Due to the high demand for natural gas from emerging countries and because natural gas has become an increasingly valuable resource is electricity production, natural gas demand should increase. This paper re-examines the geopolitical key issues related to natural gas as well as the uneven distribution of natural gas resources on a worldwide scale. This paper proposes to define the significance of liquefied natural gas in gas exchanges and it analyses the problem of European gas vulnerability using several indicators. (c) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.