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Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

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Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#181

Post by [deleted] »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #37
nisa wrote: post #18

To get some perspective why this is such a hotly debated topic - just got my heating bill for the last year - just a small 2 person flat in a small town - most flats in Germany are heated by gas one way or another - 700€/year with 5.2ct/kWh for 2021 - current market is more like 15ct/kWh and will probably rise. With the rise in rent prices in the last years this could push quite a bit of poor / lower middle class peo…

Have you seen any impact of the Euro's drop against the dollar in your day to day life? Say, things from American companies getting substantially more expensive, or salaries rising to keep pace with American counterparts?

[deleted]

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#182

Post by usrn »

akmarinov wrote: post #67

Break out the coal, boys. It's not like the US is in any way trying to be green. Honestly, China is Earth's best shot at climate change.

China is

1) Not self sufficient, they have to import food from the US

2) Burning nearly a million more cubic feet of coal per capita than the US does (and they have way more people, so that means they're really burning far far more coal)

Honestly I'm not sure how you thought that made any sense.

EDIT: (out of comment quota)

>China also installs more renewables than anyone else

I'm sure that's great for the companies producing those, I'm not convinced that will lead to them burning less coal (although their coming demographic collapse almost certainly will.) Germany was in a pretty similar situation too and the current situation is the consequence.

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#183

Post by cpursley »

theplumber wrote: post #147
cpursley wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are you and your friends okay with this? The increase in energy prices due to EU sanctions are making the Russian state fabulously wealthy right now. Russia has alternative customers, y'all don't have alternative suppliers. If the EU doesn't come to their senses and embrace realpolitik, they are looking at literal deindustrialization and a plunge into mass poverty and social unrest. BMWs aren't built nor homes he…

We can do without energy from a rough state. We have 1-2 hard years ahead but I believe Europe will rebound stronger. It made no sense to have such close relationships with someone like Putin or be so dependent on fossil fuels. I take it as an opportunity for Europe and the whole world.

1-2 hard years? Do you understand how long the infrastructure for the transition takes to plan, sign off on & build?

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#184

Post by klpons »

nisa wrote: post #18

To get some perspective why this is such a hotly debated topic - just got my heating bill for the last year - just a small 2 person flat in a small town - most flats in Germany are heated by gas one way or another - 700€/year with 5.2ct/kWh for 2021 - current market is more like 15ct/kWh and will probably rise. With the rise in rent prices in the last years this could push quite a bit of poor / lower middle class peo…

There is an obvious alternative: The West must stop doubling down every 2 months and seek a diplomatic solution.

The U.S is relatively fine. Europe is being screwed over by the virtue-signaling policies. Europe canceled cheap long term Gazprom contracts and is now buying expensive gas (including from Russia!) on the spot market. Europe buys expensive liquid gas form the U.S.

Meanwhile, China is laughing and buys cheap Russian commodities using RMB instead of Dollars or Euros. India resells Russian oil.

The policies are a disaster, and Europe suffers from not standing up to Nuland, Lindsay Graham et al.

Luhansk/Donetsk are lost. Europe needs to deal with that and ensure that it stops there (don't give me that nonsense about Peter the Great or other propaganda).

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#185

Post by zirror »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #83
oxff wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not recommending to have a nuclear war over who gets to collect vodka taxes in some East European town. I am pointing out that these people let moral foreign policy run their entire trade block and foreign policy choices, and not a cold rational calculus of any kind. All the self-sanctions have come to nothing: they have not and will not materially affect the end result of the war. They've made me, as a citizen i…

Who is to say Russia will stop at Ukraine? They clearly weren't satisfied with Crimea. Is Poland safe? Is Germany? I don't mean to be alarmist but we've seen similar scenarios play out in Europe before. This isn't merely about what's morally correct, it's also about self-interest.

Russia can't win a war against NATO, so they will not attack Poland or Germany. Maybe Moldova or something. This fear mongering is ridiciouslus. They can't even win against Ukraine, for crying out loud. Poland, France, UK, Germany(, Turkey?) would together crush them in a couple of months. Add Finland and Sweden and it gets reduced to weeks. Add the US and it'll take a couple of days. (Hyperbole, but still).

They are hopelessly outclassed in all categories but nukes. And UK/France has a couple of them, so Russia can't nuke willy nilly.

