Tom Harwood: 'Despite sitting on a wealth of natural gas resources, we chose to abandon them and be beholden to the whims of Mr Putin'

Now I want to highlight something that is being missed by many in this energy discussion.

It is true that this is not solely a British problem, it affects many countries around the world. There are no quick fixes to supply constraint and higher demand. This being said, the global gas price crisis isn't as global as some would make out.

Let's take a look at natural gas prices in Europe, East Asia, and the United States of America.

It shows the soaring prices in Europe and East Asia over the last 18 months. And prices in the USA flatlining.

What is going on? Well this is all thanks to long term US energy policy, particularly that country's enormous expansion in natural gas production since the late 2000s.

They got fracking. They used hydraulic fracturing to put two fingers up to Vladimir Putin and create their own stable supply of domestic energy.

And what foresight that has turned out to be.Because natural gas is cleaner than coal, the boost in production actually helped reduce CO2 emissions as well as generate energy security.

It insulated their country from the supply shocks that they were all too vulnerable to in the 1970s with Middle Eastern instability and oil price shocks.

Gas production in the USA rose by around 50% between 2007 and 2017.An astronomical surge. It provided security, CO2 reduction, and price falls. How much did prices fall thanks to this wise policy - a policy that did not cost taxpayers a single penny I should add...

Between 2007 and 2017 there was around a 50% drop in the price of natural gas in the US. A 50% drop. The spot price of natural gas halved.

Whereas in the UK, we pathetically pursued a moratorium on fracking. Despite sitting on a wealth of natural gas resources, we chose to abandon them. Chose artificially higher prices. Chose to be beholden to the whims of Mr Putin.

What a sorry, predictable, and entirely avoidable state of affairs.