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Russian gas flows to Europe

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Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#91

Post by OtomotO »

rhn_mk1 wrote: post #84
OtomotO wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's be fair: it's clean on the CO2 front, but the nuclear waste will be relevant for 100.000 years! That is way, way longer than we have anything like civilization!

At the moment it seems that the CO2 problem is more pressing and of greater magnitude than the problem of nuclear waste. It sounds like a relevant tradeoff.

Yes, logically I agree. I'd rather the species sees another millenium to deal with this, than "go extinct" before.

Yet that is half the reason for the drama. The other half being Fukushima and Chernobyl.

Humans are not rational beings, hence we need to look at where their fear comes from, to find appropriate solutions.

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#92

Post by formerly_proven »

clemensley wrote: post #87
ivan_gammel wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with nuclear is simply that it is irrelevant to the current situation. Won’t add enough energy to the grid, won’t solve the problem of gas demand at all, so it really doesn’t matter if Germany was right or wrong about it.

France is produces 75% of its energy with nuclear. https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profil... A German produces almost twice as much CO2 as a Frenchmen. https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-pe...

Yes, Germans have been wrong about nuclear.

No, nobody will admit to that or change their minds, the end of nuclear in Germany will be celebrated as a success for the environment.

No, changing the opinion now would not matter. Germany killed its nuclear industry decades ago. Being right about this would have mattered in the 80s and 90s. You don't get the CO2 or methane that has been emitted back into the ground or the people that died out of the ground by being right in 2022.

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#93

Post by _xnmw »

It's far too late to change this. You cannot restructure the energy sources of a whole continent in a few months or even years. This could've been fixed if the West had understood and reacted appropriately to the magnitude of the Russian threat about 10 years ago, as foreseen by academics like Stephen Cohen and businessmen like Bill Browder, instead of blindly falling for its own hubristic self-delusion (which continues till today), i.e. the delusion of considering the West to be omnipotent and the delusion of considering Russia to be an irrelevant, backward, economically insignificant country (Obama famously called it a "regional power" much to the chagrin of Putin). But the West is too decadent, fat, and blind to see anything but its own narrative of post-cold-war unipolar dominance.

The worst part is, this delusion of believing in Western omnipotence continues fuelling bad decisions today. I was in Kharkiv, Ukraine when the war hit -- there were two major delusions prevalent in the weeks and months leading up to the war. 1. People believed the war could not happen because we believed our American superpower ally would somehow magically prevent the war or stop it quickly, or 2. we believed our leaders would have the sense to settle with Russia instead of destroying our country. 4 months later after losing 20% of our territory, both fantasies evaporated quickly, but I'm astounded at how many people continue to live in the 3rd fantasy of believing Ukraine could somehow "defeat" Russia while still avoiding WW3. Do people understand what a defeat of Russia would look like? Are you trying to bring a global thermonuclear war apocalypse? What is your endgame here?

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#94

Post by fulvioterzapi »

Arnt wrote: post #80
clemensley wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't summarizing the article, I was providing a source for my statement. It's irrational that Germany is shutting down secure and climate friendly power plants while Europe is in the midst of an energy crises and a war. The reason for the irrationality is that Germans (I'm one) do not want to admit that they've been wrong about nuclear energy for decades.

It seems irrational because that's not what's happening. Those power plants can't be run next winter. Contracts have been terminated, replacement parts with long lead times haven't been ordered, maintenance windows have been shifted in anticipation of the shutdown. It's possible to write new contracts and order new parts, so they could be back in operation, maybe sometime late in 2023. But that would still leave them…

> Contracts have been terminated, replacement parts with long lead times haven't been ordered, maintenance windows have been shifted in anticipation of the shutdown.

Sounds like a long list of lame excuses.

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#95

Post by kzrdude »

Arnt wrote: post #80
clemensley wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't summarizing the article, I was providing a source for my statement. It's irrational that Germany is shutting down secure and climate friendly power plants while Europe is in the midst of an energy crises and a war. The reason for the irrationality is that Germans (I'm one) do not want to admit that they've been wrong about nuclear energy for decades.

It seems irrational because that's not what's happening. Those power plants can't be run next winter. Contracts have been terminated, replacement parts with long lead times haven't been ordered, maintenance windows have been shifted in anticipation of the shutdown. It's possible to write new contracts and order new parts, so they could be back in operation, maybe sometime late in 2023. But that would still leave them…

We don't know what Europe looks like in 2023 but the electricity will probably be useful then too.

