From the capture of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro to the war in the Middle East, 2026 has served as a powerful reminder of oil’s enduring influence in geopolitics and the global economy.

从抓捕委内瑞拉总统马杜罗到中东战火爆发，2026年有力地提醒世人：石油在地缘政治与全球经济中拥有持久的影响力。

Oil has been both a prize, as in Venezuela, and a potent tool of political coercion, as seen in the U.S. blockade that is starving Cuba of energy. And now, after oil breached $100 a barrel for the first time in almost four years, the economic risks of going even a short time without full access to energy from the Persian Gulf are becoming clearer by the day.

在委内瑞拉，石油是一种战利品，在美国封锁古巴、使其陷入能源短缺的情况下，石油又是一种强力政治胁迫工具。如今，在油价近四年来首次突破每桶100美元之后，哪怕只是短期内无法全面获得波斯湾能源的经济风险也正日益凸显。

With oil front and center, it feels almost like revisiting an earlier time, before countries began embracing renewable energy and before the United States became the world’s biggest producer of oil and natural gas.

石油重回舞台中心，这让人仿佛回到过去的年代——那时各国尚未全面接受可再生能源，美国也未成为全球最大石油和天然气生产国。

There is little sign that the war with Iran will cause the kind of economic pain experienced about a half-century ago, when oil met almost half of the world’s energy needs and an embargo by members of an oil cartel caused prices to quadruple in a matter of months. That tipped the U.S. economy into a period of high inflation and stagnant economic growth. But it is clear that going without as much oil and natural gas as the world is used to, even briefly, will strain economies around the world.

目前几乎没有迹象表明，对伊朗的战争会造成大约半个世纪前那样的经济阵痛。当时石油满足全球近半能源需求，石油输出国组织成员实施禁运，油价在数月内涨幅达四倍，将美国经济拖入高通胀与经济增长停滞的困境。但显而易见的是：即便只是短暂失去全球惯常的油气供应，也会给全球经济带来压力。

“The old game is back more than people thought it would ever be,” said Elliott Abrams, who served as a special representative for Iran and Venezuela during the first Trump administration.

“旧的游戏卷土重来，程度远超人们预期，”特朗普第一任期内负责伊朗与委内瑞拉事务的特别代表埃利奥特·艾布拉姆斯表示。

The world remains dependent on reliable oil and gas supplies, even though two-thirds of global spending in the energy sector now go to cleaner alternatives such as solar power that are growing much more quickly.

尽管如今全球能源领域三分之二的支出投向太阳能等增长更快的清洁能源，世界依然依赖可靠的油气供应。

While oil now meets a smaller share of global energy needs than it used to — less than 30 percent, according to the International Energy Agency — the world uses almost twice as much of the fuel as it did in the early 1970s. And natural gas, used to heat homes and generate electricity, underpins much more of the economy than it used to.

尽管石油在全球能源需求中的占比已低于往昔——国际能源署数据显示，这一数字已不足30%，但全球石油消耗量几乎是20世纪70年代初的两倍。而用于家庭供暖和发电的天然气对经济的支撑作用也比过去大得多。

“The post-oil world remains far in the future,” said David Sandalow, a fellow at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy who served in the Clinton and Obama administrations. “We’re in the early to middle stages of an energy transition, but energy transitions take time.”

“后石油时代仍遥遥无期，”曾在克林顿和奥巴马政府任职、现哥伦比亚大学全球能源政策中心研究员戴维·桑德罗表示。“我们正处于能源转型的初期至中期，而能源转型需要时间。”

Of course, disruptions like the war in Iran may accelerate the move to alternative sources of energy, particularly in places that lack easy access to fossil fuels, while pushing countries to use energy more efficiently. U.S. fuel-economy standards are an enduring legacy of the 1973 oil embargo, for example.

当然，伊朗战争这类供应中断可能会加速能源转型，尤其是在化石燃料获取不便的地区，同时推动各国提高能源使用效率。例如，美国的燃油经济性标准就是1973年石油禁运留下的长久遗产。

The widening conflict in the Middle East, which began with U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran on Feb. 28, has all but blocked the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway that serves as the gateway to market for one-fifth of the world’s oil and substantial amounts of natural gas. Several refineries in the region have shut down or cut processing, some after sustaining damage, according to Kpler, a research firm. That means they are turning less oil into fuels like gasoline, diesel and jet fuel.

2月28日美以袭击伊朗引发的中东冲突扩大，几乎封锁了霍尔木兹海峡。这条狭窄水道承载着全球五分之一的石油和大量天然气的外销通道。研究公司克普勒表示，该地区多家炼油厂已停产或减产，部分是因遭受破坏。这意味着原油转化为汽油、柴油和航空燃油等燃料的产能将会减少。

That disruption — and concern that it might last for some time — sent international oil prices up around 37 percent since late February. Fuel prices quickly followed, with especially large gains in the cost of diesel and jet fuel.

这次供应中断，加之市场对其可能持续一段时间的担忧，推动国际油价自2月下旬以来上涨约37%。燃油价格紧随其后，柴油和航空燃油涨幅尤为显著。

上周，加利福尼亚州卡尔斯巴德市的汽油价格已突破每加仑五美元。

Qatar, meantime, stopped cooling natural gas for export last week, citing military attacks. That sent natural gas prices soaring in Europe and in Asia, which depend heavily on imported fuel. The United States, as the world’s top natural gas producer, has been comparatively insulated. (The natural gas market is much more regional than the oil market, largely because the colorless fuel is harder to transport.)