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#186

Post by usrn »

bamboozled wrote: post #171
usrn wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of the reason Germany is still stuck on fossil fuels was the ultimatums of the environmentalists that killed their nuclear power. IMO if they really care about the environment they need to chill out so people can work out how to transition. Hard rules like this will first result in desperation which causes people to make sub-optimal choices like you're seeing now and eventually economic collapse which will absol…

Do we really need to keep blaming hippies? I've read from a few different places now that people who are part of Nordstream were powerful in German politics and had an incentive to push Gas over nuclear. I'm sure there are multiple factors at play.

I'm blaming blindly siding with environmentalists (especially corporate funded ones) without reasoning through the consequences. If you want to call those hippies than yeah I'm blaming the hippies, this is a direct consequence of their actions no matter what you call them. The exact same thing is going to keep happening if they don't change their behavior.

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#187

Post by lolinder »

fsh wrote: post #100
lolinder wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EDIT: This is wrong, as the commenter notes below, this is energy , not electricity . Citation? The number that I consistently see cited is 1/4 of all electricity in EU comes from Natural Gas [0]. [0] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/infographs/energy/bloc-2...

You are citing historical numbers for primary energy (mostly transportation and heating), not for electricity. ElectricityMaps has some live data for electricity generation: https://app.electricitymaps.com

Ah, good catch, my mistake. And thanks for the map! That's exactly what I was looking for.

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#188

Post by oxff »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #133
oxff wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sanctions do nothing to stop this. They're not acting like they're a marketing firm that gets shocked because of some red in the GDP, they're on a war footing. That will only react to, you guessed it, equal force (war).

I mean, are you suggesting we go to war with Russia directly? That's not going to help with the natural gas shortage. I hope it doesn't come to that, but it could some day, I don't know, obviously if Russia attacks... well, in the meantime, I don't think we should be giving Russia more money it can use to further develop its military.

> I mean, are you suggesting we go to war with Russia directly? That's not going to help with the natural gas shortage.

I am stating that going to war with Russia is the only way to walk the walk and be provably morally good over the issue. The sanctions are just a particularly expensive form of virtue signaling that does not alter the outcome of the war, but makes EU leaders Feel Good.

> Don't think we should be giving Russia money it can use to pay its soldiers and build more weapons.

And I disagree, my extended family is already in troubles and the proper price increase doesn't even come until winter.

It's not a "don't think" question either. Would I like to be energy independent? Of course. Can I currently? No, not without risking energy security for winter. So I would pay (but EU has decided it is a Moral Bad, and tells me to warm myself with Moral Good).

Suffering ~10%+ inflation and having no guaranteed energy (all depends on Germany) for moral good boy points only helps nobody, and neither of the conditions alter the material facts on the frontline, nor does it make EU resilient either (economical turmoil has generally been a politically radicalizing agent in democracies).

It is just stupid, hysterical politics.

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#189

Post by bonzini »

bakuninsbart wrote: post #121
yrgulation wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, most europe and the us told germany it relies too much on a single source of energy. Schroeder, Merkel, both were in bed with russia’s oil and gas tsars. Nord Stream’s ceo is a former stasi officer, ursula is corrupt and many many alternative pipelines have been pushed back in favour of we know who. Please dont mix everyone else in. As you can see some german commenters even admit to germany wanting to push for e…

Who in Europe isn't heavily affected by the gas shortage? How is this Germany's fault? To me it seems like a lot of the smaller/weaker countries in Europe just always need a scapegoat to blame when things get difficult.

Italy is a bit less affected because it's closer to Algeria. However we also had politicians trying to stop the pipeline from Turkey to Italy.

Re: Looming natural gas shortages has the EU scrambling for solutions

#190

Post by baisq »

excieve wrote: post #148
nisa wrote: post #18

To get some perspective why this is such a hotly debated topic - just got my heating bill for the last year - just a small 2 person flat in a small town - most flats in Germany are heated by gas one way or another - 700€/year with 5.2ct/kWh for 2021 - current market is more like 15ct/kWh and will probably rise. With the rise in rent prices in the last years this could push quite a bit of poor / lower middle class peo…

As a Ukrainian, I sincerely thank you for writing this. It is often disheartening to see how many people of HN don't realise what is happening (and, frankly, has been happening for 8 years) and then read cold opinions devoid of empathy. What is the compromise when the other side's goal is extermination?

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