This month, a group of talented writers from across Europe converged on Berlin to attend a workshop celebrating our inaugural Young Journalist Award. The articles that had won each participant a place at the table spanned subjects as surprising and various as Europe itself: from beggars to bus stations, cheese crackers to the mafia.

There is a slow evolution in Central and Eastern European energy supply and Poland is pushing hardest to ensure that shale gas is at its centre. Rather than pursuing a policy solely of energy independence from Russia though, the pursuit of shale is also part of a broader move to cope with European Union environmental policy.

The extraction of shale gas, still a relatively controversial process that involves injecting pressurised liquid deep into ground rock is a new method in Europe. It is rapidly becoming the next capital investment for countries in the East though, who are desperately seeking to reform outdated, coal based and import reliant energy sectors. By exerting pressure within the European Union, Poland is slowly establishing the necessary conditions to use shale gas to promote growth within the constraints of the EU's climate targets.

Loosening Russia's noose

Russia's influence over much of Europe's energy is hardly disputed. In 2009, during a 22-day dispute between Ukraine and Russia, Gazprom, the Russian owned gas supplier, managed to cut supply to 18 European states. As well as wiping out Ukraine's supply, supply to Bulgaria and Moldova dropped by 100 per cent; Poland by a third, and Germany by 10 per cent, with Slovakia declaring a state of emergency as supply through the Ukrainian pipeline faltered.

The establishment of the Nord Stream pipeline, a gas link that runs directly from Russia to Germany, may have quelled fears in Berlin of any future shortages, but has heightened pressure on those transit countries cut out of the loop. Gazprom's ability to squeeze or halt supplies to Ukraine and Poland in particular, without angering its western customers, has given Russia the strongest economic leverage to use on Eastern Europe since the fall of the Berlin Wall.