From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
By Paul Homewood
High energy prices are here to stay:
Europeans will pay an additional 350 billion euros ($395 billion) in energy bills next year as global demand for fuel and power threatens to keep prices elevated, according to Greece’s energy minister.
Kostas Skrekas said a new mechanism to help shield the most vulnerable citizens and middle-sized businesses from price increases should be created at the European Union level. It came as officials from Hungary and Spain voiced concern about recent volatility in carbon-emission markets at a meeting of environment ministers in Brussels.
“In the face of this extraordinary situation, we cannot remain uninvolved,” Skrekas said. Greece had estimated earlier this year that Europeans would face an increase of 100 billion euros this winter alone.
Europe’s energy crunch is straining national budgets and has become one of the EU’s biggest political challenges, fuelling inflation just as governments contend with the spread of the omicron virus variant. Member states have come forward with a number of proposals, from a redesign of how the electricity market works to caps on the bloc’s carbon trading market.
Across the continent prices per megawatt hour (MWh) now exceed €300 (£256) in most countries. With the exception of Poland and Scandinavia all countries in Europe have broken the €300 MWh barrier with France and and Switzerland nearly at €400 (£341.60). Head of Analytics at research firm Enappsys Andre Bosschaart said he’d “never seen this kind of volatility and high prices” adding that predictions for tomorrow’s prices suggested France and Germany would break past €400 (£341.60) MWh. Head of Oil and Gas Research at Investec Nathan Piper described the prices as “phenomenally high”, adding that gas prices were now 10 times higher than the US in Europe.
https://www.express.co.uk/finance/city/1538805/european-energy-crisis-prices-gas-nord-stream-two
$395 billion is an incredible amount, presumably on top of this year’s price rise. It equates to $890 per capita.
It is also clear that prices wont come down anytime soon, if ever. Indeed, this is exactly the scenario that the EU has been planning – to push up energy prices so much that renewables are competitive.
The only way to get prices back down is to increase production of oil, gas and coal. Under normal circumstances, rising market prices would incentivise this. However it is EU policy which is holding this back.
The EU is blaming Russia, especially now that the Yamal pipeline is closed.
Shades of Russiagate. with a Brussels accent.
Meanwhile the Enron Model is in full swing : ¨ recent volatility in carbon-emission markets ¨ – that is the key insight.
Coluuuusion cannot be far away….
Despite the EU’s disapproval, I doubt whether the Russians will be bothered. They won’t be the ones getting cold.
Anyway they have vodka!
“Germany will shut down three nuclear plants forever next week, slashing clean and reliable baseload power in the middle of winter and during the worst energy crisis in Europe since the Second World War.”
Another big wary is if Putin is going to use energy crisis and Biden’s indecisiveness and domestic problems to press with his threats to the Ukraine.
Dissolution of the Soviet Union took place exactly 30 years ago on December 26, 1991.Recently Putin called this event the end of “historic Russia”
Question is how is going to mark the anniversary, I doubt that he will ignore it.
UK latest (22 DECEMBER 2021 • 4:02PM)
“An unprecedented surge in wholesale gas and power prices is creating a national crisis.
Good Energy, EDF and trade body Energy UK have all stepped up the pressure on the Government to intervene after a stratospheric jump in prices.
It comes after UK and European natural gas prices hit an all-time record high on Tuesday amid fears of a winter supply squeeze.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/12/22/ftse-100-markets-live-news-covid-grants-economy-bitcoin/
Financial Times adds:
“Other Treasuries in Europe have already responded to the crisis, but in the UK, the energy sector is still asking if the chancellor knows that energy bills going up by over 50 per cent in the new year is a problem for ordinary people, businesses, and the economy,”
https://www.ft.com/content/55fcab59-ef29-4175-8532-a3ec7c7b5f95
Notice despite Brexit, the financial energy price Hockey Stick (yes they do exist!) matches the EU?
Despite Brexit, BoJo went almost as Green as Ursula!
Something very fishy there!
Both are blondes, BoJo was Brussels corespondent and … x, y & z .
According to your hypothesis, the energy prices have yet to hit peak (in about a month when the Gasprom pipelines are shut down.
Carrie?
The UK and the EU are not the only areas subject to bills going up. Looking at my Midwestern US natural gas bill, last November I paid 28 cents/therm and now it is 68 cents/therm. I shudder to think what it will be in a month or two.
Exactly! This is inflation, transatlantic.
NBP wholesale gas in the UK reached 470p/therm a couple of days ago. That probably implies more than ten times what you just paid as a consumer. Not quite as bad as the $300/MMBtu that gas was trading at during the Texas freeze.
I guess this proves that elections have consequences. We have arrogant and incompetent people in power.
Misery does not love company, contrary to the old saw. Misery sucks.
FJB
Putin said anyone that does not miss the Soviet has no heart, and anyone that want’s it back has no brain.
