While the skies of Brussels witness a renewed oath against "Russian energy blackmail", in other parts of the world they take stock before distributing their adhesions. Within days of each other, Rosatom has begun construction of Egypt's first nuclear power plant and has received an order for two new reactors for Hungary.
The Moscow-based multinational has spent years incorporating candidates into the nuclear club who do not always enjoy the greatest sympathy. From his hand, both Turkey and Bangladesh hope to inaugurate their first reactor next year. They are also under construction in Iran, China or India, although they are new reactors in pre-existing plants.
The list of potential clients is extensive and the consequences foreseeable. The Kremlin, which controls Rosatom, is interested not only in the business itself - which brings in tens of billions of euros - but in its long-term political dividends.
Building a plant takes more than ten years, but that is just the prologue to a technological dependency, if not a management dependency that lasts for decades.
Not even the United States leads by example when it comes to Rosatom. Although it is responsible for the Russian nuclear arsenal and receives orders directly from Vladimir Putin, the company has escaped its sanctions, so as not to increase the bills of American consumers.
US nuclear power plants import 14% of their uranium from Russia, but in addition, another 35% comes from Kazakhstan, where Rosatom also participates in the extraction of three quarters of the tonnage.
The uranium sanctions would also affect other European countries that operate plants with Russian or Soviet technology, such as Bulgaria, the Czech Republic or Slovakia (with two still under construction).
Only Finland, which seems to carry a curse when it comes to nuclear reactors, has dared to stand up. The Fennovoima plant will not be completed and now faces a claim of three billion euros in compensation from Rosatom.
So, although everyone is aware of the key role that the energy bill will play in the outcome of the great Ukrainian game, it is clear that it is not limited to gas and oil.
Rosatom extracts more than a third of the planet's uranium (only 6% in Russia itself) and enriches about half of that consumed by power plants around the world. There is only one plant left in the US capable of doing so, in New Mexico.
Meanwhile, emerging countries like Turkey or Bangladesh believe they will rise in category in 2023, when they connect their first nuclear reactor, built by Russia, to the grid. In both cases, the most expensive project in its history.
Ruppur, on the banks of the Ganges, will cover 15% of Bangladesh's energy needs. 10% in the case of Turkey, where the signing of the agreement with Russia for the Akkuyu plant, next to the Mediterranean, in 2010, changed the image of Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the eyes of some NATO partners.
This was planted and now asks that the first reactor be in time for the centenary of the Republic and elections that are expected to be close. For unclear reasons, Rosatom has just broken the contract with the Turkish construction company, in favor of Russian subsidiaries. Meanwhile, 300 Turkish nuclear engineers have been trained in Russia.
In the Emirates, a year and a half ago, a taboo of decades was broken, with the commissioning of the first Arab nuclear power plant, a few months after recognizing Israel.
Although the construction company was South Korean, Rosatom is listed as a fuel supplier. On the other hand, the pre-agreements signed by Rosatom with Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Morocco and Algeria, at the end of the last decade, remain in limbo.
In a new queue, half a dozen sub-Saharan countries aspire to produce nuclear power with Russian or Chinese assistance within a decade. These are Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Zimbabwe.
Dabaa, west of Alexandria, will be financed by Rosatom and Egypt will not start paying it until 2029, with an interest of 3%, which gives an idea of the importance that the Kremlin attributes to it. The head of Rosatom has defined it as "the largest Russian-Egyptian cooperation project since the Aswan Dam".
The hasty rehabilitation of nuclear power as "green" and "cheap" is going to have an effect. Rosatom, who builds the most reactors, will be there to fish in that troubled river.
