Crap, meet fan

Last week, Bloomberg reported that Chinese authorities were starting to have a tiny little bit of a problem with arable land and renewables. I reported on and tried to analyse the news in this piece for Oilprice but there’s more food for thought in this, especially when you put in the context of other highly fascinating news reports from the last few days.

This one, for example, cites a survey by the Nuclear Energy Institute that found U.S. utilities were considering the addition of up to 50 GW of new nuclear capacity by the 2050s. That’s a bit surprising given the seemingly dominant attitude to nuclear in the U.S., which falls within the range between contempt and outright hate.

Or take this one, about Germany, which, according to its network regulator, must reduce its gas consumption by a fifth to avoid “a crippling shortage” this winter, per the FT. I’d say the news puts the initial 15% EU-wide consumption cut in a new and very interesting perspective.

Totally different stories, right? In a way, they are. In another way, which I greatly prefer, they are all connected. Add also this recent WSJ report about Wall Street spreading its bets between renewables and fossil fuels, and the pattern might become a bit clearer. Let’s dive in, shall we?

The story about the arable land problem in China caused a very basic, very primal reaction in me when I first read it. The reaction was along the lines of “I %&$#&@ told you so!” I was by far not the only one. If you’ve read this Substack, you’d remember the problem is neither new nor minor, nor, importantly, limited to China only. And it was only a matter of time before it made headlines. Because it is an ugly problem.