Essay by Eric Worrall
“… The goal: prop up energy sources facing cost pressures from clean technology, strengthen US control …, and shut out China …”
Trump is pushing allies to buy US gas. It’s bad economics – and a catastrophe for the climate
Published: October 21, 2025 6.09am AEDT
Christoph Nedopil
Director, Griffith Asia Institute and Professor of Economics, Griffith UniversityThe price of partnership with the United States has changed. Washington is now using assurances of defence and trade access to pressure allies in Europe and Asia to buy more of its fossil fuels under decades-long contracts.
The scale is immense. The European Union intends to import up to A$1.15 trillion of US energy – mostly liquefied natural gas (LNG) – by 2028. That would be more than four times its current imports, though analysts are sceptical it will eventuate.
Indonesia has signed up for $24 billion in US energy imports and Japan is exploring a similar option.
These deals aren’t based on free trade. They represent the Trump administration’s geopolitical play using trade and security carrots and sticks to lock in long-term fossil fuel profitability and dominance. The goal: prop up energy sources facing cost pressures from clean technology, strengthen US control of the energy flows, and shut out China, the world’s top manufacturer of clean tech.
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These unfair deals will make US allies less competitive. The main use for LNG is to burn it to produce electricity. But for almost a decade, solar and and wind have been the cheapest way to produce power, consistently outcompeting all fossil fuels.
Read more: https://theconversation.com/trump-is-pushing-allies-to-buy-us-gas-its-bad-economics-and-a-catastrophe-for-the-climate-266792
…
The things they believe.
The reality is the renewable transition has failed.
President Trump is not creating gas demand, there is already a big demand for gas. The only question is who satisfies that demand.
Europe was buying heaps Russian gas before they inked the latest deals with the USA, and likely still is. Despite hundreds of billions of dollars of European investment, Europe’s renewable energy systems are incapable of supplying Europe’s energy needs.
Asia is also a long term purchaser of large shipments of gas.
So why is President Trump pushing to ink long term US gas export deals with customers?
There is a simple explanation which you would think someone who studies energy economics would know about. The world will shortly be awash with new gas supplies.
The end of this decade, early 2030s at the latest, will see an enormous influx of new Argentinian gas onto the global market.
The United Arab Emirates also recently announced $150 billion dollars of new investment in gas exports.
The only nations which have dropped the ball in this rush to supply the world’s gas needs are Australia and Russia, whose incompetent leaders have been destabilising long standing gas supply relationships.
President Trump is just doing his job – he is helping US exporters to develop new business, to take advantage of the market opportunity created by the poor behavior of other gas suppliers. Trump is using whatever leverage is available to him to maximise the share of that future Asian and European gas demand which will be satisfied by US energy exports.
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Nedopil apparently believes in LCOE. What else? Homeopathy? The Tooth Fairy?
Necrophil only believes in systematic perversion(and homopathy as this is mandatory to keep the job),
as everything here is the wrong way.
1) He is from an ASIA institute.
The same Asia that has built and is building thousands of power plants run by fossil fuels.
2) These plants are the reason for their economical success(co2 output and level of economy go hand in hand.)as it is these plants that enable them to produce cheap solar panels.
3) It was Zombie Joe and the Blinken government who forced other countries to buy expensive US Gas by blowing up northstream.(or as polish minister Sikorsky tweeted back then “Thank You USA)
Not Trump.
4)Green energies are not cheaper.
They are so expensive that they deindustrialized the countries that went green.
5)If green energy were cheaper it would have completely wiped out fossil fuel energy long time ago as result of most basic economic rules.
Especially since the market has been massively rigged in favor of green energy via subsidies,attacks on traditional energy production propaganda.
6) Nothing with green energy has anything to do with free trade.
It is being forced upon people and countries with a series of dirtiest tricks.
Renewables can not survive free trade or any kind of competition.
All his arguments are as wrong as the current No Kings protests.
Noone protested those kings when they locked down everyone.
When they forced people to take the vaccine.
When they forced people to wear mask.
When they put corporations and family members above the law.
When they sent hundreds of billions to Ukraine.
When they forced mass censorship and ended free speech..
When they attacked Lybia – and many others.
When they used lawfare and secret services to attack the opposition.
But all of a sudden these brave humanists,activists,experts and other parasites are all over the place, but they’d never protest the kingmakers at the Bilderberger meetings,
because they are the guys behind the protests and green energy.
