The European Union has spent $13 billion on Russian LNG this year - 5 times more than in 2021

• Europe's dependence on Russian liquefied natural gas skyrocketed in 2021.
• High demand from Belgium and France pushed EU spending on Moscow's LNG to $13 billion.
• That's five times as much as a year earlier despite denouncements of Russian energy.

Europe's dependence on liquefied natural gas from Russia has skyrocketed this year while moving away from the country's coal and oil.

The European Union spent roughly $13 billion on Russian-sourced LNG from January of September 2022, according to a report from Bloomberg. That's five times as much as the EU spent on Russian LNG a year earlier, driven by rising demand from Belgium and France.

The surge in LNG imports this year shows the difficulty in punishing Russia for its invasion of Ukraine earlier this year by reducing Europe's use of the Kremlin's energy supplies.

While the EU is working on an oil embargo with more sanctions and has already banned imports of Russian coal, fully banning Russian energy is still a longshot.

Russia is now the second-largest supplier of LNG gas to Northwest Europe so far this year, trailing the US. So far, only the United Kingdom and Baltics have halted purchases of Russian LNG.

The EU said the bloc would replace two-thirds of gas sources from Russia this year in March, and would rely more heavily on LNG. While Russian gas has indeed declined to 10% of the EU's total flows, LNG from Moscow is still close to half of imports.