Essay by Eric Worrall
Think you have already seen high gasoline prices? OilPrice.com claims chronic underinvestment, excessive taxation, and growing political turmoil in producer nations, could trigger a “Doomsday Scenario” as demand outstrips supply.
Oil Markets Could Face A Doomsday Scenario This Week
By Cyril Widdershoven – Jun 28, 2022, 7:00 PM CDT
Expect lots of oil price volatility in the coming months as markets finally discover just how much spare capacity OPEC members really have.
Oil production outages in Libya and the continued impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are going to push oil prices higher if new supply isn’t found.
While some analysts are predicting oil demand destruction in the near future, there is little evidence to back up those claims.
…
This week, a possible doomsday scenario could emerge in oil markets, based not only on OPEC+ export strategies but also due to increased internal turmoil in Libya, Iraq, and Ecuador. Possible other political and economic turmoil is also brewing in other producers, while US shale is still not showing any signs of a substantial production increase in the coming months.
Global oil markets have long believed that OPEC has enough spare production capacity to stabilize markets, with Saudi Arabia and the UAE just needing to open their taps. There is ,however, no real evidence to suggest that OPEC has increased production capacity in place in the short term. A research note by Commonwealth Bank commodities analyst Tobin Gorey already noted that OPEC’s two leaders are producing at near-term capacity limits. At the same time, UAE Minister of Energy Suhail Al Mazrouei put even more pressure on oil prices as he stated that the UAE is producing near-maximum capacity based on its quota of 3.168 million barrels per day (bpd) under the agreement with OPEC and its allies. That comment could still indicate that there is some spare capacity left in Abu Dhabi, but the remarks were made after French President Emmanuel Macron had stated to US president Biden during the G7 meeting that not only is the UAE producing at maximum production capacity, but also that Saudi Arabia only has another 150,000 bpd of spare capacity available.
…
Pressure will build in the coming days, as Al Mazrouei’s remarks seem to rebuke claims of a spare capacity shortage, but as always “where there is smoke, there is a fire”. A possible spare production capacity shortage, or non-availability at all, combined with an expected force majeure of Libya’s NOC in the Gulf of Sirte, and a suspension of Ecuador’s oil output (520,000 bpd) in the coming days due to anti-government protests, are likely to lead to an oil price spike.
…
Read more: https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Oil-Markets-Could-Face-A-Doomsday-Scenario-This-Week.html
If only there was a major oil pipeline project the Biden administration could approve, to provide Americans with a capacity buffer against what could be a nasty additional supply shock, on top of all the oil price pain people have already experienced.
Thankfully the USA’s green energy transition federal government is on the case. If you find the next gasoline price hike utterly unaffordable, if you are struggling to pay the bills, you could follow Democrat advice, and borrow $50,000 to buy an EV. /sarc
We’ve seen no evidence of long-term demand destruction, other than the normal consumer constraints resulting from high prices.
The projected “transition” is a liberal fairy tale.
LNG, CNG and Coal could destroy some of the demand for oil if the politicians get out of the way.. Even Trudeau stepped aside with some short environmental mumbo jumbo to allow Canadian Oil Sands to go full tilt export. Money talks and BS does the business. I have been considering transition from heating oil to coal in my home. It’s a no brainer now. I could put in a system that can also use CNG with as a coal adjunct. I live in PA makes sense right?
It absolutely makes sense. We used to have an OEM here that manufactured coal-fired furnaces, and they’re still pretty common in some of our communities. Locating a local source of (consumer) coal here (Wyoming) should be simple.
If you’re suggesting, though, that the Biden administration might figure out that coal could supplant petroleum and ease the current constraints, that ain’t happening. Objective reality and logic have no place in this administration.
Agreed! Only dreaming about coal . Seems only CHIRUSCOM and it’s Eastern associates exercise objective reality and logic in energy policy. The West has has taken a hard hit in the head from a decade long ideological propaganda tsunami that flooded our governments and corporations with echolalia and stupidity.
I live on a hill top with no piped NG available. The only option for gas is propane. CNG is not available on delivery. I could go and fill tanks myself but that is it. CNG equivalent is 1/2 the price of heating oil and gas. The guy next door has a coal furnace. Coal is a 3rd cheaper than heating oil in PA…not great; CNG would be better. I heated my home in Richmond VA in the very cold winters of the late 1970’s with coal in 6 shallow tile coal fire places in the neighborhood of Oregon Hill, I mined the coal off an old abandoned rail bed along the James River from old grown over abandoned piles of coal that fell out of rail cars during derailments in the 19th century. Some of the piles were huge.. hundreds of dump trucks worth…. when coal was King! I just used my back pack to carry the coal home…a very strenuous Saturday morning chore.