If China’s “Clean Tech” produced a more affordable ($/MWh) source of energy without Government Tax$$$ subsidies skewing prices then “Expensive” (yeah right) Gas (FF) energy couldn’t compete regardless of perceived forced incentive. But if Gas is effectively cheaper than Chinese “Clean Tech” then Gas will dominate regardless. Open markets flourish by utilizing options based on Cost/Profit margins while Closed Markets exist on Government Fiat.
There is price/cost and then there is market value. Different accounting methods can produce various cost figures for long term assets depending on assumptions.
The market value for energy that cannot at all respond to and supply customer demand is pretty well always negative. That is why it has to be mandated by government.
An economist who doesn’t understand numbers. Big surprise.
An economist who doesn’t understand ‘Economy’.
The old adage regarding economists clearly still applies.
“If you put all the economists of the world in a line, they would never reach a conclusion”…..
I believe it was President LBJ who once quipped that he wanted a one armed economist.
So he couldn’t say “On the other hand”.
Paul Krugman won a (fake) Nobel Prize with that trick.
He also said that noone could turn the economy around before Trump did in 2016.
So they installed Biden to trash the economy so much that Trump can not succeed this time.
It is not just the economy.
It is the widespread obstruction that offsets the good efforts Trump has undertaken.
Trump must not be allowed to win, they say
He must be offed, they say.
Wind and Solar are hugely expensive/kWh. That is why electric rates increase.
HIGH COST/kWh OF W/S SYSTEMS FOISTED ONTO A BRAINWASHED PUBLIC
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/high-cost-kwh-of-w-s-systems-foisted-onto-a-brainwashed-public-1
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People are brainwashed to love wind and solar. They do not know by how much they screw themselves by voting for the woke folks who push them onto everyone. Their ignorance is exploited by the woke folks
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If owned/controlled by European governments and companies, would be a serious disadvantage for the US regarding environmental impact, national security, economic competitiveness, and sovereignty
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Western countries cajoling Third World countries into Wind/Solar, and loaning them high-interest money to do so, will forever re-establish a colonial-style bondage on those recently free countries.
What is generally not known, the more weather-dependent W/S systems, the less efficient the traditional generators, as they inefficiently (more CO2/kWh) counteract the increasingly larger ups and downs of W/S output. See URL
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/fuel-and-co2-reductions-due-to-wind-energy-less-than-claimed
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W/S systems add great cost to the overall delivery of electricity to users; the more W/S systems, the higher the cost/kWh, as proven by the UK and Germany, with the highest electricity rates in Europe, and near-zero, real-growth GDP.
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At about 30% W/S, the entire system hits an increasingly thicker concrete wall, operationally and cost wise.
The UK and Germany are hitting the wall, more and more hours each day.
The cost of electricity delivered to users increased with each additional W/S/B system
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Nuclear, gas, coal and reservoir hydro plants are the only rational way forward.
Ignore CO2, because greater CO2 ppm in atmosphere is essential for: 1) increased green flora to increase fauna all over the world, and 2) increased crop yields to better feed 8 billion people.
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Net-zero by 2050 to-reduce CO2 is a super-expensive suicide pact, to:
1) increase command/control by governments, and
2) enable the moneyed elites to become more powerful and richer, at the expense of all others, by using the foghorn of the government-subsidized/controlled Corporate Media to spread scare-mongering slogans and brainwash people, already for at least 40 years; extremely biased CNN, MSNBC, NPR, PBS, NBC ABC, CBS come to mind.