The first foot fell with the Fall of the Wall, and now 30 years later the second foot is about to fall. And D.C. – London well know it. They want a new Cold War – no brains there, nor heart either. Anyone that wants a new Cold War is actually a zombie, even if in-sync! Or actually under investigation – listen to Jake Sullivan fuming, and note he is under Durham’s scrutiny for being the Russiagate source!
““Germany will shut down three nuclear plants forever next week”
They should probably wait until winter is over, at least.
Unfortunately, the German leadership hasn’t been demonstrating much sense.
Idiocracy.
Where is our Russia colluuuusion clown Simon?
He knows all about colluuuusion 😉
So does Durham, right now.
Let’s not let Europe get away with blaming Russia. Russia tried to get them to sign a contract at a cheap price, but of course, they turned it down because it was bad optics.
A contract at a cheap price is only workable over a period measured in at least a few years. “Contracts” over short periods is essentially at spot prices. It costs money to shut in gas production which becomes necessary when markets present an off/on situation.
Hungary and Balkan states Did sign on for 10 cent/million BTU gas with Russia and were excoriated by Brussels for it. Also, green clowns had a fair amount of success in blocking financing for O&G projects. Good onya idjits!
The EU is commited to an Enron debacle!
They paid about $5/million Btu.
google it
“It is also clear that prices wont come down anytime soon, if ever. Indeed, this is exactly the scenario that the EU has been planning – to push up energy prices so much that renewables are competitive”.
Except that “renewables” are dependent on fossil fuels from cradle to grave, so increased costs on fossil fuels will also drive up the costs of unreliables.
It seems tp my unexpert eye that the costs of unreliables can go nowhere but up, and up….
I was going to post exactly this comment, you beat me to it!
When is anyone going to publish definitive cradle to grave PV solar and Wind systems energy balance, including backup systems? How can anyone seriously propose using such systems without performing this basic analysis? (Hint: it wouldn’t go well for the greens if a truthful reckoning were to be performed)
The problem is that the calculations are very complicated, and “math is hard”. It’s ridiculously easy to fudge the cost calculation to say anything you want, just like Climate Scientology. Just slightly adjusting a Net Present Value percentage can have dramatic effects for calculations over decades. The other main trick is to ignore or underestimate infrastructure and backup costs.
I was actually involved in writing a government white paper on the subject, maybe 35 years ago. I can tell you that the figures were adjusted and massaged just like weather records are today. The data will say anything you want if tortured enough.
This is how the whole CAGW meme has proliferated, and how unreliables are being justified. It doesn’t matter if you bring actual facts and reasoning into the argument, either, since you just get cancelled immediately.
The last energy crisis was due to politics, mostly Muslim nationalism tied to Nixon and Carter trying half way socialism on price fixing.
This time, it is politicians buying the green blobs magic beans with renewables and anti nuclear power activism, with a layer of “keep it in the ground” nihilistic Luddism.
” The only way to get prices back down is to increase production of oil, gas and coal. ”
No , idiot , …. NUCLEAR !
But how much nuclear waste has actually been disposed of, long term ???
(I have no idea of the answer).
But I have a sneaking feeling that the answer might be ‘not a lot’
Outside the US? All of it.
The only reason why it isn’t being reprocessed here in the US is because of politics.
That’s not true Mark…
If you are going to make a blanket comment like that, put up a link or something to justify it. You wonder why you have no credibility or people constantly make fun of you? If you can’t prove it, don’t comment on it.
“If you are going to make a blanket comment like that, put up a link or something to justify it.”
In superterranea, the rule of Hitchens governs:
“What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.”
Which is why he can not. Here is just one link that invalidates Mark W’s “misstatement”. There are dozens more, but this is enough right here.
https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20210820-france-signs-billion-euro-deal-to-return-nuclear-waste-to-germany
Why would anyone believe you?
Ey up griff, I miss your Arctic sea ice news. Also, how’s that California drought going over at the Guardian?
This is the very first comment by you, griffter, that I agree with. Finland is about to open the first permanent geological high-level nuclear waste repository, all other high-level nuclear waste is in temporary storage. Reprocessing nuclear fuel doesn’t get rid of the high level waste it just separates the materials that can be reused from those that can’t. Oh, and I helped to design some safeguards equipment now installed in the Japanese reprocessing plant at Rokkasho and I was on the IAEA repository safeguards standards committee.
High level also means short half life.
Not necessarily. It can also be long-lived isotopes but a lot of them. Like Neptunium-237 with over a 2 million year half-life found in spent fuel from commercial reactors in large quantities.
A long half-life means that it’s not very dangerous. Get educated before being scared by irrational people.
You are the one that needs to get educated. The hazard of radioactive materials is a combination of their activity (shorter half lives are typically more hazardous), but it’s also a factor of the type of radiation emitted, whether it gets ingested, where in the body the material concentrates, how long it remains in the body before it gets removed by natural processes, and any chemical toxicity. The most hazardous of all radioactive materials found in Spent Fuel are Plutonium, Americium, and Neptunium.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2781271/
There’s always someone who knows just enough to be dangerous. In this case, that’s you Ziggy.
