Analysis of Energy Security Provision in the European Countries

In this paper, different approaches to understanding the concept of “energy security” were considered through the prism of factors that affect its level and methods of its evaluation. An assessment of the energy security level was conducted based on the Shannon-Wiener index for 15 countries in Europe (Austria, Great Britain, Greece, Ireland, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Germany, Norway, Poland, Ukraine, Switzerland, and Sweden) in the period 1985–2014. The impact of fuel prices, in particular, oil and natural gas, on the level of energy security in these countries have been researched. The grouping of these countries into clusters was carried out on the basis of the calculated value of the Shannon-Wiener index. As the structure of energy consumption in Austria, Greece, Norway, and Poland is diverse, that is, they consume different sources of energy (oil, natural gas, hydropower, nuclear power plants, renewable energy) in a more even way than those that have fallen into other clusters. In addition, the prediction of the level of energy security (the Shannon-Wiener index) was calculated for Ukraine by classical forecasting methods, the Holt-Winters method, using the Hodrick–Prescott filter, simple linear regression, and using trend lines. An absolute majority of forecasts have shown that Ukraine’s energy security level will slightly increase from its current level in 2015–2017. It says there is no reason to talk about sufficient improvement of the diversification of resource supply.