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Subsidies shift costs from project Owners to ratepayers, taxpayers, government debt:
1) Federal and state tax credits, up to 50% (Community tax credit 10%; Federal tax credit of 30%; State tax credit; other incentives up to 10%);
2) 5-y Accelerated Depreciation to write off of the entire project;
3) Loan interest deduction
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Utilities forced to pay:
At least 15 c/kWh, wholesale, after 50% subsidies, for electricity from fixedoffshore wind systems
At least 18 c/kWh, wholesale, after 50% subsidies, for electricity from floating offshore wind
At least 12 c/kWh, wholesale, after 50% subsidies, for electricity from largersolar systems
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Excluded costs, at a future 30% W/S annual penetration on the grid, based on UK and German experience:
– Onshore grid expansion/reinforcement to connect far-flung W/S systems, about 2 c/kWh
– A fleet of traditional power plants to quickly counteract W/S variable output, on a less than minute-by-minute basis, 24/7/365, which means more Btu/kWh, more CO2/kWh, more cost of about 2 c/kWh
– A fleet of traditional power plants to provide electricity during 1) low-wind periods, 2) high-wind periods, when rotors are locked in place, and 3) low solar periods during mornings, evenings, at night, snow/ice on panels, which means more Btu/kWh, more CO2/kWh, more cost of about 2 c/kWh
– Pay W/S system Owners for electricity they could have produced, if not curtailed, about 1 c/kWh
– Importing electricity at high prices, when W/S output is low, 1 c/kWh
– Exporting electricity at low prices, when W/S output is high, 1 c/kWh
– Disassembly on land and at sea, reprocessing and storing at hazardous waste sites, about 2 c/kWh
Total ADDER 2 + 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 2 = 11 c/kWh
Some of these values exponentially increase as more W/S systems are added to the grid
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Offshore wind full cost of electricity FCOE = 30 c/kWh + 11 c/kWh = 41 c/kWh, no subsidies
Offshore wind full cost of electricity FCOE = 15 c/kWh + 11 c/kWh = 26 c/kWh, 50% subsidies
The 11 c/kWh is for various measures required by wind and solar; power plant-to-landfill cost basis
Battery systems, with artificial sync inertia, are needed if fossil fuels are outlawed
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BATTERY SYSTEM CAPITAL COSTS, OPERATING COSTS, ENERGY LOSSES, AND AGING
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/battery-system-capital-costs-losses-and-aging
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Utility-scale, battery system pricing usually not made public, but for this system it was.
Neoen, in western Australia, turned on its 219 MW/ 877 MWh Tesla Megapack battery, the largest in western Australia.
Ultimately, a 560 MW/2,240 MWh battery system, $1,100,000,000/2,240,000 kWh = $491/kWh, delivered as AC, late 2024 pricing. Smaller capacity systems cost much more than $500/kWh
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Annual Cost of Megapack Battery Systems; 2023 pricing
Assume 45.3 MW/181.9 MWh; turnkey cost $104.5 million; 104,500,000/181,900 = $574/kWh, per Example 2
Amortize bank loan, 50% of $104.5 million, at 6.5%/y for 15 years, $5.484 million/y
Pay Owner return, 50% of $104.5 million, at 10%/y for 15 years, $6.765 million/y (10% due to high inflation)
Lifetime (Bank + Owner) payments 15 x (5.484 + 6.765) = $183.7 million
Assume battery daily usage, 15 years at 10%; loss factor = 1 / (0.9 *0.9)
Battery lifetime output = 15 y x 365 d/y x 181.9 MWh x 0.1, usage x 1000 kWh/MWh = 99,590,250 kWh to HV grid; 122,950,926 kWh from HV grid; 233,606,676 kWh loss
(Bank + Owner) payments, $183.7 million / 99,590,250 kWh = 184.5 c/kWh
Less 50% subsidies (tax credits, 5-y depreciation, loan interest deduction, etc.) is 92.3c/kWh
Subsidies shift costs from project Owners to ratepayers, taxpayers, government debt.
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Excluded costs/kWh: 1) O&M; 2) system aging, 1.5%/y, 3) loss factor 1 / (0.9*0.9), HV grid-to-HV grid, 4) grid extension/reinforcement to connect battery systems, 5) downtime of parts of the system, 6) decommissioning in year 15, i.e., disassembly, reprocessing, storing at hazardous waste sites. Excluded costs would add at least 15 c/kWh
COMMENTS ON CALCULATION
Almost all existing battery systems operate at less than 10%, see top URL, i.e., new systems would operate at about 92.4 + 15 = 107.4 c/kWh. They are used to stabilize the grid, i.e., frequency control and counteracting up/down W/S outputs. If 40% throughput, 23.1 + 15 = 38.1 c/kWh.
That is on top of the cost/kWh of the electricity taken from the HV grid to charge the batteries
Up to 40% could occur by absorbing midday solar peaks and discharging during late-afternoon/early-evening, in sunny California and other such states. The more solar systems, the greater the midday peaks.
See top URL for Megapacks required for a one-day wind lull in New England
40% throughput is close to Tesla’s recommendation of 60% maximum throughput, i.e., not charge above 80% and not discharge below 20%, to perform 24/7/365 service for 15 y, with normal aging.
Owners of battery systems with fires, likely charged above 80% and discharged below 20% to maximize profits.
