Germany’s Green-made Gas Crisis: warnings of rationing and Lehman Brothers-Style Financial Collapse

Protest during German government decision about the coal power usage at the chancellery 2020-01-29

Leonhard Lenz

Suddenly the warning lights flashing in Germany. The message is to go easy on the gas, but ultimately even if the national storage tanks were completely full, the largest economy in the EU would only have ten weeks of gas without supplies from Russia. It’s summer and they’ve already hit stage 2 of the 3 stage emergency plan.

It was all totally avoidable. A wholly Green-made crisis. They could have gone nuclear, kept using coal, and explored for more gas and then they could have laughed at GazProm. Instead talk of rationing has already started, and the event horizon now includes the possibility of mass industrial shutdowns and recession.

National Guard of Russia

Germany has been so suddenly crippled it’s almost as if an enemy force had infiltrated the activist soul and culture of the nation and duped it with a magic spell.

As long ago as 2014 a  former NATO Secretary General was warning that Russia was funding the anti-frakking mobs. It later came out Russia was also sending money through shell companies to Green protestors in Eastern Europe, and in the US too. Putin could hardly have believed how easy it was to turn young schmucks against their own civilization.

Teenagers without training are gift for enemies. If only our universities had taught them things that mattered?

“We are in a gas crisis” said the German Minister for the Economy and Energy

Germany says that its citizens may have to ration the use of natural gas this winter as the country faces an energy “crisis” due to Russia reducing its supplies last week.

First the energy goes, then the economy:

Germany Warns of Lehman Brothers-Style Financial Collapse if Gas Crisis Continues

Kurt Zindulka, Breitbart News

Germany is facing a “Lehman Brothers” collapse in its energy market that could spark a domino effect leading to a severe recession should the gas-addicted economic powerhouse of the European Union be fully cut off from Russian energy supplies.

Economy Minister and Vice-Chancellor Robert Habeck said on Friday that Europe’s largest economy could be forced to shut down certain industries should gas supplies run think by the winter.

“Companies would have to stop production, lay off their workers, supply chains would collapse, people would go into debt to pay their heating bills, that people would become poorer,” he said according to DW.

The Green Party politician warned that there could be “a kind of Lehman-Brothers effect in the energy market,” spreading through municipal utilities, industrial and commercial companies, “And then you have a domino effect that would lead to a severe recession.”

Müller predicted on Thursday that the country could only live off reserves for less than three months without Russian gas over the Winter, saying: “If the storage facilities in Germany were mathematically 100% full… we could do without Russian gas completely… for just about two-and-a-half months and then the storage tanks will be empty.”

Russia eagle: Росгвардия

 

 

9.9 out of 10 based on 82 ratings

142 comments to Germany’s Green-made Gas Crisis: warnings of rationing and Lehman Brothers-Style Financial Collapse

  • #
    red edwards

    Welcome to the real world, Deutschland. . . .

    350

    • #
      RexAlan

      Not only Germany but France as well.

      French energy companies call for ‘immediately’ limiting energy use.

      https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/french-energy-companies-call-immediately-limiting-energy-use-2022-06-25/?rpc=401&

      120

    • #
      OldOzzie

      Dutch power grid can’t handle influx of electric car charging points

      By 2025, there will be some 3,000 neighborhoods in the Netherlands where no new electric car charging points can be installed, knowledge center ElaadNL said to BNR. The growing demand for electric vehicles and accompanying charging stations is quickly overloading the power grid, grid operators confirmed to the broadcaster.

      According to Rutger Croon of ElaanNL, the power grid in some 3,000 neighborhoods won’t have room for more charging stations within the next three years. Unless smart charging – when vehicles connect digitally to the grid and only charge when less power is used, like at night – is the only option.

      Grid operator Stedin also told BNR that the government must invest heavily in the rollout of smart charging “otherwise the grid will be too crowded.” The other option is to upgrade the power grid. “But that costs a lot of money and is a social choice. So we’d rather not do that.”

      According to ElaadNL, there will be almost 5 million charging points in the Netherlands by 2050.

      230

      • #
        Ronin

        With any luck, the authorities will put a ban on recharging EVs.

        221

      • #
        Ronin

        And the green loons tried to convince us that EV charging wouldn’t affect the grid. Ha

        180

        • #
          Ted1

          The physics for EVs are simple. The energy which used to be delivered through petroleum products must now be delivered down the wire. What is the capacity of the wire?

