Now, however, Russia may be reaching for an energy weapon it has previously been reluctant to use – nuclear fuel that keeps the lights on in millions of US households.
On Friday, the Kremlin said it was imposing temporary restrictions on exports of enriched uranium to the US. The exact timing and duration of the measures was not made immediately clear.
US nuclear power plant operators rely on Russia for more than a quarter of their supplies – a legacy of the post-Cold War “megatons to megawatts” programme that saw Moscow agree to convert large parts of its vast nuclear weapons stockpile into fuel.
Industry sources stressed that the impact of Russia’s export ban will not be felt immediately because orders are placed well in advance.
Still, the move has the potential to cause havoc in the relatively fragile global uranium supply chain. Russia is the world’s sixth biggest uranium producer and controls about 44pc of global enrichment capacity, making it a key international player.
This is why the country’s state nuclear company, Rosatom, for so long escaped Western sanctions related to the Ukraine conflict. Thanks to this, Russia still generates about $3.1bn (£2.4bn) a year from nuclear exports, including $905m from exports to the US, according to trade data first reported by Tortoise.
American law makers took a first step to remedy the situation in May, when they passed a bill requiring imports of Russian uranium to stop from August. However, the bill included significant exemptions that allow US utilities to carry on importing the Russian supplies until 2027 to avoid supply shortages.
Experts say the decree announced by Moscow on Friday at the very least appears to mirror those restrictions, suggesting that exports to the US could still continue. Earlier this month, on the eve of the Russian ban, US nuclear giant Westinghouse received a shipment of enriched uranium via an ARRC Line tanker, according to Russian media.
And on Monday, Rosatom said exports to the US would “continue unchanged” to customers with contracts for the time being.
But there are fears that Putin’s latest move opens the door to changes that go beyond symbolic tit-for-tat measures.
Some analysts believe it could soon lead to a “Cigar Lake moment”, a reference to the flooding of a mine run by Canadian giant Cameco in 2006 that sent uranium prices surging.
There were early signs of this on Monday as the spot price for raw uranium surged from the one-year low of $76.50 per pound to $82.