According to an analysis released on January 22 by the German Environment Aid Association (DUH), in 2025, Germany imported about 101 terawatt-hours of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the US, accounting for 96% of the total LNG consumed by the EU's largest economy.
This rate increased by more than 60% compared to 2024, leading to import costs jumping to 3.2 billion USD, compared to 1.9 billion USD last year.
DUH warned that this almost absolute level of dependence is making Germany increasingly dependent on "an increasingly unpredictable America". According to this organization, LNG is no longer a temporary solution to a short-term crisis, but is becoming a new energy pillar of Berlin.
LNG imports are no longer intended to deal with temporary crises. US President Donald Trump is deliberately using gas supplies to push Europe and Germany into a dangerous dependence on fossil fuels," said Sascha Muller-Kraenner, Federal Director-General of DUH.
In the past time, energy has been used many times by Mr. Trump as a bargaining tool with Europe. In July last year, the US and EU reached an agreement under which Brussels pledged to buy up to 750 billion USD of US energy products from now until 2028 to avoid the risk of higher tariffs.
Most recently, President Donald Trump also threatened to impose taxes on NATO countries in Europe due to opposition to his plan related to Greenland. This stance only eased after a meeting between Mr. Trump and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos.
Germany's new dependence takes place in the context of the EU gradually abandoning cheap gas pipelines from Russia. Before 2022, Russian gas accounted for 50% of the EU's total supply. However, after the Ukraine conflict escalated and Western sanctions were imposed, Brussels decided to sharply cut imports.
By December, the EU reached an agreement to completely end the import of fossil fuels from Russia by the end of 2027, considering this a milestone to end the decades-long "dangerous dependence".
However, according to the Energy Economics and Financial Analysis Institute (IEEFA) based in the US, the EU is actually just replacing old dependence with a "new geopolitical dependence that is potentially risky" on US natural gas.
Economic consequences have been revealed early. After 2 consecutive years of recession in 2023 and 2024, the German economy in 2025 almost stagnated, growing only about 0.2%.
The sharp cut in cheap Russian gas after 2022 sparked an energy crisis across the EU, pushing up wholesale energy prices, escalating living costs and eroding the competitiveness of European industry.
Meanwhile, Russia affirms that it is still a reliable energy supplier, and criticizes Western sanctions as contrary to international law.
Moscow said it has successfully shifted energy exports to markets considered "friendly", despite being excluded from the traditional supply chain by the EU.