From your link:
Suggestion: don’t inject or ingest dangerous chemicals?
Seriously, the passing radiation isn’t a problem if it does not emit much. If you get it inside you, it can cause a problem, so don’t get it inside you!
You obviously don’t know why high level waste has to be put in a permanent geological repository. In the several million years that it’s hazardous it has to be isolated from the environment – it can’t be allowed to leach out of the waste container into surrounding groundwater. The passing radiation hazard can be dealt with by simple concrete shielding a meter or two thick – even in temporary storage. However, I can assure you that if you walked by unshielded spent fuel from a commercial reactor any less than ~1000 years old it would kill you dead after just minutes of exposure.
Some countries, like Finland, know very well how to isolate the waste from the environment for geologic times unlike the U.S. which was going to put the waste into Yucca Mountain in Nevada in highly oxidizing groundwater where the waste package would eventually fail and Neptunium would leach out and contaminate the aquifer all the way to the Amargosa Valley in California.
I don’t think you need to worry about that one. It’s listed as a “special nuclear material,” i.e. a fissile material that can be used to make a nuclear bomb (critical mass ~ 60 kg). That means you can’t get near the pure substance without being machine-gunned.
And scary long half-lives mean not dangerous.
I think every isotope of every element has a possible half-life. It may be estimated as billions of years, though. I believe that even protons themselves are believed to have half-lives.
It’s difficult to explain such things to people who are irrationally terrified of basic and all-pervasive things like radiation.
False. Totally false. See above response. Click on the link. Learn something.
Saw link. Suggested solutions provided: don’t eat or inject poison.
Ziggy. Stupid comment. See my response above.
True, not much reprocessing going on now. But the Russians are working on remixed fuel:
https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/First-batch-of-REMIX-fuel-begins-trial
They are also pushing forward with fast breeders that will consume wastes from other reactors. (they have 2 on line now and are building a third)
https://www.rt.com/news/168768-russian-fast-breeder-reactor/
Terribly little work is being done in my opinion, but nothing like this is going on in the US.
Meab,
The original question was about how much nuclear waste material had been disposed of, long term.
The correct answer is indeed “All of it.”
If it had not been disposed of, it could have caused harm.
You are using your personal definition of “long term” for your argument.
I, too, was involved bin nuclear policy starting early 1970s. What has evolved in policy we have today is a near useless mish- mash of bureaucratic regulatory confusion, arising mostly from a widespread lack of understanding of nuclear chemistry, physics and bio- effects. The policies reflect hate, scare campaigns, wrong interpretations of science like linear low dose extrapolation, befuddled thinking like stopping repository construction before using it, ignorant actions like failing to do proper economic analysis of nuclear electricity and more and more ….
One could write a thick book about nuclear policy mistakes. They have become an art form.
Summary – industry has managed low level and high level radioactive materials without significant harm to man nor beast, despite a multitude of regulatory handicaps. We should be thanked, not abused. Geoff S
Don’t lecture me, Geoff. I worked at Yucca Mountain for four years. I was the technical liaison between Performance Assessment and Licensing. I’m a STRONG proponent of Nuclear Power (I have a PhD in Nuclear Engineering albeit with a Fusion Emphasis). I went to Yucca mountain with the intent of getting Yucca Mtn. approved. That changed in a very short time as I learned the facts. Yucca is in the vadose zone – the zone where groundwater moving through cracks is highly oxidizing raising the solubility of actinides by 5 to 7 orders of magnitude and creating extremely corrosive conditions. Yucca is bounded by an imbricate fault zone to the north, rising groundwater to the south, and the Ghost Dance and Solitario Canyon faults to the east and west making the repository site so small that the 70,000 tons of emplaced waste would boil the mountain. That’s really bad because water vapor boiled in the center would re-enter at the periphery of the mountain and act just like a coffee percolator. Only instead of dissolving coffee grounds the Yucca percolator would dissolve nuclear waste. Not so bad as the site is quite dry, right? Wrong. Pack rat middens found at the site indicate that during glacial periods the site is quite pluvial (rainy) and wet. In fact, Yucca Mtn. has been an island in the distant past, and could be again in the future. As an aside, it was during my four years at Yucca Mtn. that it became evident to me that it would be necessary to predict future climate to get the site licensed. For this reason I became a climate realist. The more I looked into it, the more I found out how variable the climate has always been.
In addition, from the ridge of Yucca Mtn., you can see the Lathrop Wells cinder cone which has been dated at a mere 4,000 years old, a baby in geologic time, and there’s evidence of a magmatic pluton not far from the mountain.
The problem is indeed political. Yucca Mtn. was not one of the leading candidates for technical reasons – it was chosen purely politically. The only reason that it made the down select was that the site was completely different geologically from the other sites (salt domes and stable geography) not because it was better, it wasn’t. It was then selected only because it was in Nevada which had very little political power, not because. It actually should not have been selected as it failed the NRC 10 CFR part 60 guidance because it had oxidizing groundwater.