          It is becoming increasingly obvious that batteries should be made swappable so that they can be charged while out of the vehicle. These batteries would be part of the overall battery system, and would somewhat reduce the need for more “poles and wires”.

          But that wouldn’t make them affordable.

          00

      • #
        Paul Miskelly

        Hi OldOzzie,
        No doubt you will remember Professor Michael Kelly writing about this very issue in the UK context back in 2020. The link is:
        https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2020/05/KellyDecarb-1.pdf
        In the paper, he highlighted all of the problems about which the Dutch authorities seem to have become so recently surprised, and a few more besides.

        But of course he is merely a much-decorated electrical engineer, so why would anyone take any notice of him?

        Cheers,
        Paul Miskelly

        130

      • #
        Graeme#4

        The holiday units I stayed at in early June had a notice warning EV owners NOT to try charging their vehicles from the unit’s power points, as the premises didn’t have the power capacity to cope.

        80

  • #
    John Galt III

    Germans are idiots. Once they leave and come to America however it ios proven that their IQ rises. I can prove that with a real world example. Both Ireland and Germany hated and still hate Donald Trump. German and Irish Americans, however, voted for Trump thus easily proving the higher IQ theory.

    561

    • #
      KP

      Hang on, the rest voted for a geriatric who can’t hold his notes around the right way?? The notes that explain to him where he is and what he has to say, and when to say it and when to sit down…?

      You think THAT’S an improvement over Trump? Biden in power proves the crash in American IQ over the last generation. If Trump was the only option he would be better, but someone like Musk would blitz them all!

      91

  • #
    Graham Richards

    The free world needs only one really serious economic/social implosion to bring the rest of the developing & developed countries to their senses.
    A huge economic / financial melt down is headed their way unless they snap out their comatose slumber about fairies & unicorns of the climate hoax.

    The sooner the crisis, the more profound the result the better. Preferably before an unusually long cold winter with minimum sunshine & wind.

    The whole of Europe is at risk right now. Wake up!

    511

    • #
      David Maddison

      Yes, but the Left who dominate government, media and who are infiltrated into all institutions in the West, will simple blame the crisis on not having enough unreliables installed.

      We are seeing this claim made in Australia right now.

      531

      • #
        Lawrie

        Yes David. During the last energy emergency the media and the climate warriors blamed the shortfall on problems with the coal plants but failed to mention that wind and solar were contributing next to zero at peak times. Wouldn’t want the plebs to know that the renewables had totally vacated the field and proved their unreliability when needed. What government minister spoke about that? None. A few back benchers did guaranteeing that they will remain there.

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        • #
          Ted1

          The simplest explanation of the problem is that the coal plants have been forced by the politicians to cover for the unreliability of the “renewables”.

          10

      • #
        OldOzzie

        ALP recipe for reliable energy: add renewables

        Energy Minister Chris Bowen says the key to addressing long-term challenges in the electricity sector is to pump more renewables into the system.

        120

        • #
          Ronin

          Yes, the turtle is complaining about unreliable coal and expensive gas and that the only way forward is more ‘unreliables’, yeah that’ll work.

          160

        • #
          Dennis

          That’s true, a wind turbine installation with “firming” back up ancillary equipment followed at least by 20 years remove and replace, by 40 years remove and replace, and so on.

          As the unit price reduces based on manufacturing economies of scale in production, maybe, as the renewable’s fans like to claim, removal and replacement expenses are ignored.

          And what about the dedicated second grid Minister Bowen (Federal) is pushing, a huge additional expense not required for power stations.

          100

      • #
        Graham Richards

        A question from the uninformed:

        At what point can mass court action be taken a government that ignores their “duty of care”?
        Or have they passed legislation which makes them immune from prosecution .

        100

    • #
      • #
        OldOzzie

        I’m fed up, or to put it even more clearly: I’m fed up with the permanent and increasingly religious climate claptrap, green energy fantasies, electric car worship, scary stories about doomsday scenarios from corona to conflagrations to weather catastrophes. I can no longer stand the people who shout this into microphones and cameras every day or print it in newspapers. I suffer from having to witness how natural science is turned into a whore of politics.

        I am tired of being told what to be ashamed of by abused, pubescent children. I am tired of being told by some deranged people that I am to blame for everything and everyone – but especially as a German for the past, present and future misery of the whole world.”

