In a speech at Davos final month, President Donald Trump railed towards “windmills” as “losers” and referred to as nations that purchase them “stupid people.” Just 5 days later, 9 European countries signed a deal to build an enormous offshore wind power hub in the North Sea, the epicenter of the continent’s oil and gasoline trade.
The deal — not a direct response to Trump’s wind-bashing speech — gives an immense potential prize for Europe: it might enhance power safety and wean the continent off its heavy dependence on US oil and gasoline at a time when the US is proving to be a volatile partner.
Europe is one of many energy-importing financial powers more and more seeing renewables as synonymous with power independence: India is adding solar at a fast clip and China put in extra wind and photo voltaic in 2024 than the whole quantity of renewable power working in the US.
The US is in stark opposition, going all in on fossil fuels whereas trying to shut down wind and solar projects. On power, the US is now extra “aligned with petrostates like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Russia,” said Thijs Van de Graaf, an affiliate professor of worldwide politics at Ghent University.
Europe’s gargantuan offshore wind undertaking will likely be “the largest clean energy hub in the world,” in accordance to the joint declaration, signed by Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway and the UK at the North Sea Summit held in Germany in January.
It is anticipated to produce 100 gigawatts of offshore wind power — sufficient to power round 50 million properties — linked to countries by high-voltage subsea cables. It is framed as a means to build power resilience, present inexpensive electrical energy and safeguard power safety.
Europe, in contrast to the US, doesn’t have huge reserves of homegrown fossil fuels, and home manufacturing is falling. An enormous gasoline discipline in the Netherlands has been wound down after years of inflicting earthquakes, and manufacturing from the ageing North Sea oil and gasoline basin is in decline.
The bloc at present imports nearly 60% of its power. This degree of dependence “is a kind of vulnerability… for others to press on,” said Louise van Schaik, a senior analysis fellow at Clingendael, a global relations assume tank based mostly in the Netherlands.
And over the previous few years, countries have been urgent on it exhausting.
Russia has “really used gas as a weapon” towards Europe because it invaded Ukraine in 2022, van Schaik said. As Russia diminished flows, costs spiked, pushing up power payments and serving to gas a value of dwelling disaster.
Europe moved swiftly to cut back its dependence on Russia, however as an alternative of diversifying, it swapped a reliance on Russia for a reliance on the United States, van Schaik said. Nearly 60% of Europe’s liquified pure gasoline imports in 2025 now come from the US.
The explosion of US LNG powering Europe was an vital alternative for Russian gasoline, nevertheless it has additionally uncovered the bloc to unstable pure gasoline costs that may rise when there is extra demand.
“We’ve seen a lot of real economy impacts from not having the cheap Russian gas, then moving to LNG, which was much more expensive,” said Linda Kalcher, founder of EU-based assume tank Strategic Perspectives.
What’s extra, whereas counting on the US might have appeared a protected wager a number of years in the past, it’s trying more and more shaky below a Trump administration that’s proven no hesitation in wielding its financial may towards each foes and allies.
Last summer season, as Trump ramped up tariff threats, Europe pledged to purchase $250 billion of American oil, gasoline and nuclear a yr for the subsequent three years — more than triple the quantity it at present imports from the US.
In October, the Trump administration helped collapse the delivery trade’s plans for the “world’s first global carbon tax” and in November, it revealed a nationwide safety technique which sharply criticized Europe’s clear power insurance policies and explicitly said increasing US power exports “enables us to project power.”
But Trump’s calls for to personal Greenland — with transient fears he would think about using army power to get it — was the true “galvanizing moment,” Van de Graaf said. It was an enormous blow to the transatlantic relationship.
The US is partaking in “bullying tactics,” said Jennifer Morgan, a former German local weather envoy. “I think that’s just kind of woken up the EU to the point that they are now very dependent and vulnerable to another leader,” she said.
Clean power gives a path away from US dependence and towards power safety, consultants instructed NCS. It is one thing the continent has in abundance from the sun-soaked south to the windy north. The North Sea, with its shallow waters and blustery local weather, is the “world’s most promising area” for offshore wind, Van de Graaf said.
Wind and photo voltaic generated 30% of the European Union’s electricity in 2025, overtaking fossil fuels for the first time. Wind dominates, producing 19% of the EU’s electrical energy final yr. “You cannot talk about these energy sources as alternatives anymore; this is the new backbone of our electricity supply,” Van de Graaf said.
Globally, the renewable power industry does face challenges: uncooked supplies and labor are dearer, funding ranges have faltered, and in the US, Trump is making an attempt — not yet successfully — to kill wind tasks, additional denting investor confidence. But Europe’s offshore wind deal hopes to carry prices down with its huge scale and emphasis on interconnection between countries.
The means Europe thinks about clear power has shifted, Morgan said. Where as soon as it was about local weather coverage, now it’s about value and politics. Renewable power has “changed the economics,” she said. “It’s changed the political economy.”
As the Trump administration turns away from clear power and doubles down on fossil fuels, it’s serving to speed up this clear power motion throughout the Atlantic, Van de Graaf said. “In spite of all of his rhetoric, (Trump) is actually doing the renewables business a favor.”