Links please.
Yes it is.
That is not true Griff.
Even accepting the nuclear waste argument it becomes a ‘Zugzwang’ situation, which is worse: dealing with nuclear waste or ‘the end of the world in 12 years’.
No indeed; ALL FOUR!
p.s. Have you seen the lead times for new nuclear!!??
Okiluto, Flammanville…
No indeed; ALL FOUR!
Okiluto, Flammanville
You missed out Cambo and many other exciting winnable resources.
Coal, oil and gas with nuclear as it happens is the way to go griff.
Windy Miller ate too many beans and pulses.
Okiluto, yes, well done Finland! and they are looking to build more.
https://www.power-technology.com/news/finland-olkiluoto-3-epr-unit-first-criticality/
Construction started in 2005.
Sigh. crap reactor and European regulations
EPR is online in china, and Okiluoto is going critical in weeks. Flammanville next year probably.
All delayed deliberaly by people like you Griff.
Which is why the SMR programs are getting millions thrown at them – mass producing small reactors in factories is the only way we will build out 10GW a year.
The lead times on not shutting down existing nuclear is zero!
Sadly in the case of the UK., its almost inevitable. Thank heavens we had some mothballed coal plant as well.
I dont know what it will take to keep our AGRs going – probably more than bagning in SMRs instead.
Unfortunately some nuclear power plants have reached their use-by dates.
But they don’t need to be.
This second comment is in the wrong place – sorry.
So lets burn fossil fuels I know I will be.
Bob,
Please don’t call Paul Homewood an idiot, not least because he really isn’t one. We all know that nuclear should be the main answer in the medium to long term. The problem is, you are not just looking at the months and the odd year or two that it would take to get oil, gas and coal back up significantly to meet requirements, new nuclear in Britain and Europe takes many years to get from planning (including all the injunctions, public inquiries etc), through construction to productive life. The sort of energy crises that we will undoubtedly suffer over the next few years due to years of stupid renewables policy cannot and will not be dealt with by nuclear.
I am stunned that there is no discussion of the best transition fossil fuel namely gas and how it will produce far less CO2 in electricity generation than say coal and oil.
Why do we care about reducing CO2?
The problem is there isn’t any gas. World wide. Peak gas or somesuch probably.
Why are people pandering to the CO2 reduction nonsense?
Well the next two year perhaps.
But I think nuclear will be top priority no expense spared after this winter. Let’s face it, we have no coal oil or gas. and even if we started fracking now, i doubt we would have any for next winter. The same goes for cracking open the very very few coal seams worth opening…
It will be 2023 before ANYTHING comes on stream
Hinkley should be up by then at 3.2GW.
Rolls Royce SMR planned proof of concept by 2025 and full on operation by 2035 – I think that will be massively accelerated.
UK has the old magnox sites waiting for whoever will stick a reactor in them, but politics meant that all the potential builders simply walked away.
It is all down to money and political will. It could all be done faster, and we could be fracking by 2023.
Hinkley will likely be further delayed. The news from Taishan has not been good. Already not before June 2026.
https://watt-logic.com/2021/12/18/nuclear-update/
Redesign of the reactor core is a bit fundamental.
Europe – populated by Woke Socialists and Marxists – who are being replaced by the followers of the Religion of Ignorance and Superstition: Muslims
……and now through further stupidity they have no heat this Winter – who the Hell cares.
I do and Im praying for a stinking winter to expose the weakness of our Shambolic system. Trouble is if itis cold they will blame it on global warming and double down onthe green crap.
And not on the City of London’s massive finance CO2 scam.
Praying to Gaia is not a good idea….
In unrelated news:
Popcorn futures set new record highs.
On a more serious note:
Across the EU, price caps are getting put into place to protect consumers from high prices. But the high prices still have to be payed somewhere along the line.
So how does this play out?
Increase taxes and charge the same population via taxation instead of with electricity bills?
Run up the national debt and charge the population via another round of inflation?
Plan B:
Electric bills will drop somewhat when electricity is no longer available.
Electric bills will still have renewable energy surcharges, connection fees, fuel adjustment charges and taxes. Those will still have to be payed, just the usage fee component will drop.
Thus far, U.S. mainstream media steadfastly ignores European and Asian energy prices that are now 10× those prevailing in the U.S.
The sleazy gutter dwellers of NPR, Pravda, the WaPo, ABC, CNN, PBS, et al are apparently waiting for Europeans to freeze to death in the dark before they take notice.
Will they notice even then, or just stick to the narrative?
Plan C
Industry shuts down because it can’t afford expensive energy. Keeps the lights on for a few more weeks, but throws large numbers out if work, and completely messes up supply chains. Empty supermarket shelves, followed by riots. Then rationing of power and gas. More riots.
Will the Greens send in the army to try to keep control, or will armies mount coups?
This is precisely why I voted for Brexit and then I find that our inept political classes have enacted even more ludicrous nonsense than the EU. They are all in the same hopeless mould.There is no escape from thecatastrophe that is coming.