Tesla’s recommendation was not heeded by the Owners of the Hornsdale Power Reserve in Australia. They excessively charged/discharged the system. After a few years, they added Megapacks to offset rapid aging of the original system, and added more Megapacks to increase the rating of the expanded system.
http://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/the-hornsdale-power-reserve-largest-battery-system-in-australia
Regarding any project, Banks and Owners have to be paid, no matter what. I amortized the Bank loan and Owner’s investment
Divide total payments over 15 years by the throughput during 15 years, to get c/kWh, as shown.
Loss factor = 1 / (0.9 *0.9), from HV grid to 1) step-down transformer, 2) front-end power electronics, 3) into battery, 4) out of battery, 5) back-end power electronics, 6) step-up transformer, to HV grid, i.e., draw about 50 units from HV grid to deliver about 40 units to HV grid. That gets worse with aging.
A lot of people do not like these c/kWh numbers, because they have been misled by self-serving folks, that “battery Nirvana is just around the corner”.
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NOTE: EV battery packs cost about $135/kWh, before it is installed in the car. Such packs are good for 6 to 8 years, used about 2 h/d, at an average speed of 30 mph. Utility battery systems are used 24/7/365 for 15 years
God forbid that any political jurisdiction should have the nerve of opting for any types of fossil fuel whether it’s oil, natural gas or coal. This would mean that it suspects or knows already that renewables like wind and solar are largely undependable, and if they continue to fail to deliver, taxpayers/consumers might start voting for governments with realistic energy plans regardless of how such actions might exacerbate the largely-rumored climate crisis.
Anyone espousing renewables over fossil fuel energy on the basis of being less costly clearly has their head in the sand. It has been shown electricity costs to the consumer rise proportional to the addition of renewables. All the average person needs to do is look at their electricity bills. Especially when you add the subsidies that come from taxes they pay.
Renewables are like a transgender. You never know what you might get.
The problem is that the value of unreliables is negative. The cost is not relevant to the consumer.
Let’s interpret this. The reality is they prefer cheap Russian gas with someone else defending against land wars in Europe.
From the article:”…facing cost pressures from clean technology…”.
If and when wind and solar are cheaper than gas people would stay with them.
Wind and solar would also have be available 24/7.
That makes the cost totally prohibitive.
Gas operating at its most efficient level 24/7 is far cheaper than wind or solar.
Its when they are forced to reduce or cease electricity production for large chunks of the day, that prices start to go up.. basic economics.
Lignite by far the lowest cost fuel in Australia fed into a big boiler running steam plant at 100% of rating – that is the way to lowest cost electricity in Australia.
Could be significantly achieved tomorrow just by requiring all bidding generators to be dispatchable.
A battery firmed solar plant rated at 1GW would cost around AUD20bn. I wonder how much new lignite fired capacity could be purchased for AUD20bn.
Lignite in Victoria.. Black coal in NSW and Qld. 🙂
Doesn’t Australia have natural gas reserves?
Quite a lot, but far-leftist /socialist state governments won’t let anyone get at it.
Yes, and Rick’s statement ignores the fact that Western Australia, through its domestic gas reservation scheme, has a plentiful supply of cheap gas that it mainly uses to generate cheap electricity. WA gas cost is about half that of the other Australian states.
Could also be achieved by demanding a daily minimum production from All renewable generation sources. They would need to install reliable back-up at their generation sites to meet their guaranteed minimum quota. (24/7)
Australia “should” be able to get as much gas as they want from their own country.
It is only brain-washed governments stopping it happening.
I will take the Henry Hub price any old day.
The good perfessor was kinda hoping the Gummint’s slushfunding of well to do homeowners with solar batteries would result in an outpouring of philanthropy-
‘Hopefully’: Solar ownership issue in Australian Energy Market Operator’s transition blueprint | Sky News Australia
Ah well there’s always the hope with V2G that EV buyers will buy bigger batteries than they need to get around with to let their poorer neighbours wear it out. Hopefully they’re all on perfessor salaries.
PS: Middle class welfare and all they’re interested in is the payback time and the 30% off the battery as well as the RECs-
Aussie cities with fastest solar payback revealed as homeowners grab $3,000 energy bill savings
Handouts for settled homeowners with stable incomes while renters and struggletown be damned with skyrocketting power bills but you get to virtue signal saving the planet.
It would take a lot of households to run the remaining aluminium smelters. I only see de-induastrialisation in Australia’s future.