A few years later I moved into another house in Oregon Hill that did not appear to have a basement just a 6 inch crawl space. It didn’t make sense. The floor was just a pile of dust. I dug down through 5-6 inches of dust to find coal. For years we kept that house nice and toasty during the winter burning coal in coal fire places and never did completely dig out that basement that was 8 feet deep.
That’s brilliant. Coal seams here are visible along the roadsides.
Hopefully, the spike in gas prices will peak right around the time of US midterm elections.
That way, even the most deluded will see what the Dimbulbcrats have planned for them.
30 days before, hopefully, to capture all the pre-voting.
Biden is also sniffing around to do damage in West Texas. Prices could spike even more.
https://www.audacy.com/krld/news/business/biden-admin-epa-targeting-west-texas-permian-basin
When Joe starts sniffing, wise little girls run away.
Yes, the media and voters have not picked up on the concept of sustained high prices driven by sustained bad public policy in energy, refining and processing, mining and materials for the EV push etc. All of these areas of consumption will be hurt by permanently elevated prices– fuels, electricity, cars, housing, and food. Sorry but consequences either unintended or advocacy-intended do take time to unfold.
Your choices of words suggests a level of high prices. One can make a strong case that the only thing level about these high prices is the rate of acceleration. Or worse.
The US was oil independent until 1948. We’ve been importing oil since then. We import a lot of oil from Canada and Mexico. which seem like safe suppliers. I don’t trust any other oil producing nations. It seems like a good idea to stop importing oil from nations other than Canada and Mexico.
There’s no shortage of oil in the US now — there may be a shortage of oil refineries. But there could be problems in the future as oil exploration and development investment has not kept up with inflation since 2014 … as the US population grows.
If Mexico ever gets its act together, North American energy independence would be very achievable.
David, do you expect that might actually someday happen? Last I checked, it didn’t seem likely.
Second question: is consumer consumption of oil & gas in Mexico increasing?
How do you explore if the Government refuses to sell leases?
I merely pointed out that the oil investment problem began when Obama was President. In 2020, Expectations for future oil related government policies must have taken a nosedive after the 2020 Election/
.
Investors consider the current supply and demand and also expectations of future demand for oil. The EPA 49mpg CAFE for 2026 model cars and light trucks is going to hurt gasoline demand and boost electric car sales. Engineering on 2026 model electric cars most likely began in 2021.
“The US was oil independent until 1948. We’ve been importing oil since then.”
Not true when considering the net sums of imports and exports.
In the first half of 2020, the United States became a net exporter (exported more than it imported) by 432,000 b/d of crude oil and petroleum products.
— eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=49596
The US continued to be a net exporter until after the first half of 2021, at which time the Brandon administrations’s policies to curtail the use of fossil fuels in the US began to take effect.
Fortunately, revisionist history has a hard time gaining of foothold here at WUWT.
Net exporter is a different measurement.
Apples and oranges.
If your nation is oil independent,
than no supplier (other nations)
can stop or cut shipments and disrupt
your economy. That is not true today.
So we are not oil independent,
and we have not been since 1948.
Really?
I do believe you have your “facts” wrong”.
Check this out:
“With the onset of World War I, oil becomes vital for modern warfare, fueling ships, land vehicles, and planes. German attacks disrupt U.S. oil exports to Britain and France, causing oil shortages in those countries. When the United States enters the war allied against Germany in 1917, the Wilson administration steps up efforts to supply oil to Britain and France. U.S. production cannot meet both domestic and war demand, so the United States begins importing oil from Mexico to close the gap. During the U.S. war effort, Mexican imports average between 2.5 million barrels and 4 million barrels of oil per month, supplementing U.S. production of about 30 million barrels a month.”
— https://www.cfr.org/timeline/oil-dependence-and-us-foreign-policy
(my underlining emphasis added)
1917 is far earlier than 1948.
Net imports is the only measure that matters.
Whether any individual consumer buys from a US supplier or a foreign supplier depends on shipping costs. If they live near the border, and a foreign supplier is closer than any US supplier, then they will buy from the foreign supplier.
The same goes for a foreign consumer who lives near the US border, they may end up buying from the US supplier rather than one in their own country because the shipping costs are less.
