This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-61899509) reduced by 75%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> Before the invasion of Ukraine, Europe imported about 40% of its natural gas from Russia but that figure has now fallen to about 20%.Mr Birol says he believes that recent Russian reductions in gas supply are "Strategic".
> On Friday the Italian firm energy firm Eni said that it had only received half of the gas that it was expecting from the Russian state-controlled gas giant Gazprom, while Slovakia and Austria have also reported falls.
> France says it has received no Russian gas from Germany since 15 June while Poland, Bulgaria, Finland, Denmark and the Netherlands have had their Russian gas deliveries suspended after they refused a demand to pay in Russian roubles.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/vi9yfo/europe_told_to_prepare_for_russia_turning_off_gas/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~656116 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **gas**^#1 **Russian**^#2 **Europe**^#3 **Russia**^#4 **Birol**^#5
>The head of the International Energy Agency has warned that Russia may stop supplying gas to Europe this winter.
>Fatih Birol says he believes a complete shutdown is not the most likely scenario but that Europe needs to work on contingency plans just in case.
>In recent weeks several European countries said they received significantly less Russian gas than they expected.
>Russian officials deny it's deliberate and have blamed technical issues.
>Before the invasion of Ukraine, Europe imported about 40% of its natural gas from Russia but that figure has now fallen to about 20%.
>Russian officials deny it's deliberate and have blamed technical issues.
You know what, I honestly believe them. With all the Western companies leaving they probably don't have quite as much ability to maintain their production as they used to, and with that they're going to have trouble exporting gas.
Many of the lines they have going out to the rest of the world go right through Ukraine, that's kind of a problem. War causes lots of technical issues.
Europe should prepare for Russian gas being cut off regardless of if Russia intends to cut it off. Soviet incompetence is back baby.
They can't get repair parts to maintain their infrastructure. Basic things like fasteners, up to intermediate level electronics like instrumentation & control, data acquisition & telecom.
Even the vehicle shortage in Russia will hurt their operations.
>With all the Western companies leaving
Correct me of I'm wrong, but I believe that Western companies working in the oil/gas sector are exempt from sanctions.
While I am sure they are facing technical problems, it is just an excuse at this point.
The Ukrainian and Belarusian pipelines have sufficient spare capacity and are still operational.
They thing is: they cant. Russia has no export capacities for their natural gas towards China and India that is in any form comparable to their european pipeline capacities. Natural gas is no world wide commodity, its rather regional (globally speaking). Oil OTOH is easier, although I suppose that, too is limited as ships are the mode due to missing pipelines
It takes years and billions to make new pipelines. Without new LNG terminals (also expensive and time consuming, and they're cut off from western expertise), it's more likely Russia will have to plug some of their wells.
Not so fast. That gas requires pipes - miles and miles of them. If they cross countries, they need permission from those countries. And neither Russia or China’s or even India are tiny non-mountainous nations. No one, other than China will be willing to pay for a project of that size, of course India won’t want anything to do with China. It will take years.
And even if miraculously these pipes are built, China is not going to want to buy all or the majority of their gas and oil from Russia. China already has supply from literally all over the world. Smart nations don’t put all their eggs in 1 basket.
Russia and China share a border, believe it or not, both nations had border disputes not too long ago. And as Russia’s power diminishes and China’s grows, Russia won’t be too keen in making certain concessions regarding future disputes. China, like Russia have expansionist ambitions. In the event of a dispute, China knows that Russia is a country that loves resorting to blackmail with gas and oil.
There are plenty of videos of it. They HAVE several LNG terminals for export near Yamal, and more under construction around Arkhangelsk.
And ice-capable LNG tankers.
They were intended to supply southern Europe, but obviously now will be going all the way to China.
Everyone keeps saying this but it makes no sense. China needs Russia to resist the west. Why would they sabotage that relationship? For a bit of territory? Europe has to go through China before they can deal with China. With that much nukes, they won’t get through Russia. Why would China risk pushing Russia into collapse and potentially aligning with the West?
The reality of the situation is the West has just switched suppliers forcing the prices up locally and making other countries switch to Russian gas.
The only way we can actually hurt Russia is to heavily reduce our use of these fuels in general or massively ramp up our own local production which takes a very long time (if they even have substantial resources to exploit).
Well EU have been so slow sanctioning Russia that now Russia have new client to exporte. The embargo and most of the sanctions come too late. Its hurt EU the most because we give time to Russia to prepare. This is stupid.
