Unless you’ve already done the smart thing and retired to the woods, you’ve probably heard the news that the European Union has struck a deal with the United States to considerably boost its intake of American LNG. Well, when I say considerably, I mean an additional 15 billion cu m this year, to grow to 50 billion cu m annually by 2030. Just for context, Gazprom’s exports to Germany last year hit a record high of 59 billion cu m.
Irina, as always great points. Just because Biden wants more LNG, does not mean that it will happen. You bring up great points about the regulators and capital.
Brilliant summary! Brief, exhaustive, simply put and extremely intelligible. Just what's needed. Would you terribly mind if I use parts of your text in my discussion with "down with Russian gas" fanatics?
One part missing from your account is the role of unfounded fears in Europe (flamed by Russian operatives) that kept countries from fracking for natural gas and continue to cause countries to shut down perfectly good/safe nuclear plants. A good source of information in this area is Mark Nelson of Radiant Energy Group on Twitter. Here's a recent sample:
Mark Nelson
@energybants
GERMAN MINISTERS PUSH QATARI GAS WHILE LYING ABOUT ENERGY
Yesterday ministries controlled by the Green party double down on their Big Lie: that extending their biggest, cheapest carbon-free power plants can't help with energy.
False: it's worth *65 LNG supertankers* every year
Mark Nelson
@energybants
Numbers:
Six reactors, 60 TWh per year. Would take 100 TWh of natural gas heat to replace this electricity, unless done entirely with coal (but then coal elec couldn't replace gas).
100TWh = 17,900,000m3 LNG
266,000m3 = capacity of 1 Qatari "Qmax" LNG tanker
As for my comment about "unfounded fears", note that Germany's decision to shut down nuclear plants instead of coal has led to some 1100 premature deaths per year due to coal pollution (11,000 or so total by now):
These deaths are apparently far preferable to deaths by nuclear power, which, per kWh of energy produced, is as safe or safer than solar or wind. In fact, far more people are killed *every year* due to Germany's preference for coal over nuclear than have ever died as a result of nuclear power plant accidents. In fact, only one nuclear power plant accident is known to have had adverse health consequences for the public: the Chernobyl accident, which, 35 years later hasn't turned out to be the level of disaster initially anticipated. And the Chernobyl reactor (RBMK) was *inherently* unsafe. The rest of the world uses inherently safe reactors (i.e., that can't have a runaway chain reaction of fission). (Yet the press was woefully unaware of this in recent reporting about Ukrainian nuclear plants.) And all reactors across the world have been updated to avoid a repeat of Fukushima, which killed no one due to radiation and no measurable health consequences are expected. It never should have been evacuated. See, for example:
Everything I'm saying is freely available information from the Chernobyl Forum, the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation, the medical field of Health Physics and the plethora of organizations and specialty careers that work with ionizing radiation safety in medicine and nuclear plants. Still, the press continues to consider Greenpeace and the Union of Concerned Science their go to source of information on all things nuclear, despite the fact that these organizations donations *depend* on them spreading false information about all things nuclear in order to drum up donations. Will it ever end?
I don't know your position on all of this, Irina. I very much enjoy your column, so I've taken the time to fill you in a little bit on nuclear power in case you don't know much about it. After all, all realistic IPCC scenarios for decarbonization call for substantial increases in nuclear power because of its ability to cover for the vicissitudes of solar and wind, yet the Green movement continues to fight the IPCC recommendations tooth and nail and the current natural gas issue in Europe is one of the unintended consequences.
Of course, Belgium was planning to shut down all 7 of its nuclear plants (~50% of electricity) by 2025 due to green pressure and replace them with, of course, natural gas! Though Belgium has been forced to extend two plants for 10 years, it is stubbornly sticking with plans to close the rest (despite pleas from opposition party to keep them open).
Has the EU ever entertained the thought of reopening their OWN natgas fields and using the most up-to-date fracking technologies to produce their OWN natgas? Instead of importing natgas produced in the US using the most up-to-date fracking technology?
I doubt it. It hasn't exactly been one big Texas, it's the North Sea and the Netherlands mostly. And the Netherlands had to close Groningen because of increased seismic activity. Besides, there wasn't much left it it.
As the US opens export terminals and exports increase the US natural gas market will become more linked to the international market. In other words, this will cause USA natural gas prices to rise.
How high? Beats me and it depends a lot on how fast and how far the USA takes exports.
All those places which eschewed nuclear as too expensive will find that the "cheap" gas which makes wind feasible is not so cheap any more.
So electricity in the USA will become more expensive.
Sigh.
Rod Adams predicted this several years ago. Not these world events, but the general notion of expanding USA natural gas exports and how it would affect USA pricing and electricity.
Simply restarting recently (and unnecessarily) shutdown reactors could make a big dent in Russian gas imports:
Rauli Partanen Retweeted
Mathijs Beckers
@thiesbeckers
If we reverse the recent switching off of #nuclear reactors in the Germany and Sweden (4058MW in Ger, 900MW in Swe) we could stop the import of 7.5 BCM gas from Russia per year... That's between 3.5 & 7% of all gas we import from them.
Easier than all the other shit we're trying
Quote Tweet
Rauli Partanen
@Kaikenhuippu
· 9h
Dear #Sweden,
I hear you could restart Ringhals-1 pretty much right away. That would help us stop funding the bombs and missiles killing Ukrainian civilians and destroying their cities.
Irina, as always great points. Just because Biden wants more LNG, does not mean that it will happen. You bring up great points about the regulators and capital.