” … in 2021, the United States produced2 about 18.66 million b/d of petroleum and consumed3 about 19.78 million b/d. Even though U.S. annual total petroleum exports were greater than total petroleum imports in 2020 and 2021, the United States still imported some crude oil and petroleum products from other countries to help to supply domestic demand for petroleum and to supply international markets.”
SOURCE:
Oil imports and exports – U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)
When I said the US was oil independent through 1948, that information came directly from Google, and I merely assumed Google was right:.
“Around 1948, demand of oil exceeded the supply of oil, allowing the U.S. to start importing oil. Therefore, the nation quickly became a major importer of oil, rather than being the major exporter for it.”
SOURCE:
when did the US start importing oil? – Google Search
“. . . and I merely assumed Google was right.”
VERY DANGEROUS, that.
Google, like Wikipedia, does not tell the WHOLE truth, only the truth that supports the democratic ideology. Pick any Environmental topic and search on Google and then on DuckDuckGo. It is like you are getting information from another world, and fewer ads.
Problem is that democrats have imposed regulations that prevent US owned ships that are not US maned (Union mandates that actual take jobs away from union workers) from delivering oil/gas to Hawaii. Thus HI has to buy it from Russia/China, etc.
Why would energy companies invest in new wells or new refinery capacity when the FedGov keeps saying they will bankrupt the oil industry by 2050?
I don’t blame them.
Just reported what has been happening
since Obama was President. Biden
is making the situation worse.
Like he does with everything !
Biden seemed to indicate in his campaign rhetoric that he wanted to do it by 2024.
Bad news is this will persist for quite a while. Good news is, it guarantees a US red tsunami come November. Better news is, now that the stolen 2020 election methods have been revealed, we can guard against the left ever using them again to that extent.
Please reveal how many 2020 votes were changed
as a result of post-2020 Election investigations.
Not one electoral vote was changed.
The 2020 stolen election methods have not been revealed.
I believe you are thinking of the mules.
A vote does not become illegal if delivered by a mule.
The mule can get in trouble, but that does not change the vote.
I believe the primary fraud was voter rolls rarely updated that
contained millions of names of people not eligible to vote
in a particular state. When absentee ballots (Covid Covid)
were sent to everyone on the voter rolls, millions of extra ballots
were sent out. Democrats found ways to get them returned
with a Biden vote
Democrats could not care less if the vote was by a legal voter.
That problem has not been solved for 2022.
How many mules have gone to prison?
Trump Derangement Syndrome was a motivator in 2020
for Democrats to lie, cheat and steal votes.
That should be weaker in 2022.
But the minimal punishment for election fraud in 2020
just encourages more fraud in 2022. I can’t see leftists
giving up control of Congress without trying to win
using as much fraud as they can accomplish in 2022.
Video of one worker putting stacks of ballots through the counter multiple times.. is not one person one vote. Taping pizza boxes over windows, kicking Republicans and poll watchers out of the vote counting room is ALSO evidence of fraud. Likely they were ALSO running ballots multiple times through vote counting machines… why else would they do something blatantly illegal?
Agree 100%
I live in the Detroot Suburbs
None of that changes one vote.
A ballot has to be proven illegal with
signature matching on the envelope or
other actual evidence it is an illegal vote.
Everything else is suspicious
behavior. We sure had lots of that
during the 2020 election. I believe,
but can not prove, with 99% confidence,
that counting only legal votes would have
given Trump a second term.
People involved with everything you mentioned
can get into trouble (very few have), but even
if they are prosecuted, not one vote is changed.
Please don’t get mad at me for reporting reality.
I believe 2020 Election fraud was one of the
worst events in modern American history,
just after the attack on Pearl Harbor and 9/11
Please reveal how Biden got 10 Million more votes than Trump or either of Obama’s elections – with ZERO Enthusiasm.
Then explain why with over a 10% total increase in votes, that massive increase (Un Precedented) only occurred in dark blue states that made ZERO difference in Electoral votes, as they always vote BLUE, and the increase was less 2% in the 15 hottest/Swing states where billions of dollars were dumped into the coffers of the voting administration coffers to QUOTE “Assure a fair Vote” by democratic oligarchs/big tech. Resulting in Democratic runners making 6-12 trips a day to the Ballot Drop Boxes, all of which had no surveillance cameras near them, But you could easily see them drive up, drop a stack of paper more than two inches high into them on each trip, then return to the DIM headquarters.
Explanation: $400 million of private funding from Zuckerberg.
The EV owners are going to be cross when they are banned from charging during peak periods due to oil and gas needed for electricity generation. They better start hoping the wind blows at convenient periods.
