Europe once treated energy as the foundation of civilization. After the oil shocks of the 1970s, it built nuclear at scale, opened the North Sea, and secured long term pipeline supply. That system produced resilience, surplus, and industrial strength. Today, the arithmetic has flipped. Europe consumes roughly 38 exajoules of hydrocarbons and produces about 6. This episode examines how that reversal happened, not as an accident, but as the result of political choices that prioritized higher order goals while eroding the physical base that supports them.
This conversation connects that shift to a broader framework. Maslow’s hierarchy applied to energy systems. When policy moves up the pyramid while the base weakens, fragility follows. We walk through the numbers behind Europe’s dependence, compare the current crisis to the 1970s, and contrast Europe’s trajectory with countries that optimized for resilience instead of efficiency. The result is a clear picture of what happens when an advanced economy loses sight of the molecules that keep it running.
Listen to Decouple on:
• Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6PNr3ml8nEQotWWavE9kQz
• Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/decouple/id1516526694?uo=4
• Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1516526694/decouple
• Pocket Casts: https://pca.st/ehbfrn44
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Website: https://www.decouple.media
