and Sweden in 2024.

Russia has 32 military bases in the Arctic, against 37 for NATO.

In October 2025, Russia test-flew a nuclear-powered cruise missile 14,000 km from its Arctic test site.

In March 2026, NATO launched Arctic military exercises with 30,000 troops in northern Norway.

Since December 2024, the US has pushed to take control of Greenland, a self-governing territory of Denmark that hosts a US missile-warning base.

Read more in our latest report, free and ad-free:

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06/09/2026

🔥🌍Is the World in Multipolarity?

postfactum.co.uk: Geopolitics, explained

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