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#96

Post by markvdb »

difosfor wrote: post #15
shmerl wrote: post #7

How fast did the rest of Europe cut ties with Nazi Germany after World War II started? Current level of feeding Russia's war machine looks bizarre.

What's the alternative though? I also wish we would completely stop paying Russia, but this will come at incredible financial and stability (i.e: Europe falling apart) costs. Perhaps we should increase our spending on ending the war sooner instead. I don't know. We're caught between a rock and a hard place.

EU level energy emergency measures. So much time lost already since late February. Measures would have to radically focus on short term returns to yield a timely effect.

Some ideas to evaluate, in no particular order. Some are (close to mainstream), others elephant's shit:

- accelerated LNG terminal buildouts (butchering Nordstream 2 and making it a terminal at the coast, ...)

- EU level natural gas purchasing

- carrots for lowering per capita energy consumption: insulation, contests, subsidies, ...

- temporary ban on use of cars with >= 3l engines

- 100 km/h EU wide maximum speed limit

- no private jet traffic except for medical emergencies

- temporarily extend/unmothball coal and nuclear electricity plants - temporary regulatory relaxation on wood harvesting for heating purposes

- 24/7 production at any and every solar panel, wind turbine, insulation and heat pump manufacturer - faster rollout of planned (hvdc) interconnects - EU wide helicopter money for paying energy bills or lowering them: per capita, differentiated by climate zone

- (possibly) concentrate large solar and green hydrogen projects in southern EU (higher immediate returns)

- intensive direct wage support for employees in temporarily loss-leading energy intensive sectors

- ..._

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#97

Post by kzrdude »

formerly_proven wrote: post #92
clemensley wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

France is produces 75% of its energy with nuclear. https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profil... A German produces almost twice as much CO2 as a Frenchmen. https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-pe...

Yes, Germans have been wrong about nuclear. No, nobody will admit to that or change their minds, the end of nuclear in Germany will be celebrated as a success for the environment. No, changing the opinion now would not matter. Germany killed its nuclear industry decades ago. Being right about this would have mattered in the 80s and 90s. You don't get the CO2 or methane that has been emitted back into the ground or th…

The second best time to change course is today.

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#98

Post by _ph_ »

qbasic_forever wrote: post #60
jacquesm wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you can imagine isn't all that relevant though, once the decision to mothball an installation of this size is made it isn't as though you decide to run your car for another year. This is a massive infrastructure project, with all kind of regulatory hoops they need to jump through to operate safely, including training of employees, gear certification and so on. Starting things back up again could well be a multi-…

Germany's GDP is 4 trillion dollars, its government budget is over 400 billion. Refurbing 3 nuke plants is nothing with those resources. The entire manhattan project that pioneered nuclear power only cost about 50 billion in today's money, but they aren't even starting from scratch like that. If they wanted it to happen I can't see any financial or technical blocker.

Sure, but why bother? These 3 plants would only add a tiny bit to the German electricty production. They really won't be missed. And they cannot be used to replace gas, as gas power plants are used for quick responses, not base load.

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#99

Post by _ph_ »

qbasic_forever wrote: post #62
turbinerneiter wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany still does not have a solution for the nuclear waste. Nobody wants it. All the pro nuclear people turn into anti nuclear people once their region is looked at for a nuclear waste disposal site. Recently a former conservative minister got an award for fighting against wind power which is named after a former key figure of the early green movement in Germany, wo later dropped out to figth against wind turbines.…

Freezing to death this winter because your source of fuel oil is now your geopolitical enemy seems like a more pressing problem than the tiny amount of waste 3 plants will generate decades from now.

To prevent "freezing to death" would require heating, not electricity, which Germany has enough. It is the house heating that is powered by gas. And no one is going to freeze to death, the question is only the impact onto industry.

Re: Russian gas flows to Europe

#100

Post by clemensley »

Arnt wrote: post #89
clemensley wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no dispute about the safety of nuclear. We have statistics going back decades. https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy#:~:text=... .

Germany's shutting those down because of the Fukushima disaster. A lot of Germans believe (rightly or wrongly) that Japanese are as quality-conscious and dependable as they themselves. Corollary: if the Japanese can fuck up in the ways that led to Fukushima, then the German operators can fuck up in similar ways. Now, these people may be wrong. But they made the decision. Until Fukushima, there was a net pro-nuclear v…

Did you know that most likely nobody died from radiation after Fukushima? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disa...
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