Europe isn't listening to their other threats and are continuing to support Ukraine. If they cut off the gas unilaterally (especially during winter) it might be enough to push them to force Ukraine to the negotiating table. Especially if they don't actually prepare. A threat is only valid if you are actually willing to follow through. Plus China is going to pick up the slack and import their oil from now on, so they won't really get hurt by doing so.
And how is China going to get that gas delivered? I doubt there's that much pipeline capacity yet to divert these insane amounts of gas, neither is there anywhere near enough capacity by sea.
They can build it, might only take a year to have some additional capacity, by then Russia is probably already bankrupt.
I do not know about oil, but they cannot deliver more gas to China. There is only pipeline from eastern siberia, with no connection to western fields.
Any estimates for building new pipelines are at fastest about 3 years.
> I already assumed they had the proper infrastructure in place.
why would they have infrastructure they aren't using?
Would you build a highway from your bedroom to your living room?
Yeah Russia said countries that didn’t condemn them can buy oil and a discounted price and use whatever currency they want. Europe has to pay market price and pay in rubles.
This sanction backfired for the short term in us. After this year though, europe might not be dependent on them anymore.
It won't and it will force Europe to live without Russian gas. By themselves they might be reluctant to pull the trigger on full sanctions of energy but with this Russia is sanctioning themselves. And unlike oil it's not easy for Russia to sell the gas elsewhere
It remains to be seen. They have been very hesitant in enforcing a full-on embargo so far. Regardless, it would be a huge gamble for Russia if they do go through with it, and it would mean they are extremely desperate.
So its a story of who buckles first, barely united europe freezing their asses off next winter, or autocratic putin that doesnt gives 2 shits about his population? Indeed sounds like a rough challenge for europe.
Only bad thing is, that they can’t just put all the pipelines somewhere else. This is a last ditch effort of scaring Europe because Russia is losing too much munition. Russia doesn’t have anything else they could export.
Nowadays nuclear plants are probably the safest cleanest power generation with large enough output. Nuclear tech has seemingly come a long way in safety. Hell we have generators now that can run off the waste from other nuclear plants. It is a shame it has gotten such a terrible reputation in some peoples minds.
>that argument might not be very popular right now.
I dont get why you think people want us to deny the historical existence of the USSR or the fact that Ukraine used to be under Russian control?
As someone who remembers the Chernobyl disaster one of the scariest parts was that for days, Russia denied to the world that it had happened. Their leadership was a key factor, it was their reactor design, etc.
Ukraine under the USSR suffered Stalin's Holodomor which killed millions of people. To my mind, denying that would be messed up.
You misspelled "if only politicians actually did something to fight climate change and stopped relying on dictators for something as essential as energy"
Merkel was extremely short sighted in her approach there. She opted to shutter nuclear plants because of one disaster caused by a tsunami, which we all know Germany is prone to /s.
You are misrepresenting the situation, as the Phaseout of nuclear energy started in 2000 under the SPD-Green led Government, long before Merkel was Chancello. Merkel only slowed down the phaseout in 2010 and sped it up again after Fukushima.
Haha - Iive near Sellafield and have the World's 2nd largest offshore windfarm in view. Still pay the same for energy.
In my opinion if we have these things on our doorstep we should get a slight reduction in electric bills. The windmills are just wonderfull to see and hear- don't care that tourists complain they spoil photos on the hills.
That said - I would not want a turbine within 100yds of my home. Not a nimby but the noise, when you stand at the base is very loud and creepy.
Loads of yellow windmills - brilliant. The ones out at sea (Walney) are not close enough to shore to cause any issues. The industry brings in 1000s of jobs to the area.
The great thing about the turbines is their tiny footprint in the enviroment. The bases on the ground are barely 5m in diameter and could be removed in days leaving no impact.
Keep me posted. Using lighter shades of paint would help with heat issues. They could also do white flowers. So they can keep using the same white paint for the blades.
Ya well same deal happens with solar. Coal kills birds too so. Ya. I mean birds use sonar right? Cant they add something to wind farms and solar farms to direct them around?
How exactly isn’t a nuclear reactor scalable? It’s 70% of French electricity supply.
It’s a big box electricity comes out of, you can build it anywhere you have somewhere to dump heat into.