Out of the Continental Fat, into the English Fish-and-Chips?
Just shows that even though Brexit is part of a global phenomenon (Yellow Vests, Trump…), the one thing not challenged was High Finance.
The Lead actually points directly at that. It is best called the Enron Model, free-market energy speculation. The EU adopted the Enron Model (remember how that went…) and The City of London desperately needs Marc Carney’s $100 trillion bailout.
Give it up, bonobo. You’re falsely associating Enron, a crooked scam, with the energy markets. What you’re doing is just like the climate alarmists when they falsely associate climate realism with big tobacco.
Some people equate anything they don’t understand with a scam. For booboo, there’s a lot that he/she/it doesn’t understand.
We understand Enron quite well. For further understanding contact Skilling at the pen.
It’s not what we understand that is a problem.
It’s what you understand, that is wrong.
Suck it up!
Enron were angels, until they were devils.
All doing free-market scams. Ask Skilling at the pen.
That’s got absolutely nothing to do with the present energy markets, Bonobo. Claiming that it does makes you a liar. A liar with a (dishonest) agenda.
No system can survive a departure from reality. Renewables, without a yet to be developed, supercheap, high-capacity backup system, can’t power a first world country. If you are forced into having renewables, you’re forced into having two systems that could theoretically power your civilization. At least twice the upfront cost. Maintenance on two systems. Manpower for two systems. You pay for that inefficiency through your economy going to hell in a handbasket. You can also pay for it by freezing in cold weather when your inadequate heat pumps, which aren’t working well because of the sub-freezing temperatures, can’t keep up. But if there’s no power anyway, I guess that really isn’t important.
Part of the lack of realism is Biden telling vehicle manufacturers that they have to reach a certain mpg by year so and so even though they have not yet been able to build prototypes achieving those levels.
Democrats feel that if they pass a requiring something to be done, it will be done.
I still remember the EPA fining refiners for not using a material that didn’t exist.
And when they do up the mpg, they get hit with NOx emissions, Dieselgate.
NOx, is also plant food….
NOx is solved already with Adblue.
Yes, why listen to engineers?
They are just going to tell you that what you want to do, can’t be done. And who wants to hear that?
To understand Europe, I think a Nietzschean perspective is needed—-that is, seeing the rise and decline of civilizations over centuries, even millennia
Western Europe is in decay. Characteristic is its loss of belief in itself. A kind of guilt over its past glories, especially its colonial period from 1500 to 1950, is palpable.
Europe’s response to the global warming fantasy is just its method of suicide. Take global warming away and Europe will find another method of self-destruction.
Meanwhile, the great old civilizations of India and China appear to have finally arisen phoenix-like out of centuries of decay into a new ascendent era.
As an American of European descent, I find this sad.
Self inflicted wounds are the worst, and denying that you caused it is pathetic . No respect for their intelligence or their situation.
Amazing the collective amnesia – Enron is the problem :
https://www.marketplace.org/2021/08/04/the-legacy-of-enron-in-californias-power-challenges-today/
This model is in the EU – the reference to volatility and massive price increases should at least ring a bell in CA, TX.
This cannot be controlled simply by gas pumping – it must be dealt with directly. The entire CO2 trading scheme is a massive finance scam that would make Jeff Skilling blush!
Along with subsidies for unreliable power.
The only CO2 trading worth doing is real CO2 gas in pipelines to be used in enhanced oil recovery. All the rest is scamsville.
The problem is ignorant regulators and legislators who create dysfunctional markets by imposing stupid constraints on supply. Once that is done you can choose the method their stupidity is revealed. Simple lengthy power outages (see e.g. Venezuela) , or sky high prices.
One would think US Leftists would learn from the EU’s mistakes that trying to run a grid on solar, wind and unicorn farts is economically devastating and physically impossible, but, alas.
As the saying goes, “Smart people learn from their mistakes, but wise people learn from the mistakes of others…”
Unfortunately, US Leftists are neither smart or wise, and will simply continue with their crazy wind and solar energy policies, and assure the US will suffer the same devastating economic effects as their EU comrades which is, by definition, insane..
It all fits into their plans to bring down the US economy to the point where all the non-elite folks are dependent upon the feds for their survival. The dark winter is being brought about via the prohibitions against oil, natural gas and coal. There is no viable alternative for the immediate future outside the “fossil” fuels. They know that, its not a mistake, its a plan for destruction. Coupled with the deadly vaccines for a virus which, by itself is survivable by a major portion of the population, and you have chaos. Exactly what the left has in mind. Yes, insanity. No doubt about it. Russia tried it in the early part of the 20th century and lots of folks died at the hands of the government. There will be little difference with that experience.
Biden today, extended the moratorium on having to repay student loans for another year.
The people with huge student loans, are not the poor, they are the elite.
