Keith Johnson writes:  European Union competition officials will likely throw the book at Russian energy giant Gazprom on Wednesday, flexing Brussels’s strongest muscle and potentially reshaping an energy sector that has worked largely to Moscow’s advantage since the 1970s.

EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager is expected to charge Gazprom with a bevy of anti-competitive practices, including denying pipeline access to other energy suppliers and charging discriminatory prices to certain customers.

This threatens to further ratchet up tensions between Brussels and Moscow that have been severely strained over the Ukraine crisis.

The EU case takes aim at three pillars of Gazprom’s longtime business model in the European market, the Russian firm’s biggest outlet for natural gas. At issue are Russian restrictions on the free flow of gas between European countries; limits on third-party access to gas pipelines; and the linkage of gas prices to crude oil prices, which EU officials argue has led to discriminatory pricing. All three practices under investigation potentially undermine Europe’s energy security. If they can be resolved either through negotiations with Gazprom or in the courts, it would help create a genuinely unified European energy market better able to withstand supply shocks.  EU Tightens Screws on Gazprom