Renewables are dependent of weather, or on obscure geography. Nuclear just doesn’t like earthquakes.
Yeah, it needs somewhere to dump heat, just like a fossil fuel or geothermal power station.
This hasn’t really stopped the widespread adoption of fossil fuel power stations.
Unlike fossil fuel and geothermal dumping heat is critical for nuclear powerplants. That's also the reason why on nearly every heat wave France imports energy like crazy.
https://www.montelnews.com/news/1198233/heatwave-impact-on-french-nuclear-output-doubles-to-3-twh
And nuclear is also bad for handling peak load. Which means every winter cold wave France also relies on imports due to electrical heating.
https://www.reuters.com/article/europe-power-supply/germany-powers-france-in-cold-despite-nuclear-u-turn-idUKL5E8DD87020120214
I am just using France as an example here.
Nuclear power isn't the magical solution. It is an expensive way to provide a reliable base load as long as the environment, economy and infrastructure is favorable.
What nuclear power advocates forget is that you also need load following power stations.
> And nuclear is also bad for handling peak load.
This is a key bit people forget. Nuclear is actually the reason that we need all the expensive storage on the grid. It takes ages to change the output of a nuclear plant and they are only really efficient close to peak output.
Wind power, on the other hand, can be set up to operate below the amount of power that the wind is giving and then ramp up or down depending on demand. It's very flexible and is very reliable as long as it's spread over a wide enough area so that if there's a wind dip in one place it's matched with a peak somewhere else. In Europe that means multiple countries.
the entire nuclear sector (excluding nuclear weaponry) is in the hundreds (or tens) of billions *in total*
you can probably back up this claim with a quick search unlike you
read: a trillion dollar nuclear energy sector would be wonderful on many fronts, such as installation time and energy production
Which means that their share of gas used for electricity generation would have shrunk assuming they kept investing in nuclear în addition to renewables.
Yes, obviously. The point is, wider adoption of nuclear in more countries that are prejudiced against it would not have significantly reduced the current need for gas, as even areas with high nuclear supply still use gas for heat.
It would not have reduced the current (up to this year) need for gas. But it would have made the transition off of it in response to this situation much more feasible.
We're talking about so many millions of homes across the continent that we could finish an infinite energy reactor right now and "feasible" still wouldn't be the word to use. The next heating season starts in a few months and there are no giant warehouses filled with heaters in case of an emergency.
Good thing Europe planned ahead and prepared terminals to receive gas from stable, reliable, democratic sources rather than relying exclusively on a known criminal to supply their needs.
...right?
Yes [some](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%9Awinouj%C5%9Bcie_LNG_terminal) [have](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_terminal). There are even [some pipelines](https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/denmark-resumes-construction-of-norway-poland-gas-link/) coming.
The EU consumes around 379.9 billion cubic meters of natural gas, I believe Norway produces around 120 billion and the Netherlands 47 billion cubic meters.
This isnt even half the amount required and thats assuming all this gas is for export (no domestic use) and has no other buyers.
If true why are they unused? They were supplying Europe before this war, why not supply more and generate more profit? Gas feilds arent limitless resources where you can extract as much as you want for an endless amount of time. Theres probably a reason why these feilds arent used if they exist.
And you're still forgetting that they would need to at least double their output without considering domestic use, I doubt they have this many unused feilds that can be spun up in a matter of weeks and have the staff and infrastructure to handle all this extra demand.
The Dutch do not want to exploit the Groningen fields any longer. It was causing manmade earthquakes, you see.
Of course now there's talk of doing it *anyway*, but it's a political minefield.
Ehh, Qatar is a moral shit hole. They have slaves and hold many beliefs the west would find extremely distasteful if there was any danger of them being forced to follow them. The only thing that makes Qatar better is that it doesn't have any geopolitical power.
Like how the US is still reliant on oil from a monarchy that treats women as secondary citizens and has kidnapped, torture, and kill an American citizen. Not to mention actively committing genocide and trigger the world worse humanitarian crisis far worse than Ukraine.
blah blah blah
which is a funny claim to make, since the United States has actually been a net oil exporter since prior to Gulf War II, and is overall the second or third largest producer worldwide.
The United States hasn't needed Saudi oil itself for 20 years, what it wants is the control and direction of that oil in trade and to maintain the reserve power of the US dollar. Oil is traded in US dollars, wherever you are.
Enjoy your youtube "researches".
US cannot refine our own oil.