Yeah; tell me about it! Just renewed my electricity tariff (in England – I know, I know; we are, sort-of, out, but the issues are much the same and ‘our’ government is now running to EU standards): up 66%! I’d like to tell ’em to frack off – council tax coming soon too (probably up about 10%). CPI at 5.1%? Hmm, and the rest!
The EU is facing an energy crisis, because:
1) Brussels’ RE idiots refused to sign long-term contract for gas from Russia
2) NATO and the US are stupidly trying to contain and pressure Russia.
3 There is minimal wind, minimal solar, and some nuclear plants are down with “issues”
4) Russia retaliated by merely limiting gas flow to the EU to CONTRACTED amounts, plus 5%, to ensure TOTAL compliance with SIGNED contracts.
5) Owners are diverting LNG carriers to the EU to rake in on the bonanza.
6)
US spot price $7/million Btu
EU spot price $65/million Btu
The 5% is sold by Gazprom on the spot market at very high prices.
EXCERPT from:
WIND AND SOLAR TO PROVIDE 30 PERCENT OF NEW ENGLAND ELECTRICITY CONSUMPTION BY 2050
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/wind-and-solar-provide-50-percent-of-future-new-england
Energy systems analysts of Denmark, Ireland, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, etc., have known for decades, if you have a significant percentage of (wind + solar) on your grid, you better have available:
– An adequate capacity, MW, of other power plants to counteract any variations of (W+S), 24/7/365
– High-capacity, MW, connections to nearby grids
– An adequate capacity of energy storage, such as:
1) Pumped hydro storage
2) Hydro plants with reservoir storage
3) Grid-scale battery systems
The more presence of variable (W+S) on the NE grid, the more the other generators have to vary their outputs, which causes these other generators to be less efficient (more wear and tear, more Btu/kWh, more CO2/kWh).
Owners in European countries with much wind and solar on the grids get compensated for their losses.
Those compensations are charged to the general public, not to the Owners of wind and solar systems, as part of the political (subsidy + cost shifting) regimen, to make wind and solar appear price-competitive versus fossil fuels.
RE folks often advocate:
1) Electricity must be 100% renewable, or zero carbon, or carbon-neutral by 2050
2) Getting rid of the remaining nuclear plants
3) Getting rid of natural gas, coal, and oil plants
4) More biomass burning
About This Article
This article has four parts and an Appendix
Part 1 provides an introduction to miscellaneous energy topics, and consumption of world energy quantities
Part 2 provides an introduction to existing NE grid conditions
Part 3 provides an introduction to daily NE grid load shaping, to deal with heat pumps and EVs in 2030
Part 4 provides the future NE grid conditions with 20% wind and 10% solar in 2050
The Appendix shows various energy topics, such as Turnkey Capital Costs of Grid-scale Battery Systems; Grid-scale Battery System Operating Cost in New England; Energy Losses of Battery Systems; “All-in” Electricity Cost of Wind and Solar in New England
Mostly right. Have a look here :
Mario Draghi Says “Urgent Policy Action” Needed To Tackle Europe’s Energy Crisis
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/mario-draghi-says-urgent-policy-action-needed-tackle-europes-energy-crisis
When Italian Premier Mario Draghi, ex-Goldman Sachs, ex-ECB chief, suddenly says the EU must do something – do you think he means touching the wild spot-pricing Enron Model in the EU? I think not.
“The EU is facing an energy crisis, because: …:
People who can’t rationally deal with conflicting points of view more readily accept alarmist appeals that promote guilt and fear, rather than logical appeals showing how demonstrably wrong the perverse science supporting their guilty fears really is.
10% solar in New England?? In the winter??? Will they need to cover all of NH with panels (and VT with pumped storage)?
Hi hiskorr,
I agree, 10% solar on the NE grid is ridiculous, but I needed to assume such a number to do my analysis, which showed the utter folly of it.
We had a 10” snowfall a few days ago, and snow is still covering the panels.
There was not much wind during these days.
Please read the entire article, because it applies to almost all grids in northern climates in the US and Europe.
There is absolutely no way Europe can do without Russian gas AND be competitive on the world stage.
The EU is totally hamstrung with rules and regulations.
Elon Musk is totally pissed at the slow pace of the government approving his plant so he can start producing cars.
He said, the Texas plant may produce before the German plant!!
I just read Ukraine, not a member of the EU and NATO, will urge Brussels to FORCE Gazprom to supply more than 5% in excess of long-term-contracted quantities of gas.
If so, it would flood the spot market and decrease prices.
Months ago, Ukraine was offered gas at $6/million Btu by Russia, and stupidly turned it down, in favor of buying reverse-shipment gas from nearby EU countries at higher prices.
Now, these countries have no gas to export, except at very high prices
It looks like Ukraine screwed itself, but likely will be bailed out anyway, because it is willing to bark at Russia, as a proxy for NATO
“With the exception of Poland and Scandinavia all countries in Europe have broken the €300 MWh barrier with France and and Switzerland nearly at €400 (£341.60)”
One thing I do not understand is why the price is so high in France? France has ~70% nuclear, ~12% hydro and only ~8% natural gas, coal & oil combined, the rest being solar & wind. if 82% of power is essentially fixed cost, why is the remainder increasing so much? selling to other countries for a nice profit?
