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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

#251

Post by throwaway0a5e »

killjoywashere wrote: post #130
nisa wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am on the margin. So is my family. I'm getting by fine at the moment but I'm just a little above the poverty line but have no reserves. I have no choice anyway. I just hope that if I can't pay the bills there will be a moratorium to cut energy for a while. I'm trying to buildup a reserve for a few months exactly for that situation. It's also not clear when the price hikes will hit the consumers so I hope I have a f…

A large-scale theme in humanity that usually goes unnoticed is how much more the poor are willing accept privations and duties in the name of patriotism. They are also more charitable on a per-cent basis, and certainly on a marginal per-cent basis.

>the poor are willing accept privations and duties in the name of patriotism

Not everyone agrees on what patriotism means or what actions are patriotic or good for the nation. Tolerating a few abstract points off your GDP because people you don't like voted your country out of the EU easy enough so people put up with it. You are not going to get a nation to put up with serious hardship like what the energy situation is shaping up to do unless everyone is on the same page about what the end goal is.

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

#252

Post by belorn »

baisq wrote: post #190
excieve wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Quoted post unavailable.

We should all be worried when the war goal is Lebensraum. It was the leading motivation for world war 2, and there can never really be an end to the ambition of colonialism through war.

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

#253

Post by Scarblac »

hans1729 wrote: post #206
jonah wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long-term vs. short-term thinking. Would you rather be colder in the winter for a couple years or live in a warzone and have your family killed and culture destroyed?

This asserts that Russian aggression would transcend across NATO-borders. Is that a given? 1. Party Z invades Country U. 2. Continent C denounces the invasion of U and sanctions Z. 3. Z retaliates against C. Does an act of retaliation (weaponizing Gas) from Z towards C count a declaration of war? Because if not, who exactly did Russia declare war on? Europe is many things, most prominently a continent and an idea. Wa…

I see cutting off the EU's has supply as very similar to war, and they started doing that last November. So they will again, the moment the EU doesn't do exactly what Russia says.

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

#254

Post by theplumber »

usrn wrote: post #186
bamboozled wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

We invested more in oil and gas than in renewables so I think you should blame oil and gas more than environmentalists

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

#255

Post by veeti »

pydry wrote: post #173
veeti wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many of those pensioners naively participated in Germany's anti-nuclear movement in the 70's, 80's, 90's? You reap what you sow. No sympathy for Russian puppets.

It's kind of amazing that Germany can make the biggest effort of any western country to switch over to renewables and when they start suffering because America and Russia decided they want a proxy fight, Americans opine that Germany should be suffering because they decided to switch off a source of 4% of their power and didnt build enough port capacity for overpriced American LNG. If this truly is the official Americ…

Thanks, but I'm from Finland and like the rest of Europe we had enough of Germany's bullshit.

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

#256

Post by xyzzyz »

XCSme wrote: post #203
xyzzyz wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Europe, much fewer people live in houses, and thanks to the dense, walkable cities they enjoy, they have much fewer roof and yard space to put the panels. Also, unlike US, most of Europe doesn’t have huge swaths of hot and sunny plains that are currently not used for anything valuable. Look at the satellite view of Germany, France or Poland: it’s all farms, with occasional forests.

I do live in Europe and lived in various European countries, that being said the apartment buildings could also have a similar solution (their own solar panel/wind turbine/geothermal) OR simply do that in a more localized way (each city has their own solar/wind farms). Combine this with more regulations regarding energy saving/consumption (promote more efficient electric devices). In the end I see it as having multip…

> the apartment buildings could also have a similar solution (their own solar panel/wind turbine/geothermal)

They can’t, though. Apartment buildings are too efficient at packing people together to have enough per capita roof square metrage for panels. Practical wind turbines are huge. A typical wind turbine blade is longer than the height of a 10 story building. Geothermal is also rather impractical as a source of energy, due to low thermal conductivity of the rock.

> In the end I see it as having multiple independent energy-generating clusters (each building, or each city, or each country) and sharing excess energy outside the cluster only when needed.

You are describing here exactly the current status quo. That how energy works right now.

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

#257

Post by btilly »

klpons wrote: post #184
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 chea…

No. Absolutely not.

You can't understand anything Russia does until you understand that it has a bully's mindset. Anything you negotiate with them just emboldens them to do more to you later. When confronted, they escalate but there is a lot less muscle behind that than it seems.

Therefore any negotiation of the kind that you describe will embolden them to reach for more as soon as they think they can. Appeasing Russia will no more prevent further aggression than giving Czechoslovakia to Hitler avoided WW 2.

Also you completely misunderstand the war situation. The current phase has been a war of attrition with a slow retreat. The Ukrainian counteroffensive will come in August or September, once Russia's ability to wage war has been exhausted. From projects that I've seen, it is an even bet whether there will be a COMPLETE Russian collapse before the end of the year. (Yes, they won't even get to keep Crimea.)

If you want to understand the military situation in detail, I recommend https://www.understandingwar.org/publications. You don't have to follow it in detail. For example if you'd read https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offens... a couple of months ago, you'd understand everything you need to understand to realize that Russia won't be able to hold the territory that they have taken.

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

#258

Post by cpursley »

kennywinker wrote: post #201
cpursley wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but the sanctions are obviously backfiring on Europeans and not hurting the Russians by any objective measure. I agree on the transition, but where are the bids, construction, etc for new LNG terminals and other replacements? All I see is "Putin bad" talk and no action on what's actually required. But hey, at least no more Russian athletes and violinists!

> the sanctions are obviously backfiring on Europeans and not hurting the Russians by any objective measure I’m not sure that’s an accurate summary of the situation. > "If the goal is a quick and complete collapse of the Russian economy, then no, sanctions are not working because the Russian economy is still functioning. But if the goal is to weaken Russia economically over time, then sanctions are 100% working." htt…

Except that it's not. The ruble is the best performing currency in 2022, inflation is not as bad as predicted, shelves in Russia are full and Russian state tax revenue is way up (they raised pensions and mimimum wage by 10%).

Sure, there is some pain - but there's this little thing called import substitution. The Chinese and Turks are happy to oblige (machines, vehicles). The sanctions are just making Russia more independent and resilient.

If anything, people have underestimated Russia in a big way. Well, those who weren't paying attention.

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

#259

Post by belorn »

skrause wrote: post #204
danans wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Still me and all of my friends are still fine with this. There is no alternative anyway There is an alternative: heat pumps. The problem is the upfront cost, which needs to be lowered through economies of scale.

Heat pumps are not an alternative in the next few years because there are not enough available on the market. I know someone who wanted to buy one for his house in Germany and the waiting list is more than 1-2 years right now.

Couldn't German industry produce more of them? Heat pumps seems like a technology which isn't import dependent in the way that natural gas is, especially if the government were there to help with funding.

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

#260

Post by wewxjfq »

TheLoafOfBread wrote: post #234
wewxjfq wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every year Germany has been a net electricity exporter. If other countries buy German electricity, it means they can't produce it cheaper. You know who is paying by far the highest spot prices in Europe causing prices to go up? France.

Exporter with massive asterisk. They are exporting electricity during summer, when it is cheap and nobody needs it and importing it during winter when it is expensive.

Germany sees peak exports during winter months. You have no idea what you are talking about.
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