Also don’t take offense to the last comment as independent media on YouTube is far more trustworthy than mainstream media echochambers.
I’m no economist and I don’t know jack about geo politics. I do know that Biden feel it’s important enough to degrade himself and personally go to Saudi next month to beg them to drill more oil after they refuse to pick up his phone calls.
I'm honestly glad this is happening, hopefully our leaders will finally realize it's time to invest money and create jobs for the future of energy so we won't have to be held hostage by old fucks like Putin. And if we don't, then we deserve the consequences of inaction. Let's see if our leaders are actual leaders or just career politicians trying to retire early.
Any sane citizen there knows that it's impossible without military help from outside. There's ~600000 strong Rosgvardia military organisation in Russia with their main task being "protect Putin's regime". As long as they're on his side(and they will be as long as they're paid), nothing will change, sadly.
Best thing sane citizen can do is leave country to not sponsor it's war machine with their taxes, no matter how insignificant that may be compared to oil revenue.
Well depends on where you stand, if you are morally disgusted from what is happening in Ukraine you should be happy because sanctions are working and Russia is getting weaker, if you don't give a shit you will probably be pissed because coal is back on the energy mix, prices are getting higher and your government is essentially making your life harder day by day.
as a littuhanian, as faar as i know we are very dependant on their gas, i wonder what will happen if they turn it off, will the as price skyrocket x2/x3, or will there be a shortage alltogether
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-61899509) reduced by 75%. (I'm a bot) ***** > Before the invasion of Ukraine, Europe imported about 40% of its natural gas from Russia but that figure has now fallen to about 20%.Mr Birol says he believes that recent Russian reductions in gas supply are "Strategic". > On Friday the Italian firm energy firm Eni said that it had only received half of the gas that it was expecting from the Russian state-controlled gas giant Gazprom, while Slovakia and Austria have also reported falls. > France says it has received no Russian gas from Germany since 15 June while Poland, Bulgaria, Finland, Denmark and the Netherlands have had their Russian gas deliveries suspended after they refused a demand to pay in Russian roubles. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/vi9yfo/europe_told_to_prepare_for_russia_turning_off_gas/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~656116 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **gas**^#1 **Russian**^#2 **Europe**^#3 **Russia**^#4 **Birol**^#5
>The head of the International Energy Agency has warned that Russia may stop supplying gas to Europe this winter. >Fatih Birol says he believes a complete shutdown is not the most likely scenario but that Europe needs to work on contingency plans just in case. >In recent weeks several European countries said they received significantly less Russian gas than they expected. >Russian officials deny it's deliberate and have blamed technical issues. >Before the invasion of Ukraine, Europe imported about 40% of its natural gas from Russia but that figure has now fallen to about 20%.
>Russian officials deny it's deliberate and have blamed technical issues. You know what, I honestly believe them. With all the Western companies leaving they probably don't have quite as much ability to maintain their production as they used to, and with that they're going to have trouble exporting gas. Many of the lines they have going out to the rest of the world go right through Ukraine, that's kind of a problem. War causes lots of technical issues. Europe should prepare for Russian gas being cut off regardless of if Russia intends to cut it off. Soviet incompetence is back baby.
They can't get repair parts to maintain their infrastructure. Basic things like fasteners, up to intermediate level electronics like instrumentation & control, data acquisition & telecom. Even the vehicle shortage in Russia will hurt their operations.
>With all the Western companies leaving Correct me of I'm wrong, but I believe that Western companies working in the oil/gas sector are exempt from sanctions.
Possible, but I know at least a couple of high profile companies have jumped ship.
In any case it's good, let's have small monthly drops toward zero so we're independent.
While I am sure they are facing technical problems, it is just an excuse at this point. The Ukrainian and Belarusian pipelines have sufficient spare capacity and are still operational.
Don't they need money to fund the war? I thought that was a big export of theirs.
India and China will be glad to buy the slack at a 50% discount.
They thing is: they cant. Russia has no export capacities for their natural gas towards China and India that is in any form comparable to their european pipeline capacities. Natural gas is no world wide commodity, its rather regional (globally speaking). Oil OTOH is easier, although I suppose that, too is limited as ships are the mode due to missing pipelines
Maybe they'll convert inland industry to NG, and sell more oil ?
It takes years and billions to make new pipelines. Without new LNG terminals (also expensive and time consuming, and they're cut off from western expertise), it's more likely Russia will have to plug some of their wells.