Victoria already has a scheme to hand out OPM to unit owners corporate to cover cost of solar and batteries. But not sure how you incentivise owners of rental properties to lower the cost of the renter’s electricity bill!
Christoph Nedopil: “Wah-wah-waaaaaahhhhh!”
Another blatant lie from a greentard. Imagine that.
For some reason I was trying to think of a Latin-sounding name for AGW cultists..
came up with “Climatis Hystericarsis”
Extremo de Caelo as in, Prophet of doom. We could go with a Harry Potter curse description “Ignoramus” and wave an imaginary wand whenever we meet such an individual.
It also has a Latin feel to it, so that is a bonus.
“Climatis Hysteric-arses” also works
“using assurances of defence and trade access to pressure allies in Europe and Asia to buy more of its fossil fuels”
The professor professes that Trump should not use coercion related to defence to get his way.
How many times were we told that, unless we bow to the green agenda, we would be pariahs to the rest of the world that were embracing ruinables?
E.g.:
Legislation governing renewable energy compliance encompasses a range of laws at federal, state, and international levels that establish standards and obligations for renewable energy projects. These laws aim to promote sustainable development and ensure alignment with climate goals.
Yet another example of why people can’t trust academics. These people are supposed to have better answers because they have so much more education than the rest of us. This guy is doing great harm to his profession and academics in general. Not counting the harm done to those who don’t know any better. It is past time for honest academics to call these clowns out. What a disgrace.
I agree but the first ones to call out clowns face danger.
Michael Mann has made a fetish out of suing any and all of his critics in an ongoing campagin of lawfare. I wonder where he gets the funding for all this litigation?
Putting aside the delivery boys like Tides, Soros, etc, the actual $$$$s would have been unwittingly provided by US taxpayers.
Thats only part of it. The bowels of academia are the places which brought us Covid lockdowns (six in California alone), AGW (in its full and most hysterical mode claiming that the Arctic would be ice-free), DEI in all its most extreme silliness, anti-Semitism on university campuses (pretending that it was only about Palestinian liberation), post-modernist nonsense claiming that science and arithmetic were racist.
There is no limit to the insanity which has come out of various dark corners of academia. Worst, they have a professional code of their guild: tenure which prevents them from being dismissed regardless of how idiotic their ideas may be.
Academic protection has defended the most outrageous and disgusting political manipulations of science by people like Michael Mann and Phil Jones. Academic and institutional protection has allowed the corruption of scientific literature by demolishing the credibility of peer review. It has corrupted official institutions such as the Met Office, GISS, and a host of scientific and government organizations around the world.
I agree with you about the need to call these clowns out. But academia has no such method of doing this.
“But for almost a decade, solar and wind have been the cheapest way to produce power, consistently outcompeting all fossil fuels”. He forgot to add “when you don’t count all the things that make it the most expensive”. Like batteries and fossil fuel backup and enormous amounts of poles and wires. And I suspect that this guy clearly doesn’t understand the difference between power and energy (like most renewable activists).
Sounds like somebody knows his country is about to switch back to natural gas, and instead of admitting they were wrong to go with renewables, he’s getting set to blame Dr. Evil, I mean President Trump.
Simultaneously, they throw bad words at him but must be so glad someone is finally addressing the situation. He’s the big bath accounting of political overreach.
“These unfair deals …”
Can someone point out the number 1 reason the deals would be unfair? and to whom?
Look at his profile. The possibility that he is simply shilling for Chinese RE exports is greater than zero.
That’s just plain stupid.
Why would the EU spend A$1.15 trillion on imports when wind and solar are abundant and free?
I might be missing something but…. Russia dropped the ball on global gas supply? Who was it that sanctioned the crap out of Russian hydrocarbons… and who was it that blew up Nordstream?
Academics?
When I was doing my apprenticeship a common phrase was, ‘those that can do, those that can’t teach’.
Punctuation was an elective?
Why not…Pronouns, are; Elective
It is a wonderful thing that academic professors who have never worked or run a business or built anything know better how everything works. I am so grateful for their wisdom.
They know better than people who wasted their lives building grid and power stations.
Australia should fight back against Trump. They have large gas reserves. They could recover it from the ground and sell it on the cheap to SE Asian (and New Zealand) and break the monopoly!
In reality, Trump would only welcome such an effort. Christoph Nedopil just isn’t bright enough to grasp his strategy or his goal: wealth for democratic and emerging nations.