France would normally have 60GW+ of nuclear running over the winter. Shutdowns for maintenance problems mean they have just over 40GW. Some plants are being shut for good. France was very early to go for nuclear in the 1970s after the 1972 oil crisis. A lot of plant dates from then. Their replacement programme was going to major on the flawed EPR design, and is now hopelessly behind.
“Kostas Skrekas said a new mechanism to help shield the most vulnerable citizens and middle-sized businesses from price increases should be created at the European Union level.”
The simple and obvious answer is to ditch unreliables and develop gas and oil fields, increase supplies and reduce prices.
More common sense than a mechanism.
Will not work in the current inflationary climate. Liquidity pumping by the FED and the ECB must be dealt with. This is way beyond mere critical physical things like ¨energy¨.
Obviously the Poles who refuse to close down their coal-based powergeneration are the only sane people left in Europe. The Germans on the other hand will discover in February, usually the coldest month, that their eastern neighbours can not make up the German shortfall as the Poles will need the electricity themselves. I predict riots in Berlin and Munich.
Poland is in trouble for all sorts of reasons
“European Union Launches Lawsuit Against Poland For Violating ‘Primacy’ of EU Laws”
Does the judge come with a tank?
Does the border come with a wall?
Heh. The Polish are known for their expert masonry skills… .
The EU is pissed Poland is stubbornly doing what it wants for its own good.
you dont think they will simply invade poland?
They’ve never been known to do anything like that…
The cold wave may set in over the next month. It is close at hand now. … https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/500hPa/overlay=temp/orthographic=18.47,60.07,892/loc=6.344,49.556
The Dutch just announced yesterday that in order to comply with emissions limits, coal fired power stations will be limited to 35% of capacity effective 1st January. Shooting yourself in the foot, onto of shuttingin Groningen gas. Perhaps add a few Dutch cities to the riot list?
Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of guys 😉
and gals.
There, fixed it for ya.
“RE folks often advocate:
1) Electricity must be 100% renewable, or zero carbon, or carbon-neutral by 2050
2) Getting rid of the remaining nuclear plants
3) Getting rid of natural gas, coal, and oil plants
4) More biomass burning”
NOT SO regarding biomass- I’ve tried explaining this several times. The green crowd UTTERLY HATES biomass because it releases plant food (https://www.pfpi.net/). The only people in New England in favor of biomass are the wood products industry- who happen to LOVE fossil fuels because you can’t do forestry without fossil fuels for your logging machines, trucks, chain saws, sawmills, etc. The greens, some of them, might like corn based methanol added to gasoline, but the forestry folks don’t like it. Woody biomass is indeed renewable but has NOTHING to do with solar and wind.
my previous post was meant to be a reply to William Post (see below)
Woody biomass is far from renewable, because the renewable cycle, 80 to 100 years in northern climates, is not allowed to complete itself, plus significant fossil fuel is used for operation and maintenance, and embedded in infrastructure, on an A to Z basis
Wood power plants are 25% efficient, i.e., the energy equivalent of 3 of 4 trees is wasted
You don’t know what renewable means. It means the forest will continue to grow. It doesn’t mean “grow to full biological maturity”. The fact that fossil fuel is used is utterly irrelevant to whether or not the forest is renewable- instead, that concern is about whether or not woody biomass is carbon neutral- which is another topic. Also, as I’ve noted countless times here- whether or not those trees are used for biomass- they will get cut because most of this happens in the American southeast, the coastal plain. These forests are intensely managed with or without a biomass market. Without the biomass market, those trees, which are the weeds in a managed forest- will be cut, piled up and burned in place, outdoors, causing real air pollution. When burned in a biomass facility (most of them)- the smokestacks have precipitators which remove much of the air pollution.
Respect and salute to Bob Dole who passed this week. A WW2 veteran who remarkably recovered from spinal injury in Italy in 1945, he had a distinguished career as a Republican senator, running for president once or twice. I always thought him a wise and competent leader, who will be missed. Rest in peace Bob!
Causing pain and uncertainty with what in mind?
Some are making huge profits….
Which is the only reason the damn lights haven’t gone out.
True to form, the energy crisis will, if not simply denied outright, be blamed on; 1) “Capitalism” 2), “Fossil Fuels”, and 3) “Climate Change”.
What a perfect time for Putin to attack the Ukraine. Europe can’t repel, nor even speak ill of him lest they get cut off.
As with Napoleon at Moscow, the winter will do the job… Looks like Kiev read US schoolbooks and think Waterloo.
OMG Hockey Sticks do exist :
To blame this on supply and demand or forcing is worse than the IPCC.
Enough Hockey Sticks for the San Jose Sharks :
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Europe-Faces-Full-Blown-Energy-Crisis-As-Gas-Prices-Smash-All-Records.html
And Mann thought he had a monopoly!