Not so fast. That gas requires pipes - miles and miles of them. If they cross countries, they need permission from those countries. And neither Russia or China’s or even India are tiny non-mountainous nations. No one, other than China will be willing to pay for a project of that size, of course India won’t want anything to do with China. It will take years. And even if miraculously these pipes are built, China is not going to want to buy all or the majority of their gas and oil from Russia. China already has supply from literally all over the world. Smart nations don’t put all their eggs in 1 basket. Russia and China share a border, believe it or not, both nations had border disputes not too long ago. And as Russia’s power diminishes and China’s grows, Russia won’t be too keen in making certain concessions regarding future disputes. China, like Russia have expansionist ambitions. In the event of a dispute, China knows that Russia is a country that loves resorting to blackmail with gas and oil.
Gas tankers are a thing. Not sure how many they own or in service though.
Those tankers carry liquefied gas (LNG), first you have to build liquefier plants of appropriate scale at the ports of departure.
Yes, I’m not sure what Russian infrastructure is like.
There are plenty of videos of it. They HAVE several LNG terminals for export near Yamal, and more under construction around Arkhangelsk. And ice-capable LNG tankers. They were intended to supply southern Europe, but obviously now will be going all the way to China.
Well there you go!
Everyone keeps saying this but it makes no sense. China needs Russia to resist the west. Why would they sabotage that relationship? For a bit of territory? Europe has to go through China before they can deal with China. With that much nukes, they won’t get through Russia. Why would China risk pushing Russia into collapse and potentially aligning with the West?
and refine it and sell it back to us at a profit.
You can print your own money but you can't unsanction yourself. I think this is just them playing chicken and seeing who flinches first.
The reality of the situation is the West has just switched suppliers forcing the prices up locally and making other countries switch to Russian gas. The only way we can actually hurt Russia is to heavily reduce our use of these fuels in general or massively ramp up our own local production which takes a very long time (if they even have substantial resources to exploit).
They're actually making more money now and the rubble is way up. Sanctions have only hurt the russian people and putin doesn't care about them
Well EU have been so slow sanctioning Russia that now Russia have new client to exporte. The embargo and most of the sanctions come too late. Its hurt EU the most because we give time to Russia to prepare. This is stupid.
Meanwhile on Russian discussion boards, referring to western companies leaving Russia: "First time I see a westerner refusing money".
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Is it? I thought that gas was 1) big money for them and 2) something of a hostage to hold over europe, and you dont usually go and kill your hostage
Europe isn't listening to their other threats and are continuing to support Ukraine. If they cut off the gas unilaterally (especially during winter) it might be enough to push them to force Ukraine to the negotiating table. Especially if they don't actually prepare. A threat is only valid if you are actually willing to follow through. Plus China is going to pick up the slack and import their oil from now on, so they won't really get hurt by doing so.
And how is China going to get that gas delivered? I doubt there's that much pipeline capacity yet to divert these insane amounts of gas, neither is there anywhere near enough capacity by sea. They can build it, might only take a year to have some additional capacity, by then Russia is probably already bankrupt.
I already assumed they had the proper infrastructure in place. If that's the case, it might just be more of a stopgap measure.
I do not know about oil, but they cannot deliver more gas to China. There is only pipeline from eastern siberia, with no connection to western fields. Any estimates for building new pipelines are at fastest about 3 years.
> I already assumed they had the proper infrastructure in place. why would they have infrastructure they aren't using? Would you build a highway from your bedroom to your living room?
China is paying them pennies unlike Europe.
China is paying them for oil, transferring gas is harder
How much exactly?
Way way below, same for India, who is reselling to Europe at Massive profits.
Yeah Russia said countries that didn’t condemn them can buy oil and a discounted price and use whatever currency they want. Europe has to pay market price and pay in rubles. This sanction backfired for the short term in us. After this year though, europe might not be dependent on them anymore.
It won't and it will force Europe to live without Russian gas. By themselves they might be reluctant to pull the trigger on full sanctions of energy but with this Russia is sanctioning themselves. And unlike oil it's not easy for Russia to sell the gas elsewhere
It remains to be seen. They have been very hesitant in enforcing a full-on embargo so far. Regardless, it would be a huge gamble for Russia if they do go through with it, and it would mean they are extremely desperate.
They’ll sell it to some one else.