        241

        • #
          Ronin

          Once again, the good hardworking German folk are or have been led astray by the idiots in power, this won’t end well just like it didn’t last time(s).

          100

      • #
        Annie

        This is absolutely brilliant! I agree 100% with this man’s sentiment. Well said! Thankyou for the link EG.

        70

  • #
    Kalm Keith

    I used to think that the story of King Arthur and the Holy Grail, Merlin and Excalibur was just an ancient fantasy.

    Now, here at the “peak” of civilisation in 2022 there’s proof that fantasy worlds are very real, so real in fact that in the midst of being incinerated due to human origin CO2 excesses you can also be frozen to death as governments suspend all scientific reasoning developed since the time that Excalibur was thrown into the lake.

    But wait, is that Hillary Clinton’s long arm reaching out of the D.C. swamp to grab the sword and save humanity?

    242

  • #

    Unbelievably the EU voted last week to continue with their plans to introduce a carbon tax on countries that export to the bloc and use more co2 in the exported product than if it were made within the borders of the community.

    So they are still obsessed by co2 even though no one else is. This shows the huge impact it would have on the US

    https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-the-u-s-is-preparing-for-europes-carbon-tariffs/

    I guess the same would apply to Australia.. The UK is aligned to the EU’s standards but there is growing unrest at the green agenda herevand whether we would apply the same rules to countries expecting to us is as yet unknown,

    282

    • #
      Thomas A

      Like communism, backers of the CO2 monster realized early that demonizing and taxing CO2 in Europe would be economically debilitating to home economies if it couldn’t also be unleashed throughout the rest of the First World. It was part of the reason Trump was considered so dangerous. The US economy under his leadership was starting to power ahead and had to be restrained to keep Europe competitive. The Left is seeing the light at the end of their tunnel. It’s almost impossible for them to give up their gains now when they seem so close to a new world order.

      291

    • #
      KP

      …and tell me, who gets the money?? Oh, the Govt!! Those who have crippled most countries with their spending and borrowing, and are now desperate for any cash they can steal. This will add to the costs for their subjects, but the Govts won’t be blamed as tariffs are invisible to retail buyers.

      It should put Chinese and Indian prices through the roof, but most importantly it will cut the West off from world trade as the BRICS and the non-aligned ignore the rich countries that are making exports to them uneconomic and concentrate on trade among themselves. The West are aiming to price imported goods so high that they compete with local manufacturing again.

      Imagine the cost of goods in Aussie if the ‘dollar-a-day’ Chinese wages are replaced with $30/hr unionised industries locally. We still wouldn’t have jobs as no-one could afford to buy the goods we made!

      90

      • #
        Ronin

        Pretty much all that comes out of China used to be made here, are we saying we couldn’t make a toaster or jug or iron here for $50,if we really had to.

        110

  • #

    Russia is restricting gas supply to the EU The thinking is that the blocs resolve to help ukraine will disappear if their public find themselves not only with high gas prices but also being rationed.

    https://www.politico.eu/article/vladimir-putin-russia-gas-cut-off-looms-the-clock-is-ticking-for-the-eu-to-secure-supplies-kremlin-war-ukraine-lng/

    In that case they would just want an end to the war and would step away from providing weapons and money. The UK is nowhere near as dependent on Russian gas and has been in the vanguard of providing practical help to Ukraine but a cold winter would severely test our power supplies as so many coals plants have been destroyed

    202

    • #
      Graeme No.3

      “Earlier this week, Habeck said the reduction of Russian gas supplies to Germany demonstrates the effectiveness of Western sanctions, and claimed EU restrictions on goods and services provided to Moscow are preventing it from using money generated through energy sales”. In other words we have cut gas but Russia is getting more money.

      Last week, gas flows through the Nord Stream pipeline from Russia to Germany were cut by as much as 60%. According to Gazprom, German equipment supplier Siemens Energy failed to return gas pumping units to a compressor station on time. The repaired turbines for the Russian pipeline are currently stuck at a Canadian maintenance facility, and are not being released due to Ottawa’s sanctions on Russia. In other words the left hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing

      160

      • #
        Kippax

        It’s called an ‘own goal’. Meanwhile, Russia is raking it in and laughing all the way to the bank.