Why to people post qraphs and tables that are completely unreadable?
better graphics at oilprice.com, above…
Actually the way to get prices down is to build more nukes.
The EU zone has no gas or oil it can produce, and it’s very unhappy about coal, especially as the EU has practically declared war on Poland, which has the largest reserves, for daring to tell the EU to stop interfering with its (very Catholic) culture .
Not everywhere is the USA with economic oil and gas and coal reserves.
In the mean time we will all be taking it on the chin. While the EU and the Grifflette all tell us that its not renewable energy that is the problem its lack of renewable energy! And we must put in more wind mills.
I don’t think the UK will black out – its been as cold as it gets with no sun and no wind and we have just about managed with the nukes the coal the wood and what gas we had to burn. And propped up France which is in serious trouble with some reactor out. But it’s cost a helluva lot in gas to do it..
No, EU and UK cannot really do more fossil extraction. UK and Norway (which isnt in the EU either) might frack if their silly snoflakes millennials would let them. Huge profits for US gas producers if they can ship LNG to UK, provided Biden shuts his mouth about Ireland…
China is expected to have a commercial and functional Thorium MSR design in about 8 years, with a hypothetical electrical cost of just $0.03/kWh….
No wonder China didn’t even officially attend COP26.
China is delighted to see the West insanely try to build a wind/solar grids, which could be 20 TIMES more expensive (on a cost/kWh basis) than China’s MSRs.
Imagine the second wave of international production that’ll move to China if their MSR program actually works as projected.
The West is committing economic suicide with their insane “renewable energy” fantasy.
Britain will probably scrape through this winter so the idiots in Westminster will charge on full steam ahead with their lunatic decarbonisation plan.The UK’s blackout comes next winter with Hunterston B & Hinckley point B closed and West Burton and Drax coal fired stations shut in September 2022. That’s National Grid’s margin gone and the minute the wind stops blowing it’s lights out for us.
With more cold weather coming in February and March 2022, watch it get even worse.
Not a lot of people know that in Australia because like the spiraling energy costs in UK and unlike any and every extreme weather event it has received zero media attention.
It ain’t just Europe. LNG at the Japan-Korea Market (“JKM”) hit $49.35/MMBtu on 21 December.
And this is why I have always been so vociferously opposed to the CAGW cult.
It was only when I started reading WUWT all those many years ago when Anthony started this marvellous site that I learnt how insidious the climate cult was:
if the CAGW zealots were just a bunch of nutters ranting at their little conferences, I wouldn’t care less. But it’s not just that; the CAGW mania has infested every part of our lives and is hitting us in the pocket every day in many ways, be it energy, travel, or consumer goods (to name but a few).
Having to pay through my nose and watch those less fortunate than myself be completely impoverished because of the global warming scam makes me beyond mad.
Even if (or when) the green scam collapses and people realise the idiocy and things return to normal, I will still be angry that so many people suffered because of the likes of that corrupt little weasel Mike Mann and his horrendous compatriots. That huge amount of suffering the green zealots have brought upon this world can never be reversed.
There, that’s my rant over.
I see NPR is neglecting to report the skyrocketing cost of electricity in Europe, the U.K. and East Asia.
This major story is being deliberately and intentionally ignored by NPR. Why?
It’s going unreported by NPR because electricity in Europe and the U.K. now costs TEN TIMES (10×) what electricity costs in the U.S. Why?
The cost of electricity in Europe and the U.K. has skyrocketed because wind and solar-generated electricity has completely and utterly failed.
So NPR buries its head in the sand.
They’ve been burying their heads alright, but I don’t think it is in the sand.
Europeans are a bit like Californians, Following Einstein’s definition of insanity. If you keep voting the same way, you keep getting the same type of politicians. Those are the fools that live perfectly happily off other people’s taxes while pushing those same people into energy poverty. Those political pensions will of course keep up with the inflation they cause. I suspect it might take another French Revolution to sort this nonsense out.
Looks like conditions in the Northern Hemisphere are set up for large cold waves to descend on both continents. The 10 day forecast for my area in NorCal is forecasting 10 F for the 29th of the month. If that holds true, then that will be the coldest temp to hit this area in the last 11 years. You can see the cold wave moving over the Pacific Ocean as it prepares to move inland. … https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/500hPa/overlay=temp/orthographic=-123.88,33.99,671/loc=-130.326,37.804
Conditions across Europe are also in a position where a deep cold wave can impact much of Europe depending on surfae winds.
Is La Niña weaker?
http://www.bom.gov.au/archive/oceanography/ocean_anals/IDYOC007/IDYOC007.202112.gif?fbclid=IwAR3knUgbPxaPL1wLIaHS3woTRY02-IiDKtu8e2msUzlRJu-Q5hlOyKcFTuQ
It may be that next year Europe will have a wind surplus instead of a wind drought.
The problem is, who knows?
Certainly not Griff, I don’t recall him predicting this years conditions
Unless “overperform” is a prediction