Posted on 03/20/2014 7:18:07 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has declared the G8 to be dead, thanks to Russia’s take over of the Crimea:
German Chancellor Angela Merkel declared the Group of Eight leading nations defunct given the current crisis in Ukraine, in a clear message to Russia that the world’s seven other major industrialized countries consider its actions in Ukraine unacceptable. “As long as there is no political environment for such an important political format as the G-8, the G-8 doesn’t exist anymore, not the summit nor the format,” said Ms. Merkel, in Germany’s parliament, the Bundestag. “Russia is widely isolated in all international organizations,” the chancellor said.
Ah, yes, the old “isolated in all international organizations” gambit. And what have all the “international organizations” done in reaction to Russia’s Crimean takeover? About what they did when Russia pushed into Georgia. A whole lot of nothing. It is one thing to have international organizations that have teeth and are willing to do something in reaction to such a blatant act. But when they mostly issue statements condeming the action and void the Netflix accounts of certain Russian officals, being isolated from those organizations isn’t such a big deal. All it does is make further diplomatic efforts more difficult, not that it is clear that Russia is open to diplomatic overtures.
Another thing that is happening is Europe is discovering it has managed to put itself in an energy situation that isn’t at all to its advantage. 30% of Europe’s natural gas flows through Russian pipelines (Germany gets 40% of its natural gas supplies from Russia).
So the scramble is purportedly on to change that situation.
European leaders will seek ways to cut their multi-billion-dollar dependence on Russian gas at talks in Brussels on Thursday and Friday, while stopping short of severing energy ties with Moscow for now. EU officials said the current Ukraine crisis had convinced many in Europe that Russia was no longer reliable and the political will to end its supply dominance had never been greater. “Everyone recognises a major change of pace is needed on the part of the European Union,” one EU official said on condition of anonymity. As alternatives to imported gas, the Brussels talks will debate the European Union’s “indigenous supplies”, which include renewable energy and shale gas.
Now, one would think that such a situation would call for drastic and speedy action. Anyone want to bet how long they dither and, should they decide to exploit their “indigenous supplies”, how onerous the rules and regulations will be?
When leaders of the European Union’s member states meet today and tomorrow (20-21 March) in Brussels, they hope to reach consensus on the EU’s long-term climate goals. But agreement appears unlikely because of deep divisions between east and west. Ahead of the summit, ministers from 13 member states signed a declaration supporting a European Commission proposal for an EU commitment to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 40% from 1990 levels by 2030 – up from a 20% target set for 2020. This ‘green growth group’ includes France, Germany, Italy and the UK. But Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia are wary of the target and the timeline, and are resisting any such commitment.
The latter group will most likely be all for moving ahead as speedily as possible to exploit “indigenous supplies”. They’ll meet some pretty stiff headwinds, apparently, from the Western EU nations. You can almost see this train wreck coming.
Meanwhile in the pursuit of “green energy”, Europe is apparently ready to toss in the towel:
Governments across Europe, regretting the over-generous deals doled out to the renewable energy sector, have begun reneging on them. To slow ruinous power bills hikes, governments are unilaterally rewriting contracts and clawing back unseemly profits.
You have to laugh. ”Unseemly profits”? They’re subsidies, sir. Not profit.
It’ll be interesting to see if the EU has the will to sort this all out in the next couple of days. If one is a betting person, you’d have to guess that the odds for success are long, given the EU’s recent history.
“European leaders will seek ways to cut their multi-billion-dollar dependence on Russian gas”
Hey, I’ve got an idea! How about building some more windmills and solar panels! That should do the trick, right?
Dunning-Kruger Effect (summarized): "Stupid people are too stupid to realize they're stupid".
("The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which unskilled individuals suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly rating their ability much higher than is accurate. This bias is attributed to a metacognitive inability of the unskilled to recognize their ineptitude.")
Be nice to Israel and get it from them?
Power plants using natural gas fired combustion turbines take about two years to complete from ground breaking. That can be more than 200 megawatts in one pop.
If we end up supplying the Euros with gas, they better be forced to pay a very pretty penny for it.
We do have natural gas to spare. Lots of it. The shale play drilling is the cause of our rapidly approaching energy independence. The oil produced from the gas wells is reducing our need for imported oil. Unfortunately the low price of natural gas in the US caused by the massive over supply is making it less feasible to continue drilling. Drillers are concentrating on areas with wet gas to get the propane, butane, ethane and pentanes that accompany the methane for another revenue stream.
The solution is to build LNG facilities and start dumping that surplus gas in Europe thereby beggaring Russia. Putin will then be known as .... kaputin.
How about triple? Is that profitable enough for you? Europe is paying three times as much for natural gas as we are. I think we might be able to eke out a few billion dollars of profit.
Aww, poor them.
If I am not mistaken, two LNG terminals have, at long last, been permitted and are under construction.
I know of one on the West coast that will be shipping gas to Japan. Where’s the other? The biggie will be Cove Point in MD. The underground piping and the pipelines are already in place. That’s the one that will put Putin in Depends for the rest of his life.
Green is OFF, red is ON?
This is nutty. They have plenty of coal, yet refuse to use it, even in the face of a military threat from Russia.
perezagruzka, peregruzka. What difference does it make?
The German Chancellor is trying to fill the vacancy created by the Liberal Messiah’s wussyness.
Excellent point.
...”one that will put Putin in Depends for the rest of his life”....
Putin’s already been three steps ahead of all these sanctions no matter how far they go...Made a deal with China who will buy if the prices change or Ukraine shuts his pipelines down...also while all eyes were on Ukraine, Putin made an oil deal in S. America and another in Africa.
Remember, Putin himself makes all the oil deal decisions so he’s ahead of this game currently.
The Oligarchs moved their money long ago to other nations favorable to Putin....so the EU might be biting their nose off if they go too far...he’ll just cut them off entire.
Here you go:
But most, if not virtually all of France’s power is nuke.
I know. We flame so much NG from Bakken that you can see the light from outer space. I was being facetious.
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