        Even if the war ended and sanctions were lifted, perhaps Mr Putin would decide he has to honour the commitments made to new customers

        140

      • #
        Ronin

        The left aren’t helping, in fact they don’t even understand the meaning of the word.

        60

  • #
    David Maddison

    President Trump warned Germany and Europe in general about not relying on Russian gas and everyone laughed at him (conservative present company excepted).

    Under Trump and before the de-electrification policies of the Biden Maladministration the USA had vast amounts of gas they could have shipped to Germany in liquefied form.

    Socialism / Greenism aa seen in Germanu doesn’t work. The last time Germany was destroyed it was due to the National Socialists, Now it is about to be destroyed again by their cousins the International Socialists (Greens).

    Read Rupert Darwall’s “Green Tyranny: Exposing the Totalitarian Roots of the Climate Industrial Complex”.

    The National Socialists wanted a “green” Germany as well. The parallels are remarkable – e.g. both want windmills and no meat consumption, state censorship and propaganda, dictatorship and the people to suffer (except for the Elites).

    The philosopher of fascism has been largely written out of history by the Left and is largely invisible today but was Giovanni Gentile who admired Marx but developed his own variation of socialism, corporate statism as was seen in National Socialist Germany, Missolini’s Italy and the beginnings in much of the West today.

    In corporate statism, rather than government running the companies, employers and employees are controlled by government for the good of the state, much as is developing now in Western countries. It is a “public-private partnership”, the term used by the Left today.

    Also see short video by Dinesh D’Souza, https://youtu.be/m6bSsaVL6gA

    191

    • #
      OldOzzie

      President Trump, A Formidable Candidate In 2024 Republican Primaries: Golden/TIPP Poll

      Trump still holds sway over a sizeable section of the Republican Party and has the support of millions of American voters – a fact that drives Democrats to tear him down.

      Aside from the austere posturing and holier-than-thou reasons, what is motivating the January 6 hearings?

      Democrats’ desperation to render Trump powerless.

      Democrats attempted impeachment based on January 6, which failed. The J6 hearings are now a second chance. They’re hoping Merrick Garland will come to their aid if that doesn’t work.

      You would wonder, why is that?

      Our latest Golden/TIPP Poll has the answer.

      Democrats know that Trump is a potential threat in 2024 and are all out to handicap him so that he can’t run. The poll shows that if the Republican primary were held today, Trump would win 55% of the votes. It is still Trump’s party.
      In the poll, conducted from June 8 to June 10, we presented 16 potential Republican contenders to 385 registered Republicans or independents who lean Republican.

      Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is coming in a distant second, with 12% of the votes. The panicked media is heavily promoting a New Hampshire poll from a different organization in which DeSantis is leading Trump in the state and arguing that primaries are a state-by-state contest.

      171

  • #
    David Maddison

    Enemies of the West, both Russia and China, have been behind funding and promoting the useful idiots of the “green” movement and the Left in general. And profiting from it as well.

    It utterly defies comprehension that Germany and the EU could allow themselves to become dependent on Russian gas, especially when President Trump warned them about this and the consequences and offered them US gas which was plentiful before Biden.

    192

    • #
      el+gordo

      Its OK the free enterprise model is at hand, the Americans will save Europe in this cold war.

      https://www.ft.com/content/c1b8c308-b189-4a24-af67-6d18902e42c8

      31

    • #
      KP

      There’s nothing wrong with buying gas from Russia. Europe caused all their woes themselves when they started an economic war with Russia at the behest of the Yanks. Lets admit it, apart from some diehard old farts with Cold War memories, no-one really gives a shit about Russia or Ukraine, its all just part of the USSR.

      This whole problem has been manufactured by the Yanks and the Euros have been taken in by their propaganda. If they had treated Russia invading Ukraine with the same actions as America invading Iraq they would all still have Russian gas on tap and be trading with those 140million Russian citizens.

      You reap what you sow, just don’t try to blame someone else for your mistakes…

      As for teh USA providing gas.. Lol! As much chance of us all driving electric cars, and for the same reasons.. Not enough ships, no terminals, no pumping stations.. just no infrastructure and no chance of it being built in the next decade. Surely you wouldn’t want to short-cut the vital environmental application system and the local body laws would you?

      79

      • #
        Zane

        Nice try Ivan. The US has 7 LNG export terminals operating and is actually the third largest LNG exporter behind only Qatar and Australia. They are going gangbusters 24/7.