Thanks, Stu!
I was wondering how the US an EU could make the natural gas supply/purchase commitment deal. Now I know.
Tragically funny
Brilliant summary! Brief, exhaustive, simply put and extremely intelligible. Just what's needed. Would you terribly mind if I use parts of your text in my discussion with "down with Russian gas" fanatics?
Thank you. Feel free to use it.
One part missing from your account is the role of unfounded fears in Europe (flamed by Russian operatives) that kept countries from fracking for natural gas and continue to cause countries to shut down perfectly good/safe nuclear plants. A good source of information in this area is Mark Nelson of Radiant Energy Group on Twitter. Here's a recent sample:
Mark Nelson
@energybants
GERMAN MINISTERS PUSH QATARI GAS WHILE LYING ABOUT ENERGY
Yesterday ministries controlled by the Green party double down on their Big Lie: that extending their biggest, cheapest carbon-free power plants can't help with energy.
False: it's worth *65 LNG supertankers* every year
Mark Nelson
@energybants
Numbers:
Six reactors, 60 TWh per year. Would take 100 TWh of natural gas heat to replace this electricity, unless done entirely with coal (but then coal elec couldn't replace gas).
100TWh = 17,900,000m3 LNG
266,000m3 = capacity of 1 Qatari "Qmax" LNG tanker
67 Supertankers
As for my comment about "unfounded fears", note that Germany's decision to shut down nuclear plants instead of coal has led to some 1100 premature deaths per year due to coal pollution (11,000 or so total by now):
https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w26598/w26598.pdf
These deaths are apparently far preferable to deaths by nuclear power, which, per kWh of energy produced, is as safe or safer than solar or wind. In fact, far more people are killed *every year* due to Germany's preference for coal over nuclear than have ever died as a result of nuclear power plant accidents. In fact, only one nuclear power plant accident is known to have had adverse health consequences for the public: the Chernobyl accident, which, 35 years later hasn't turned out to be the level of disaster initially anticipated. And the Chernobyl reactor (RBMK) was *inherently* unsafe. The rest of the world uses inherently safe reactors (i.e., that can't have a runaway chain reaction of fission). (Yet the press was woefully unaware of this in recent reporting about Ukrainian nuclear plants.) And all reactors across the world have been updated to avoid a repeat of Fukushima, which killed no one due to radiation and no measurable health consequences are expected. It never should have been evacuated. See, for example:
https://aeon.co/ideas/fear-of-radiation-is-more-dangerous-than-radiation-itself
Everything I'm saying is freely available information from the Chernobyl Forum, the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation, the medical field of Health Physics and the plethora of organizations and specialty careers that work with ionizing radiation safety in medicine and nuclear plants. Still, the press continues to consider Greenpeace and the Union of Concerned Science their go to source of information on all things nuclear, despite the fact that these organizations donations *depend* on them spreading false information about all things nuclear in order to drum up donations. Will it ever end?
I don't know your position on all of this, Irina. I very much enjoy your column, so I've taken the time to fill you in a little bit on nuclear power in case you don't know much about it. After all, all realistic IPCC scenarios for decarbonization call for substantial increases in nuclear power because of its ability to cover for the vicissitudes of solar and wind, yet the Green movement continues to fight the IPCC recommendations tooth and nail and the current natural gas issue in Europe is one of the unintended consequences.
Of course, Belgium was planning to shut down all 7 of its nuclear plants (~50% of electricity) by 2025 due to green pressure and replace them with, of course, natural gas! Though Belgium has been forced to extend two plants for 10 years, it is stubbornly sticking with plans to close the rest (despite pleas from opposition party to keep them open).
Nelson is great. His cutting analysis has been invaluable.
Has the EU ever entertained the thought of reopening their OWN natgas fields and using the most up-to-date fracking technologies to produce their OWN natgas? Instead of importing natgas produced in the US using the most up-to-date fracking technology?
I doubt it. It hasn't exactly been one big Texas, it's the North Sea and the Netherlands mostly. And the Netherlands had to close Groningen because of increased seismic activity. Besides, there wasn't much left it it.
As the US opens export terminals and exports increase the US natural gas market will become more linked to the international market. In other words, this will cause USA natural gas prices to rise.
How high? Beats me and it depends a lot on how fast and how far the USA takes exports.
All those places which eschewed nuclear as too expensive will find that the "cheap" gas which makes wind feasible is not so cheap any more.
So electricity in the USA will become more expensive.
Sigh.
Rod Adams predicted this several years ago. Not these world events, but the general notion of expanding USA natural gas exports and how it would affect USA pricing and electricity.
Simply restarting recently (and unnecessarily) shutdown reactors could make a big dent in Russian gas imports:
Rauli Partanen Retweeted
Mathijs Beckers
@thiesbeckers
If we reverse the recent switching off of #nuclear reactors in the Germany and Sweden (4058MW in Ger, 900MW in Swe) we could stop the import of 7.5 BCM gas from Russia per year... That's between 3.5 & 7% of all gas we import from them.
Easier than all the other shit we're trying
Quote Tweet
Rauli Partanen
@Kaikenhuippu
· 9h
Dear #Sweden,
I hear you could restart Ringhals-1 pretty much right away. That would help us stop funding the bombs and missiles killing Ukrainian civilians and destroying their cities.
Surely you could do as much?
#Switchoffputin
Paying attention to a Scandinavian teenager who emotes and slings vapid rhetoric about 'climate' is never a good start.
The chickens have come home to roost.