To cut off a significant supply of cash to the Kremlin, European Union countries will vote next week to implement a phased elimination of Russian fossil fuel imports as punishment for the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the New York Times reports.

While it was generally agreed among the member to stop the flow of Russian energy, the European nations had to develop plans to offset the loss of Russian fuel from other sources because the countries rely heavily on those sources.  Last week, Lithuania deployed a floating liquid natural gas processing ship that converts LNG back to gas for distribution through their gas system, allowing the nation to use LNG tankers instead of the Russian pipeline.

The immediate impact of the embargo will be scores of Russian tankers turned away from European ports.  The second stage will be weening European countries away from Russian pipeline supplies, with gas likely coming from the United States and other allied nations. 

European nations have been preparing for this action by adapting other sources of energy–like solar, wind, nuclear and hydro–to handle more of the power-generating duties, a move that will have long-term benefit to the countries by reducing their dependence of fossil fuels coming from Russia and providing additional security for their power production.

“The problem that seemed very large for Germany only a few weeks ago has become much smaller,” Germany’s energy minister, Robert Habeck told the news media during a visit to Warsaw on Tuesday. He added, “Germany has come very, very close to independence from Russian oil imports.”