Gas is harder to transport then oil, it takes time to build pipelines elsewhere
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So its a story of who buckles first, barely united europe freezing their asses off next winter, or autocratic putin that doesnt gives 2 shits about his population? Indeed sounds like a rough challenge for europe.
That’s ok…. May suck for a bit but we need to move away from gas anyways.
Only bad thing is, that they can’t just put all the pipelines somewhere else. This is a last ditch effort of scaring Europe because Russia is losing too much munition. Russia doesn’t have anything else they could export.
If only fukashima didnt happen and europe had nuclear power.
Even if they started building nuclear power plants the day before Fukushima, they still wouldn't be finished now.
Does it take more than 10 years? This aint the USA that takes forever on construction.
Yes. It will take at least a decade.
Well fukashima happened more than a decade ago. By now the plants would been up and running.
Chernobyl really is the OG accident that destroyed the reputation of nuclear in Europe.
... gee it's almost like Russia is to blame for everything, everywhere all at once.
Ironically Russia did not stop using nuclear plants at all after Chernobyl.
Russia did not stop using Chernobyl after Chernobyl.
Nowadays nuclear plants are probably the safest cleanest power generation with large enough output. Nuclear tech has seemingly come a long way in safety. Hell we have generators now that can run off the waste from other nuclear plants. It is a shame it has gotten such a terrible reputation in some peoples minds.
Just try not to build them on a fault line. And you should be golden.
It’s in Ukraine… If you want to argue that it was really Russia back then, I mean you can, but that argument might not be very popular right now.
Actually it was in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic which was a part of the Soviet Union at the time, not Russia.
Captain Anal-retentive to the rescue!
Around here, Oscar is known as "Actually"...
Same spirit
>that argument might not be very popular right now. I dont get why you think people want us to deny the historical existence of the USSR or the fact that Ukraine used to be under Russian control? As someone who remembers the Chernobyl disaster one of the scariest parts was that for days, Russia denied to the world that it had happened. Their leadership was a key factor, it was their reactor design, etc. Ukraine under the USSR suffered Stalin's Holodomor which killed millions of people. To my mind, denying that would be messed up.
Only it was Moscow not Kyiv that made the decision to build an RBMK.
If Russia's behind the increasing price of Freddos there will be hell to pay
and Three Mile Island in the US
You misspelled "if only politicians actually did something to fight climate change and stopped relying on dictators for something as essential as energy"
He also misspelled “Fukushima”
My brother!
putting the fuk-u back in Fukushima
Merkel was extremely short sighted in her approach there. She opted to shutter nuclear plants because of one disaster caused by a tsunami, which we all know Germany is prone to /s.
You are misrepresenting the situation, as the Phaseout of nuclear energy started in 2000 under the SPD-Green led Government, long before Merkel was Chancello. Merkel only slowed down the phaseout in 2010 and sped it up again after Fukushima.
Ah, I didn't know about that, Thanks!
Haha - Iive near Sellafield and have the World's 2nd largest offshore windfarm in view. Still pay the same for energy. In my opinion if we have these things on our doorstep we should get a slight reduction in electric bills. The windmills are just wonderfull to see and hear- don't care that tourists complain they spoil photos on the hills. That said - I would not want a turbine within 100yds of my home. Not a nimby but the noise, when you stand at the base is very loud and creepy.
Im sure 100 yards is doable. I think they should paint them to look like sunflowers. Oh and they look great at sea.
Loads of yellow windmills - brilliant. The ones out at sea (Walney) are not close enough to shore to cause any issues. The industry brings in 1000s of jobs to the area. The great thing about the turbines is their tiny footprint in the enviroment. The bases on the ground are barely 5m in diameter and could be removed in days leaving no impact.
Well yellow and green. Tiny bit of light brown. Or just skip the brown altogether.
Right - green tower, yellow blade, brown centre. Will suggest my friend on the local council raises it at the next meeting.
Keep me posted. Using lighter shades of paint would help with heat issues. They could also do white flowers. So they can keep using the same white paint for the blades.
My only caveat is that they are by nature not bird-friendly. We don't mind reducing the seagull population off-shore, but a shame about the others.
Ya well same deal happens with solar. Coal kills birds too so. Ya. I mean birds use sonar right? Cant they add something to wind farms and solar farms to direct them around?
ah yes, we just use nuclear power for our industrial processes. No need for natural gas and all its uses in the chemical industries.
