Evaluation of Energy Security in Select Eastern European Countries1

After the invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation in February 2022, energy security in the EU was put into question. Dependency on Russian fossil fuel imports resulted in difficulty implementing sanctions, along with volatile energy prices impacting the entire continent. Some of the most affected countries were those highly dependent on Russian energy, and geographically cut off from other sources. This article evaluates the state of energy security in selected Southeast and Eastern European countries with a lens on the aftermath of the invasion of Ukraine and future paths to reducing dependency on Russian energy imports via renewable energy sources. States analyzed include Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, and Slovakia. These countries were chosen due to their geographic location, dependency on Russian resources, and lack of previous literature evaluating and comparing energy security within. Evaluations of the energy situation in each nation were developed along with an index for comparison amongst each country and the EU plus other European regions based on 25 data metrics. Data collected include energy supply diversity, energy import/export ratio, price volatility in electricity and natural gas, renewable energy capacity, green hydrogen investment, future electricity and capacity installation needs, and cross-border transmission capability. Metrics were grouped into categories: energy imports and natural gas storage, cross-border connections, energy prices, the electricity sector, RES share in other sectors, National RES in energy targets, energy use, and funding/policy. To determine an overall index score for each country, each category was assigned a weight based on importance to energy security, determined by previous indices developed by the Global Energy Institute, the World Bank, and other literature.