As far as ICE are concerned, serious shortages seem to be worst for diesel.
If we managed to place a few windmills in the room for the J6 hearings, then it would be possible to power much of the Atlantic coast.
There is a massive and steady stream of BS being spewed that appears to be quite consistent in its current production.
Surely we can put something so predictably reliable to good use!
They have “solved” that problem at Glastonbury. Just use diesel generators to charge EVs and charge £80 (apparently reduced to £50 after complaints) for a 1-hour charge.
But, but, but, Glastonbury is net-zero because they planter a few trees
Related news…
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Shell-Warns-Spare-Oil-Capacity-Is-Running-Very-Low.html
I do wonder when/if TPTB will finally understand what they have unleashed on us all and whether it is genuinely due to extreme stupidity (certainly a possibility) or if they are deliberately crucifying the plebs (also quite conceivable).
Why did you leave out both/and?
Of course they don’t understand, or don’t care if they have a slight clue.
Only good thing is that it seems to be happening fairly quickly, so many of the guilty are still around and holding the bag.
Hope for accountability, and change.
There is some hope that the non-progs, non-lefties are in the game, at least more than they have been in the past. Less “go along to get along”, although time will tell.
Payback’s a biatch.
Business TV prog today: Electricity charger for a battery powered larger trucks may cost more than the truck itself. Using a L2 charger, the charging would take well over ten hours.
Mobile charging unit, coming to your neighbourhood soon
What a good idea. The batteries that charge batteries are charged by lightning, just as it says on the side of the trailer.
Those Lightnings are over $100k….how much for the mobile charger?
The unit takes power off the grid at a slow 7 to 19.2 kW, charges its internal battery, and can then deliver higher power to charge EVs faster (but not fast). It’s limited to supplying a charge at 80 kW (the fastest EV chargers are now 350 kW). It has different options for its internal battery capacity but the smallest internal battery, 105 kWh, holds enough juice to fully charge one EV or partially charge two to 5 EVs. Once you deplete the battery it needs another 6 to 12 hours to fully recharge. It also has an option to recharge at 80 kW, but if you have 80 kW available this thing is not needed.
Since Li-Ion batteries degrade rapidly above 600 to 800 charge/discharge cycles, if it was charged/discharged once per day, it would need a new battery every 3 to 4 years. Twice per day would kill the battery in less than 2 years. The price of a charge would have to be very high, more than 50 cents per kWh, to pay for itself. You’d be better off driving a Prius on gasoline than using one of these things to charge your EV.
Is the diesel generator mounted behind the charger, or do you need a second trailer?
Doomsday Scenario #2
They’re all crying out for a windfall tax…
“Windfall tax will deter North Sea oil and gas investment and risks higher energy prices, Rishi Sunak warned”
https://inews.co.uk/news/business/windfall-tax-denorth-sea-oil-gas-investment-energy-prices-rishi-sunak-1703722?ico=most_popular
How many of the people demanding a windfall profits tax, would be willing to support a subsidy to these same companies when oil prices are low?
High profits now, are how these companies build up the reserves in order to survive the low half of the price cycle.
Like most liberals, they actually believe that they are entitled to a heads I win, tails you lose kind of world.
Net-zero
There’s no hope. It’s going to be a tough winter for a lot of middle and low income folks that rely of fuel oil, diesel, propane and gas. Not to mention the coming increase in food prices as grain futures adjust to reflect the number of acres that were taken out of production this past year due to diesel and fertilizer costs.
Does any one really know who has what capacity? Maybe no one here on WUWT with it’s data resources likely knows but the industry knows. You would think that oil over $100 would incentivize rapid investment in increased capacity. Maybe they are forecasting oil going back up to $140 or higher or hovering with little volatility while it can be all blamed on Putin. Why blow capital at the peak price in the short run. As time goes the producers will get itchy to cut political deals they want and get in on the tail end of the profit storm. Biden doesn’t make the Saudi Prince itch much. Remember these markets are colluded…supply and demand is only part of the picture. Also remember in our day, market collusion doesn’t require a hand shake because the oil industry has it’s quants with all the deep learning projection models and all shorts of proxy indexes and clandestine info gathering. They are also very sophisticated at ‘narrative” and lying by omission and allusion. The big lie in 1974 and 1975 was oil was quickly and permanently running out. This began the big push for dream high tech solutions for cheap, clean energy that apart from nuke power never happened. Instead we got smart phones and online pseudo life. The oil crisis of 1974-1980 was totally political and American Oil companies made out like bandits. Nixon and Ford both got wind fall profit taxes passed on the oil companies. Then the Texas oil man juggernaut collapsed into a savings and loan debacle. By 1996 gas was 76 cents after being over a dollar since 1974. OPEC had plenty of oil. Pledge to protect the Sunni’s from the Shiites and oil will go down.