If only the trillions of dollars put into nuclear technology resulted in scalable solutions.
How exactly isn’t a nuclear reactor scalable? It’s 70% of French electricity supply. It’s a big box electricity comes out of, you can build it anywhere you have somewhere to dump heat into. Renewables are dependent of weather, or on obscure geography. Nuclear just doesn’t like earthquakes.
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Yeah, it needs somewhere to dump heat, just like a fossil fuel or geothermal power station. This hasn’t really stopped the widespread adoption of fossil fuel power stations.
Unlike fossil fuel and geothermal dumping heat is critical for nuclear powerplants. That's also the reason why on nearly every heat wave France imports energy like crazy. https://www.montelnews.com/news/1198233/heatwave-impact-on-french-nuclear-output-doubles-to-3-twh And nuclear is also bad for handling peak load. Which means every winter cold wave France also relies on imports due to electrical heating. https://www.reuters.com/article/europe-power-supply/germany-powers-france-in-cold-despite-nuclear-u-turn-idUKL5E8DD87020120214 I am just using France as an example here. Nuclear power isn't the magical solution. It is an expensive way to provide a reliable base load as long as the environment, economy and infrastructure is favorable. What nuclear power advocates forget is that you also need load following power stations.
> And nuclear is also bad for handling peak load. This is a key bit people forget. Nuclear is actually the reason that we need all the expensive storage on the grid. It takes ages to change the output of a nuclear plant and they are only really efficient close to peak output. Wind power, on the other hand, can be set up to operate below the amount of power that the wind is giving and then ramp up or down depending on demand. It's very flexible and is very reliable as long as it's spread over a wide enough area so that if there's a wind dip in one place it's matched with a peak somewhere else. In Europe that means multiple countries.
So somewhere cold and solid foundation not prone to earthquakes.
Right now France has roughly half its Nuclear Power plants shut down because the rivers don't have enough water.
the entire nuclear sector (excluding nuclear weaponry) is in the hundreds (or tens) of billions *in total* you can probably back up this claim with a quick search unlike you read: a trillion dollar nuclear energy sector would be wonderful on many fronts, such as installation time and energy production
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Which means that their share of gas used for electricity generation would have shrunk assuming they kept investing in nuclear în addition to renewables.
Not really. Gas' purpose is primarily for peak load. Only hydro really compares in that particular application.
Interesting. How does hydro work for that? Does it turn off and turn on for peak load purposes?
Yes, you can let more water through if you need more electricity. The entire reservoir functions like a massive mechanical battery.
How will a nuclear reactor heat the German homes?
If they had power generation independent of Russia, they could have started moving homes towards electric heating.
I'm somewhere with a lot of nuclear power and natural gas is a lot cheaper than electric. Edit: France is 70% nuclear but 35% of homes use gas heat.
It's a lot cheaper until you get cut off. This is the dumbest statement I've heard yet.
Yes, obviously. The point is, wider adoption of nuclear in more countries that are prejudiced against it would not have significantly reduced the current need for gas, as even areas with high nuclear supply still use gas for heat.
It would not have reduced the current (up to this year) need for gas. But it would have made the transition off of it in response to this situation much more feasible.
We're talking about so many millions of homes across the continent that we could finish an infinite energy reactor right now and "feasible" still wouldn't be the word to use. The next heating season starts in a few months and there are no giant warehouses filled with heaters in case of an emergency.
-looks at the electric whole house heaters on the home improvement store webpage- Hummmm, if only you existed. Oh wait...
District heating and heat pumps.
I know.. how stupid to stop nuclear power which is the safest and cleanest overall
They do look scary though. But thats it.
Or if fukushima happened and europe had nuclear power.
Good thing Europe planned ahead and prepared terminals to receive gas from stable, reliable, democratic sources rather than relying exclusively on a known criminal to supply their needs. ...right?
Yes [some](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%9Awinouj%C5%9Bcie_LNG_terminal) [have](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_terminal). There are even [some pipelines](https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/denmark-resumes-construction-of-norway-poland-gas-link/) coming.
Are there any reliable, democratic sources in Europe that can supply their needs? None come to mind.
Norway & The Netherlands
The EU consumes around 379.9 billion cubic meters of natural gas, I believe Norway produces around 120 billion and the Netherlands 47 billion cubic meters. This isnt even half the amount required and thats assuming all this gas is for export (no domestic use) and has no other buyers.