        41

    • #
      Ronin

      Where are our useless ‘ ASIO and ASIS’, why haven’t they found out about the soviets funding the green lobby and done something about it.

      91

    • #
      Zane

      The globalists and Big Oil are also behind the Climate propaganda, as was Enron before it crashed. They just want to keep the price of energy high by making it scarce. Of course many green carpetbaggers went along for the ride, from Tesla to the late German wind billionaire Aloys Wobben of Enercon. They especially want to shut down nuclear and coal, so they can sell natural gas and Arab oil forever.

      40

  • #
    David Maddison

    Russian gas is a bit like unreliable wind and solar. It is useless random energy only and not despatchable unless it has a “battery”.

    If Germany insisted on buying Russian gas, it should have been purchased on the basis of what was actually dispatchable and deliverable.

    That is, the gas should have been purchased and used to fill storage tanks or depleted gas wells in the North Sea (“batteries”). The gas should have only been included in the energy inventory once it was in Germany’s possession.

    64

  • #
    Neville

    Why don’t the delusional EU start to build heaps more TOXIC, UNRELIABLE S & W disasters and backed up by more big TOXIC batteries?
    Meanwhile in Rwanda prince Charley and clueless Marles etc are telling the world that we’ve reached CODE RED and we must have more S & W for our future energy supplies.
    Unbelievable but true.

    131

    • #
      David Maddison

      The reason the Queen is not allowing her son to ascend the Crown even though she is well past retirement age is that she knows her son is an idiot.

      360

      • #
        Brett

        Yep, have to agree with that. I’m going to have to vote for au the become a republic,
        when the lecturing one world order climate crazy leftoid gets the crown

        120

        • #
          Kalm Keith

          As long as we don’t “elect” Trumble as president.

          What would be worser: Prints Charles in London or Trumble ruling us from his New York hideaway.

          I basically want clean, honest, decent government.

          112

  • #
    David Maddison

    Unlike Europe, Australia has vast amounts of coal, gas and uranium but it is equally inaccessible to non-Elite Australians as it is to Europeans.

    Due to my volunteer charity work I encounter many people who are cold and miserable in winter in their own homes in Melbournistan. It is horrible and also not conducive to children doing homework, etc..

    It should not be happening in energy rich Australia.

    I will soon start writing a series of letters to rich known Leftists and supporters of the anthropogenic global warming fraud asking them to sponsor Melbourne families and asking them to directly fund families suffering energy poverty with a contribution of about $1000 each to assist them with keeping warm in winter.

    191

  • #
    Earl

    Seems we had a disruption to our flow during the night. Don’t know to what extent or duration but we woke up to the microwave clock flashing 0:00 and the airconditioner flashing its green light. We haven’t used the aircon for months.

    50

    • #
      David Maddison

      Which fiefdom of Australia do you live in, if indeed you do live in Australia?

      31

      • #
        OldOzzie

        Wind farm’s connection to power grid causes lights to flicker across South Australia

        A connection between Port Augusta Renewable Energy Park and the national electricity grid is under investigation for causing lights to flicker and dim across South Australia for hours this morning.

        Energy distributor ElectraNet said the privately-owned power generator connected its new wind farm to the grid in South Australia’s north about 1:30am, causing a “voltage issue”.

        There have been widespread reports of house and street lights flickering across the state as a result.

        The minister stopped short of assigning blame but said it could be “a connection issue”.

        “We don’t know what the actual cause is. We know the source of the problem but we don’t know who was causing it,” he said.

        “It could have been [the] renewable energy park, it could have been ElectraNet.”

        100

        • #
          rowjay

          The southeast of ACT (including the airport) had a mysterious power outage on March 12 last year starting early afternoon. When I checked the energy providers fault page, there was no real indication of the cause.

          Later on, I discovered that the Majura Park Community Solar Farm located in SE of ACT was switched on at about the same time.

          Hmmmm.

          100

          • #
            Kalm Keith

            A.C. + D.C. = fzzzz + candles.

            90

          • #
            Philip

            “community solar farm”? Goodness me, talk about socialist rhetoric!

            120

          • #

            Maybe new inverter problems in both cases? When electricians wire a big building and throw the main switch for the first time it is laughingly called the “smoke test”. Maybe like that with wind and solar “farms”.

            91

            • #

              …..throw the main switch for the first time, it is laughingly called the “smoke test”.

