Commissioned Book Review: Thane Gustafson, Klimat: Russia in the Age of Climate Change
| Author | Zlata Sergeeva |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/14789299221112218 |
| Published date | 01 February 2023 |
| Date | 01 February 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Commissioned Book Review |
Political Studies Review
2023, Vol. 21(1) NP23 –NP24
journals.sagepub.com/home/psrev
Commissioned Book Review
1112218PSW0010.1177/14789299221112218Political Studies ReviewCommissioned Book Review
book-review2022
Commissioned Book Review
Klimat: Russia in the Age of Climate
Change by Thane Gustafson. London:
Harvard University Press, 2021. 321 pp.,
$39.95. ISBN 9780674247437
Traditionally, Russia was perceived as a passive
actor with regard to climate politics. Despite
being the fourth largest greenhouse gas emitter,
it lingered with the adoption of the Paris Agree-
ment, which it ratified only in 2019. However,
in 2020, Russia suddenly ‘woke up’, setting
targets on hydrogen exports in its new Energy
Strategy till 2035, developing Hydrogen
Roadmap and adopting legislation that would
allow the creation of an emissions trading sys-
tem. Even more surprising was Russia’s pledge
to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060 announced
right before COP26 in Glasgow. But are these
steps a serious attempt to fight climate change
or a façade intended to calm down the import-
ers of Russian oil and gas?
This question is examined by Thane
Gustafson in his recent book Klimat: Russia in
the Age of Climate Change. As becomes clear
from his analysis, the influence of energy transi-
tion is going to be tremendous for all economic
sectors of Russia – however, the influence of
Russia on energy transition will be negligible,
to a large extent because of the country’s
declining involvement with the world econ-
omy, and superficial attempts to adapt to struc-
tural changes in the world energy. The book’s
main message is that the indirect effects of
the energy transition, which by now became
irreversible, will be the chief determinants of
Russian wealth and power by 2050. And only
the timely measures – which are currently lack-
ing – will prevent the country from becoming a
‘declining power’.
The author organized the book in nine chap-
ters, five of which describe each sector of the
Russian energy industry – oil, natural gas (includ-
ing LNG and hydrogen), coal, renewables and
nuclear power. The three latter chapters have dif-
ferent logic. Two of them are devoted to the agri-
cultural sector and metals, which are going to
suffer most from the direct (such as drought) and
indirect (such as carbon pricing) consequences of
climate change and related policies. Another
chapter describes the Arctic – the polar region in
Russia, where the mean temperatures are rising
five to seven times faster than in the rest of the
world.
Carefully walking the reader through all
peculiarities of Russian economy and politics,
Thane Gustafson introduces key personalities
from the industry and government that shape
climate debate in the country and explains their
motivation on taking a particular position.
According to the author, there are four major
groups of stakeholders, most of which use the
climate change agenda in the fight for gaining
domestic political resources. Gustafson also
gives a succinct but with all necessary details
background for each sector and explains how it
developed to the current situation and what par-
ticular challenges and opportunities arise for it
from the energy transition. The picture is not
encouraging: despite several success stories in
the past and present, all sectors apart from
nuclear are not prepared for the major transfor-
mation that lies ahead. Thus, the oil sector in
Russia is dominated by the narrative that global
oil consumption will increase by 2040, and at
the same time is suffering from declining pro-
duction from the brownfields and rising costs
from the greenfield projects, which will result
in the declining net value of oil export even in
the near term. As for coal, the demand for it is
bound to fade beyond 2030, even despite short-
term increase in its consumption in Asia.
Natural gas, which, on the contrary, is expected
to boom within next decades, will still be
unable to compensate for the declining oil
revenues. Renewable sector, which cannot be
called mature in Russia, won’t be able to serve as
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