I have long thought that the public in Western countries would make waves about the absurdity of suppressing fossil fuels when the price of energy for consumers rose high enough. And to a considerable extent that is already starting to happen.
But the cost of averting fossil fuels is not merely a modest deterioration in our comfortable lifestyles and the impoverishment of the poor. As the situation in Ukraine is now unfolding, the suppression of fossil fuels in the US, Europe and other Western countries also requires significant empowerment of our most important geopolitical opponents, and pose great risks to world security and even to our national security.
The ascension of the Biden administration a year ago brought about an all-out government war on the fossil fuel industries: decommissioning the pipelines; terminate the lease of mineral exploitation rights on Government land and offshore; order that all government agencies work on regulation to remove fossil fuels from electricity generation by 2035; threats by banking regulators to banks lending to fossil fuel industries; SEC initiatives to make it more difficult and expensive for fossil fuel industries; dozens of initiatives in places like the Department of Energy and the Department of the Interior to prevent projects that use fossil fuels or make them more difficult or expensive; and much, much more.
To no one’s surprise, fossil fuel prices have skyrocketed. Crude oil prices went from about $40-60/barrel in the Trump era in the Trump years to almost $100/bbl today. US natural gas prices averaging around $3/MMBtu in Trump years is now around $4.50 (which has skyrocketed over $6 by the end of 2021). In Europe, where virtually all jailbreaking has been suppressed by governments for allegedly caring about the environment, most recent natural gas import prices almost $30 / MMBtu
Certainly, the direct effect of this price increase is to increase costs for consumers: increase electricity bills, increase heating bills in homes, increase the cost of gasoline for cars. For example average price of regular gasoline at the pump station in the US has increased from about $2.25 in January 2021 to about $3.60 today.
But equally important is the extent to which this skyrocketing energy price benefits all of the worst actors in the world, starting with Russia. Russia depends largely on energy production and exports to the West for its government budget. A year ago, with the price of energy in the toilet, Vladimir Putin was basically bankrupt. Today, with energy prices nearly doubling, he is relatively confused. And suddenly we have an invasion of Ukraine, basically sponsored by Western countries that have suppressed their own oil and gas production and therefore have to buy these things from Russia.
So you might ask, why don’t Western countries cut their imports from Russia and leave Putin tall and dry? The simple answer is that Western countries have invested hundreds of billions of dollars in wind and solar energy that do not work and do not provide the necessary energy; so if these countries want to keep the grid running, they need to buy natural gas, which comes mainly from Russia.
Consider Germany. Germany passed it “Energiewende” back in 2010, and the fantasy itself will lead the world to the amazing clean renewable energy future. Germany’s highest electricity usage is around 90 GW. To deliver that, it built a number of Wind power capacity 65 GWand almost 60 GW of solar capacity. So that’s a total of about 125 GW of generating capacity right there, compared with peak usage of about 90 GW. It sounds like they have more than enough wind and sun power alone to take care of all their needs.
But of course wind and sun don’t work that way. Here in winter we have cloudy days, calm winds and long nights. This is a chart from Agora Energiewende on German electricity production and consumption over the past few days:
It appears that shortly after sunset today, wind and sun together generate less than 5 GW of the supposed 125 GW of “capacity.” Usage at the time was about 50 GW. Oh, and Germany is phasing out its nuclear reactors, too. So, aside from a small amount of hydroelectricity and “biomass” at the bottom of the chart, there’s coal, oil and natural gas; or alternatively, power failure. From Time, today:
Order[e] The apparent omission of Biden’s sanctions package could be the result of promises made to European countries, cowering in fear that their dependence on Russian gas made them powerless to fend off invasion. of Russia. This is not without reason. Germany will be particularly affected if Russian gas imports are blocked; Import to Europe 40% natural gas from Russiabut for Germany it up to 50%on top 45% depends on Russian coal and 34% on Russian oil. Meanwhile, Germany is continuing to phase out nuclear, making it more dependent on Russian energy imports.
And of course the US cannot supply these energy needs of Europe because the Biden Administration is deliberately blocking natural gas production there.
Time for a bit of energy realism from the Biden people? Here are the comments from Climate Envoy John Kerry days before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine gets underway:
“But clearly it can have a profoundly negative impact on the climate. You have a war and you will obviously suffer huge emissions consequences for the war. But equally important, you will lose the focus of the people, you will certainly lose the attention of the big countries because they will be deflected and I think it can have a bad effect. . . . ”
It’s almost impossible to understand how stupid and ignorant this guy is. And I don’t necessarily just pick Kerry. That’s all of them, not least Biden himself.
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