Also, Iran is a huge NG exporter via LNG. India runs its transportation on CNG from Iran. As central Asia industrializes and consumerizes under the leadership of RUSCHI-COM, OPEC may see giant long term destruction of demand via geographical market partitioning by the COM’s and their energy producing friends. So it makes sense for OPEC to realign. I think this is part of the long term political picture that is unfolding that is impacting supply as well. But I am guessing at best.
In the oil industry, rapid investment in capacity still involves years of waiting.
Which will not be done, since governments all over are telling the industry that they are going to be shut down shortly. Why make an investment that will take 10 years to break even when you expect it to be shut down in 5?
If only we weren’t on the brink of UN Agenda 2030 – no private vehicles for the masses. Codified by the WEF.
Meanwhile, the KXL pipeline remains shut down due to Brandon’s executive order and, according to an oil exec who was interviewed on one of the news channels, no new oil refineries have been built since 1977 due to (I would imagine) govt dictates.
Government is more the problem here than it is a solution. We are our own worst enemy for as long as we do not realize that.
” the KXL pipeline remains shut down”
KXL was only 8% completed.
Even with Trump as President for four years.
More of a pipedream than a pipeline.
Also irrelevant
Because US refineries have no oil shortage without KXL
We actually have a shortage of refineries,
which you mentioned.
Richard,
The KXL pipeline was shut down during the Obama years too, wasn’t it? I believe David Middleton mentioned this in one of his postings here.
At any rate, I was thinking more about the long-term effect of the shutdown rather than the near term. I probably should have mentioned that. I believe I read somewhere that something like 800,000 bpd was eventually supposed to flow through it, true?
I believe that the oil exec who was interviewed also said that the existing refineries have been expanded over the years to accommodate increasing demand. Still, they are getting old and probably in need of replacements. I am not hopeful that this will happen.
A pipeline that was never more than 8% completed can not have any effect on the supply of oil. But it is a symptom of counterproductive energy policies. Remember that it was a shutdown of construction with little completed, not a shutdown of an operating pipeline. More like a symbol of ridiculous government policies – shooting ourselves in the foot. in the spirit of Germany, UK and Australia.
Oil is not expensive now because the KXL never got built.
Democrats impeded that pipeline for over a decade. We know who the assholes are.
pick 5 other major pipelines. assume that they had never been constructed. tell me if the cost of oil would be higher or lower if they had never been built…
Nevermind, I’ll make it easier. Assume the the Colonial, the Enbridge, the Trans Alaska, the Dakota Access, and the Big Inch had been completed up to 8% and then stalled through the years; would oil/energy costs be higher, the same, or lower?
“Oil is not expensive now because the KXL never got built.”
Weasel words (your words). Oil production and delivery is lessened because the KXL never got built. Supply/demand concepts are still real. Regulatory burden also plays in, and impairs production/delivery performance as well as short/long term planning/financing/cost analysis for production/delivery, but cannot be directly quantified.
KXL matters.
(simply analogy: I’ve been waiting for a part for a 2021 Toyota for 3 months. The car is 99% ready but not drivable. In the meantime I get a free rental … nobody else gets to use the rental, only me. People come into town and call Hertz and are told, “We are out of cars”. In addition, State Farm raises their insurance premiums to cover the cost having to pay for a rental car for 3 months. It doesn’t matter if the car is 8% or 99% ready when it is put on hold; there are associated costs until it is done. It doesn’t mean that there are no benefits associated with finishing a project in a timely manner, just because you don’t have the capacity to see them.)
zerohedge: at the current record pace of SPR (Strategic Petroleum Reserve) drainage, one way or another the Biden admin will have to end its artificial attempts to keep the price of oil lower some time in October (or risk entering a war with China over Taiwan with virtually no oil reserve). This means that unless Putin ends his war some time in the next 5 months, there is a non-trivial chance that oil will hit a record price around $200 – precisely the price the White House is bracing for – a few days before the midterms. Which translates into $10+ gasoline.
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/white-house-quietly-modeling-shock-200-oil
And while one can speculate how much longer Democrats can continue the “Jan 6” dog and pony show as the entire economy implodes around them, how America will vote in November when gas is double digits should not be a mystery to anyone.
