Quick Takes On The Energy Situation
Yves Smith wrote a very long piece today, asking Will Europe Go Down to Defeat Before Ukraine? The race would seem to be nip and tuck right now. However, in the course of the article Yves presented a remarkable graph, showing where the cost of electricity in Europe is headed:
She then went on to provide an example of the effect this is having on real world economic activity—right now:
We are already seeing early signs of distress, like aluminum smelters cutting output or shuttering facilities. From Reuters on August 25 (visit original story to see full detail on chart):
Europe’s aluminium output capacity is around 4.5 million tonnes. Of that, about 1 million tonnes has been taken offline since 2021 and another 500,000 tonnes is under threat, analysts at Citi say.
And of course that’s just one example. Apparently fertilizer plants are also shutting down, glass production is in the tank, and there’s more bad news every day. I heard today that 70% of restaurants in London are planning on simply shutting down soon, because they won’t be able to afford heating during the winter.
I’m sure most readers have seen the stories about Poles waiting in line for literally days to buy coal—that in the country with the most coal reserves in Europe. But Poland shut down most production to keep the EU Climatistas happy, and now can’t import coal from Russia.
Meanwhile, Russia doesn’t care, because they’re making money hand over fist:
In fact, Russia is making so much money that, according to the BBC
Andrei Martyanov points to a headline that shows the declining influence of the US over energy markets:
Meanwhile, another story that illustrates that some countries have decided to take care of themselves and their citizens—sanctions be damned:
Japanese Firm Signs New LNG Deal With Russia's Sakhalin-2
By Tsvetana Paraskova of Oilprice.com
Tokyo Gas, the largest city gas supplier in Japan, has signed a long-term LNG agreement with the new Russian operator of the Sakhalin-2 project to keep supply volumes from the project, a spokesperson for the Japanese company told Reuters on Tuesday in a second such deal between a firm from Japan and the new operator.
When the chips are down, people do eventually act to preserve themselves.
I don't know what is going to happen this Winter, but it looks increasingly dire to me. The feedback from Europe's energy crisis will eventually show up in natural gas prices and electricity prices in the US, and at that point, Zhou Baiden is likely to stop the export of LNG to Europe just to save his own party's ass. The only thing that might keep a cap on all of this is that Russia is still exporting a lot of oil and gas despite the sanctions, and parties like China and India are simply reselling it to the Europeans at a big markup.
To add to the energy mess in Europe, this: apparently our moral betters are turning to China to buy…Russian LNG, for triple the price, naturally. https://www.zerohedge.com/
This fits in your “can’t make this stuff up” category!