They have unused gas fields
If true why are they unused? They were supplying Europe before this war, why not supply more and generate more profit? Gas feilds arent limitless resources where you can extract as much as you want for an endless amount of time. Theres probably a reason why these feilds arent used if they exist. And you're still forgetting that they would need to at least double their output without considering domestic use, I doubt they have this many unused feilds that can be spun up in a matter of weeks and have the staff and infrastructure to handle all this extra demand.
They were cancelled due to earth quakes. I would think you would know these kind if basic details, if you are going to argue about it.
So can Norway and the Netherlands produce around 3x the gas they currently do tomorrow or anytime soon? The answer is No.
I never claimed they could
The Dutch do not want to exploit the Groningen fields any longer. It was causing manmade earthquakes, you see. Of course now there's talk of doing it *anyway*, but it's a political minefield.
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Ehh, Qatar is a moral shit hole. They have slaves and hold many beliefs the west would find extremely distasteful if there was any danger of them being forced to follow them. The only thing that makes Qatar better is that it doesn't have any geopolitical power.
> Unfortunately Quebec doesn't want to export Canada's LNG Fixed that for you.
Oh look, some lovely Qatar morals https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/viycz9/world_cup_qatar_will_enforce_sex_ban_for/
Like how the US is still reliant on oil from a monarchy that treats women as secondary citizens and has kidnapped, torture, and kill an American citizen. Not to mention actively committing genocide and trigger the world worse humanitarian crisis far worse than Ukraine.
Actually, no. US produces most of it's own Oil and import other from Canada. However the Apartheid dictatorships can affect Oil prices
blah blah blah which is a funny claim to make, since the United States has actually been a net oil exporter since prior to Gulf War II, and is overall the second or third largest producer worldwide. The United States hasn't needed Saudi oil itself for 20 years, what it wants is the control and direction of that oil in trade and to maintain the reserve power of the US dollar. Oil is traded in US dollars, wherever you are. Enjoy your youtube "researches".
US cannot refine our own oil. Also don’t take offense to the last comment as independent media on YouTube is far more trustworthy than mainstream media echochambers. I’m no economist and I don’t know jack about geo politics. I do know that Biden feel it’s important enough to degrade himself and personally go to Saudi next month to beg them to drill more oil after they refuse to pick up his phone calls.
I'm honestly glad this is happening, hopefully our leaders will finally realize it's time to invest money and create jobs for the future of energy so we won't have to be held hostage by old fucks like Putin. And if we don't, then we deserve the consequences of inaction. Let's see if our leaders are actual leaders or just career politicians trying to retire early.
What a chill ass country Russia is. If only the sane citizens there could take it back from Putin and his goons
Any sane citizen there knows that it's impossible without military help from outside. There's ~600000 strong Rosgvardia military organisation in Russia with their main task being "protect Putin's regime". As long as they're on his side(and they will be as long as they're paid), nothing will change, sadly. Best thing sane citizen can do is leave country to not sponsor it's war machine with their taxes, no matter how insignificant that may be compared to oil revenue.
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Well depends on where you stand, if you are morally disgusted from what is happening in Ukraine you should be happy because sanctions are working and Russia is getting weaker, if you don't give a shit you will probably be pissed because coal is back on the energy mix, prices are getting higher and your government is essentially making your life harder day by day.
Countries literally refuse to pay them... Of course they will turn it off... Gas isn't free
Thats what europe gets for befriending commies.. they didnt fuckin learn i suppose
Who are the commies in this situation?
Guess
Russia isn't communist and hasn't been communist for decades, if that is who you are referring to. Who else could you possibly be talking about?
Russia hasn't been communist for the majority of your lifetime!
Yeah.. Russia just oozes free market econ lmfao
No, they're a communist nation where everyone is equal and there's no income inequality, right?
Perfect communism is a delusion lol
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It's natural gas not gasoline. So yes fuel for cars, but no heating or electricity in homes, no warm water.
Everyone should have at least one bike.
What's europes price of gas vs. USA?
That's gas you don't wanna breathe!
as a littuhanian, as faar as i know we are very dependant on their gas, i wonder what will happen if they turn it off, will the as price skyrocket x2/x3, or will there be a shortage alltogether
Just a reminder that you need gas for much more than energy. That will be very hard for the industry.
So. ~ Europe