Israel is very much an isolated nation when it comes to energy. Until recently, Israel had virtually none of its own energy and was dependent on outside sources to even light a lightbulb.
This caused huge potential security problems for this small country. It imported coal and had an agreement with Egypt to supply oil and natural gas, making it vulnerable to changing and hostile Mid East political turmoil.
The recent removal of Hosni Mubarrak, Egypt's long term leader and friend of Israel, saw the reins of power change. Almost immediately friction began between the countries. The pipeline from Egypt’s natural gas fields to supply Israel was sabotaged more than 14 times, making it unusable.
In April, the new regime in Egypt, by now headed by the Muslim Brotherhood, decided to cancel the long term natural gas supply contract with Israel.
This could have been a devastating blow, possibly forcing a war for energy, a nations lifeblood. But in a dramatic, almost biblical turn of events, Israel had been rescued from the Egyptian decree by the discovery of huge natural gas fields off its coast.
The size of this discovery turns Israel into a long term, energy independent country. They have more than enough gas to become an energy exporter. This is game changing and history making at the same time…..As though a hand again parted the water to rescue the Israelis.
When I asked Danny Danon about this huge turn of events, his response was: “We were very lucky when we found the gas and within a year we expect to be transferring the gas from the sea into our power grid".
Danon expects to see his country become a major exporter of gas to its neighbors, as well as Europe. Israel will no longer need to import coal or gas for its power. Danon "hopes that Israel’s cutting edge technology companies will find a way to get it off the use of oil to power its cars." His aim is to "have the tech able to transform the countries fleet of cars to electric power and not have to import a drop of oil, since they will have an abundance of electric generation."
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