Jim,
That is a different angle I had not considered but a very important one. Thank
you for your wise comments.
From: dsp-ea-general-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <dsp-ea-general-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
On Behalf Of Jim Farmilo
Sent: June 27, 2022 2:41 PM
To: dsp-ea-general@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: FW: The West’s own myopia led us to this energy crisis
I can't speak to the details of the piece but the tone is, in my view, accurate.
First, governments that last four years or less do not have a sense of
transition. Ok, so burning petroleum, a limited resource, may not be the most
sustainable plan. Given the climate changing it may not even be smart.
However, society cannot change direction that quickly. The real issue is not
if we should move to a sustainable energy mix but how and when we get there--
with realistic understanding of the challenges and the time it takes to solve
those challenges. Ultimately we need hydrocarbons for manufacturing so there
will always be a market and the energy "solution" will likely be a mix of
technologies.
Second, we are painting ourselves into a cultural corner. We are becoming a
society in which single or small groups of individuals are allowed to stop
almost any action. When the St. Lawrence Seaway was created a number of towns
along the old shoreline were flooded and the people re-located. Not pleasant
for them, but ultimately a major economic driver for many decades now. Could
that happen today? I don't think so. No longer " for the greater good" we have
the social intimidation media, the grade three level sound bite and what
appears to be socially acceptable aggression and violence.
...Jim
On Jun. 27, 2022 3:09 p.m., Peter Aylen
<peter.aylen@xxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:peter.aylen@xxxxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
I wondered what others opinion is on this.
The West’s own myopia led us to this energy crisis
Konrad Yakabuski, Globe and Mail. June 24.22
The Group of Seven summit that begins Sunday in Germany will be all about
fossil fuels amid a global energy crisis unseen in nearly five decades. The G7
leaders will talk a lot about the need to ramp up production of oil and gas in
order to address energy shortages, and rates of inflation, that are making the
2020s look a lot like the 1970s.
Once again, war has served as the catalyst for a crisis whose underlying causes
have to do with the complacency of Western governments in the face of shifting
geopolitical dynamics. The Arab oil embargo against countries that supported
Israel during the 1973 Yom Kippur War caught the world flat-footed.
Unfortunately, the painful lessons of that era had been forgotten or dismissed
in favour of the West’s “clean-energy” orthodoxy by the time Russia invaded
Ukraine in February.
In the years leading up to the invasion, Western European politicians allowed
their countries to become increasingly dependent on Russian natural gas because
they considered it the lesser of two evils. The alternative was importing North
American liquefied natural gas (LNG) derived from hydraulic fracturing, or
fracking. Besides, they insisted, it was only a matter of time before abundant
wind and solar power, and electric cars, would eliminate the need for all
fossil fuels.
Policy-makers in Canada made much the same call. At one time, more than a dozen
proposals for LNG export terminals were on the drawing board in this country.
Instead of incentivizing their construction in the name of exporting LNG to
favour a transition away from much-dirtier coal in China and Europe, and
reducing energy dependence on authoritarian and undemocratic regimes, Ottawa
erected additional barriers to their realization. The result is that only one
such project is now under construction, and it still faces major hurdles before
it is up and running.
Well, guess what? Europe’s scramble to displace Russian gas has led U.S. LNG
producers to divert their limited supplies from China to Europe. Beijing has
responded by replacing gas with coal, ordering the country’s coal mines to ramp
up production of the fossil fuel that already supplied 60 per cent of China’s
electricity before the invasion of Ukraine. China has also moved to import more
low-quality coal from Indonesia and Mongolia, meaning it needs to burn more of
the stuff just to produce the same amount of electricity that came from using
higher-quality thermal coal.
Germany, meanwhile, is poised to ration power and restart idled coal plants as
Russia cuts off its supply of natural gas. Russia blames the 60-per-cent
reduction in gas flowing to Germany via the Nord Stream 1 pipeline on Western
sanctions that prevent the return of a turbine under repair by the Canadian
unit of Siemens Energy. But German economy minister Robert Habeck rejects that
excuse, saying Russia is squeezing its gas supply “as a weapon against Germany.”
U.S. President Joe Biden, who as a White House candidate vowed to make Saudi
Arabia a “pariah” state, is set to visit that country next month to appeal to
leaders there to increase oil production to help drive down crude prices that
have sent the cost of gasoline to more than US$5 a gallon at the pump. Such
grovelling might have been partially avoided had former president Barack Obama,
under whom Mr. Biden served as vice-president, not vetoed the Keystone pipeline
in 2015.
This week, Mr. Biden’s Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, pooh-poohed the idea
of resuscitating Keystone in case, you know, this energy crisis goes on for a
while. “I don’t see it as a short-term measure to address the current
situation,” she said after meeting in Toronto with Finance Minister Chrystia
Freeland, who insisted she had raised the matter privately with her U.S.
counterpart. “And longer term, we remain committed to our climate-change
objectives.”
Except that, in focusing too narrowly on those objectives, the West has allowed
Mr. Putin and the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to wield too
much power over the global energy market.
It would be a mistake to assume this current crisis is a temporary setback in
the midst of a transition to non-carbon-emitting energy sources that is already
under way. Rather, it may be a taste of what’s to come unless the West puts
energy security on an equal footing with global warming. Allowing thugs and
autocrats to hold the West hostage should not be the price to pay for cutting
global carbon emissions.
Surging fossil fuel prices have filled Russia’s coffers, allowing President
Vladimir Putin to claim that sanctions against his country have backfired.
“Gloomy predictions about Russia’s economy didn’t come true,” he said last
week. “European countries dealt a blow to their own economy all on their own.”
That comment is only partly true. But that it has any truth at all is a
testament to the West’s energy myopia.
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