Given the influence China has with the Biden crime family, what makes you think this wasn’t the plan?
The SPR is at the lowest level since 1986 I read.
Depleting the reserve has NOT kept gas prices down, and endangers our national security in case of war or other supply disruption.
Hmm, almost seems to be deliberate damage…
“almost”?
SPR is, under democrats the PPR, i.e. Political Petroleum Reserve, first used by Bill Clinton for political purposes.
Leftists ruin everything they touch.
This is just another example of a leftist band aid policy.
We are in big trouble if they ruin the electric grid.
If?
“people over pipelines”
Activists seems to be trying to outdo each other with non sequiturs.
Pipelines 4 people there fixed it
I highly recommend this video to anyone interested in understanding what’s going on with world oil production. Amrita Sen is one of the best in the business.
https://youtu.be/PJqd3USm_uo
From the above oilprice.com article excerpts:
“Oil production outages in Libya and the continued impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are going to push oil prices higher if new supply isn’t found.”
Oh, pleeeeease . . . enough with this bogus claim that Russia has cut exports of their oil as a result of US and western European sanctions against buying oil from Russia.
As most people with an IQ above room temperature know, Russian has continued selling its normal production, with the buyers of its oil in Russian-friendly countries, such as China and India and Thailand grabbing the sanctioned amounts and then turning around and selling that oil back to the US and western European countries either directly or via further “laundering” of it through other countries (e.g., Venezuela; and some have even asserted much is cycled through Mexico).
Net result: oil prices increase via middleman “vigorish”, but oil supply stays relatively constant . . . but the MSM won’t tell you this.
Whether the Middle East is producing at capacity or not is not the problem. It is their oil they should produce whatever they think is right. That green devils, politicians, administrators and bureaucrats would put America’s well being in the hands of foreigners is beyond disgusting. I have two points, the green devils can go to hell and any politician, administrator or bureaucrat that doesn’t put the welfare of Americans first and foremost should be dealt with swiftly and brutally. Americans expect and deserve reliable, abundant and affordable power at all times. We have the resources, the technology, the know how and the people to make it happen. Anyone who stands in the way needs to be dealt with severely.
Is that the FBI knocking at your door?
Robert, I can’t think of any punishment for a politician, administrator or bureaucrat that would be more punishing than to fire them with no pay, no benefits and to be banned forever from ever holding a government job of any kind and never be allowed to deal with the government in any other job they might find. It would be the worst of the worst for most of them.
After convicted of the treason they have perpetuated, No contractor or corporation that receives ANY funds from the U.S. government shall be allowed to employ any of these scoundrels.
They’re still busy putting leg chains on former executive secretaries from the Trump administration.
My prediction: the elected (or pretend elected) individuals who created this mess in the name of saving the planet, will soon discover in a very public way that the planet is fine and that it is society’s energy underpinnings that need saving. They will discover they have been lied to by irresponsible and conflicted experts and will quickly set about defunding and shaming those individuals while they launch all kinds of government initiatives to get electricity, gas and warmth to all the dependent voters. At least that is the script they will write for themselves once they realize political redundancy and historical irrelevance is knocking at their door.
My Nut Zero opinion is highly unusual:
I believe Nut Zero is designed to fail.
In a year or two the failure (way behind schedule)
of Nut Zero will be spun as yet another “crisis”
Leftists will claim more government power
is the solution (as they say about any crisis,
whether real or imaginary).
In a few years there will be two crises:
The imaginary coming climate crisis, and
the real Nut Zero project far behind schedule crisis.
Eventually there will be a “Repair the Electric Grid Crisis” too.
And leftists will want to be in charge of that project too.
They love to tell people what to do, and how to live.
Think they are experts on every subject.
What kills oil prices is a DEMAND SHOCK.
Without the U.S. replacing Russian (and other nations’ incremental production) with development of its own, Russia (and other nations) wins the long game, eventually selling to us at ever higher prices. To put it simply, our demand is inelastic and growing over decades while the global demand is sure to increase.
“To put it simply, our demand is inelastic . . .”
Wait until the
recessiondepression hits.VW eGolf – $30 – $40,000 an affordable EV. However, a battery replacement is $25,000 PLUS.
Result, Worthless for a trade-in or to sell after 5 years.
Think of the impact on the used car market. Also forces the lower income people to buy a new EV every 8 years (typical warrantee on battery) with no trade in allowance.
Or, are the low income people stuck buying a 5 year old EV and crossing their fingers?
$25,000 will by me gas for my SUV for 5 years at todays prices.