与此同时，卡塔尔上周以遭受军事袭击为由，暂停天然气液化出口，导致高度依赖进口燃料的欧洲和亚洲天然气价格暴涨。作为全球最大天然气生产国，美国相对未受影响。（天然气市场比石油更具区域性，主要因为这种无色燃料更难运输。）

Gasoline and diesel prices have been climbing at a time when many Americans are already worried about the economy and inflation. Many of those economic concerns can be traced to the last major energy disruption, after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

在许多美国人本就担忧经济与通胀之际，汽油和柴油价格持续攀升。这些经济焦虑很大程度上可追溯到2022年俄罗斯入侵乌克兰后的上一次重大能源危机。

Gasoline prices, which briefly topped $5 a gallon that year, had fallen considerably, so much so that the relatively low cost of filling up served as a counterweight to rising prices elsewhere in the economy — and a point of pride for President Trump. The war with Iran carries political risk for Mr. Trump, not least because of the toll that higher energy prices will most likely take on the U.S. economy.

当年美国汽油价格曾短暂突破每加仑五美元，此后大幅回落，低廉的加油成本成为对冲其他领域物价上涨的重要因素，也是特朗普总统引以为傲的政绩。与伊朗的战争对特朗普而言存在政治风险，尤其是高能源价格很可能拖累美国经济。

It is no coincidence that oil has re-emerged as both geopolitical tool and economic threat during a period when the United States is unwinding trading relationships and clashing with other great powers, said Meghan O’Sullivan, a deputy national security adviser for Iraq and Afghanistan under President George W. Bush.

曾在小布什政府负责伊拉克和阿富汗事务的副国家安全顾问梅根·奥沙利文表示，在美国重塑贸易关系并与其他大国发生冲突的时期，石油重新成为地缘政治工具和经济威胁，这并非巧合。

“The energy weapon never went away, but there’s a whole confluence of global conditions — and then individual decisions by the Trump administration and others — that have really brought it back to the fore,” said Dr. O’Sullivan, now a professor at Harvard University’s Kennedy School. “Energy can be a tool of foreign policy, but it can also be an objective.”

“能源武器从未消失，但一系列全球形势叠加特朗普政府等各方的决策，确实让它重新回到前台，”现任哈佛大学肯尼迪学院教授的奥沙利文说，“能源可以是外交政策工具，也可以是政策目标。”

For the latter, look no further than Mr. Trump’s pursuit of oil in Venezuela. And in recent weeks, the United States has blocked Cuba from accessing oil in an attempt to topple the country’s Communist government. Starved of energy, the island nation, which is exceptionally dependent on imported fuel, is facing a humanitarian crisis and widespread power outages.

后者最鲜明的例证莫过于特朗普对委内瑞拉石油的争夺。最近几周，美国切断古巴的石油供应，试图推翻其共产党政府。这个极度依赖进口燃料的岛国因能源匮乏，正面临人道主义危机和大范围停电。

In the Middle East, Iran has leaned on one of its strategic advantages: its ability to disrupt the flow of oil and natural gas through the Persian Gulf and hurt economies around the world.

在中东，伊朗正依靠自身一大战略优势：有能力扰乱波斯湾油气运输，冲击全球经济。

“This is going to underscore yet again how exposed countries are to energy sources that are produced outside their borders,” Dr. O’Sullivan said.

“这将再次凸显各国对境外能源供应的依赖程度，”奥沙利文说。

上周哈瓦那停电期间，人们在面包店外排队。美国的封锁正使古巴陷入能源短缺的困境。

How countries respond to the war in the long run will hinge partly on the severity of the economic fallout from higher energy prices. Reactions are also likely to vary by region, pushing countries in Asia and Europe that do not produce much oil or natural gas to adopt renewable energy faster. The United States, awash in oil and natural gas, may continue to lean into those strengths, at least under Mr. Trump, even though burning the fuels accelerates climate change.

各国对这场战争的长期应对策略部分取决于能源价格上涨带来的经济冲击程度。不同地区反应或将呈现差异：油气匮乏的亚洲和欧洲国家可能加快可再生能源部署；而油气资源丰富的美国，至少在特朗普执政下，可能继续倚重这一优势，尽管燃烧化石燃料会加速气候变化进程。

“For any country that does not have substantial supplies of oil and gas, a no-brainer conclusion is that investment in renewables plus storage is strategic from an energy security point of view,” said Kelly Sims Gallagher, a former Obama administration official who is now dean and professor of energy and environmental policy at Tufts University’s Fletcher School.

“对任何油气资源匮乏的国家来说，一个显而易见的结论是：从能源安全角度看，投资可再生能源及储能具有战略意义，”曾在奥巴马政府任职、现塔夫茨大学弗莱彻学院院长兼能源与环境政策教授凯利·西姆斯·加拉格尔表示。

Clean energy comes with its own geopolitical risks, including greater reliance on China, which dominates the production of everything from solar panels to wind turbines and rechargeable batteries.

清洁能源也伴随地缘政治风险，包括对中国的依赖度上升——中国在太阳能板、风力涡轮机、可充电电池等诸多领域占据主导地位。

But unlike oil and gas, which countries need on an ongoing basis, securing wind and solar equipment is more of a one-time risk. Once a country has the tools to harness the sun and the wind, the energy sources themselves cannot be taken away.

但与各国持续依赖的油气不同，获取风能和太阳能设备更多属于一次性风险。一旦一个国家拥有了利用太阳能和风能的工具，这些能源本身就无法被夺走。

“You can’t weaponize the sun,” said Catherine Wolfram, a deputy assistant secretary for climate and energy economics in the Treasury Department in the Biden administration. “You can’t weaponize the wind.”

“你没法把太阳变成武器，”拜登政府财政部负责气候与能源经济的副助理部长凯瑟琳·沃尔弗拉姆说。“你也没法把风变成武器。”