Germany Moves To Expropriate Energy Firms In Case Of Emergency

The lower house of the German Parliament approved a bill on Thursday that could allow the government to place energy firms under trusteeship if the security of supply in Germany is threatened. Europe’s largest economy, Germany, is a major buyer of Russian natural gas and oil and has been preparing for two months for the possibility that fossil fuel supplies from Russia could be disrupted either because of sanctions or retaliatory moves from Moscow to cut—or cut off—the supply of oil and/or natural gas. Now the German lawmakers…