              How quickly we forget’

              25 years in the RAAF, and this was the electrician’s virtual mantra, after every ‘rectification’.

              The original fault was always diagnosed from the viewpoint of a non electrical tradesman as ….. “an expensive brown odour”.

              The life of an electrical tradesman was always one of tracking down those expensive brown odours, and the fixing them.

              Tony.

              70

            • #
              Graeme#4

              Yes, once you let the smoke out, it’s darn hard, if not impossible, to put it back in again.
              A prankster once wired a fire cracker across the low-voltage winding of a very big rebuilt power supply, about to be tested after the rebuild. The loud bang, followed by a curl of smoke, horrified the gent who had done the rebuild.

              10

          • #
            Ronin

            I went past there a week ago on the way to a wine tasting at Mt Majura winery almost next door.

            30

        • #
          Philip

          We don’t know what the actual cause is. We know the source of the problem but we don’t know who was causing it

          It shows how complicated grid management is becoming. I know an ex electrical engineer for Transgrid (is it?) who mentioned 10 years ago just how complicated and erratic it was becoming (and he’s a light green by default). At the time they were putting solar farms where lines had no capacity to take the power and major upgrades being required, where as the old one was very old, but just fine for existing use and would be for another 100 years. Low cost infrastructure vs high cost.

          40

          • #
            OldOzzie

            Summed up by showing how hard it is to sync

            Authorized Personnel Only – How to Start and Sync a 400,000 Watt Turbine Hydroelectric Generator

            From the Comments

            Typically when you initiate a “Start” on a hydro unit the governor will open the gate servo to a preset “Speed no load ” position to roll the generator off close to syncronous speed . Excitation to the generator field can then be applied either manually or automatically by a speed switch (now you will see generator AC voltage slowly building up on the meters) . Generator output frequency and voltage can now be matched to the bus frequency and voltage by slowly increasing the water flow applied to the turbine to adjust the frequency and the field current applied to increase or decrease generator output voltage being compared to the bus AC values . With a properly tuned governor you should be able to adjust the generator speed so the sync scope is slowly moving in a clockwise (gen freq faster than bus freq) and every time the pointer passes through 12 O’clock on the meter the generator is momentarily in sync with the bus and the generator breaker can be closed syncronising the generator to the grid . After sycronizing you can load the generator by increasing the governor speed setpoint and putting more water on the turbine . The generator speed cannot increase now as it is held at 60 hertz by the grid you will see watts increase out of the generator now with the water increase .

            If you were to adjust the speed setpoint down now to the point where you are not producing generator watts output you are then “Motoring ” the generator but generator frequency will remain at 60 Hz. held by the grid . Increasing or decreasing the generator field current will result in Vars out , unity power factor . or Vars in condition but that is a lesson for another day.

            Hope this helps people who expressed interest.

            Worth reading the rest of the Comments

            70

            • #
              Ronin

              Interesting, yet I visited Maryborough Sugar Mill about 20 years ago, they had three old appearing but fully refurbished steam turbo generators, on the wall behind them were electronics cabinets with lights and buttons, the fitter described putting them on line, all they had to do was dry the steam supply up to the manual stop valve, when the green light came on for the correct steam temp, he would unblock the steam supply valve and it was then sitting on the throttle valve, then it was a matter of pushing the ‘go’ button and away it went, the electronics set the governed speed and then automatically synced the speed and coupled it to the grid.

              70

              • #
                Dennis

                Maryborough Queensland is the location of Olds Engineering and they have been designing and building steam engines for a very long time, the Olds Family being related to the US Oldsmobile motor car business and REO (R.E.Olds) trucks.

                50

      • #
        Earl

        Indeed I do, and I live (if you call this living) in the fiefdom of the palace chook lgbtwtf Queensland.
        The peasants are revolting…. well stop looking at them and come and eat your lunch.

        30

        • #
          Zane

          The chook may be flying off soon is what I hear.

          10

          • #
            Earl

            Yes, word is she has already lost interest in politics. Probably wont loose interest in sport though with the olympics currently still to continue to be held. Cheers

            10

  • #
    Kippax

    So funny. Schadenfreude at it’s best. Trump was right. All my ‘good obedient’ German relatives derided Trump, lapped up the Green crap and ‘tsk tsk’ the refugees. Oh well.

    As a dual Aussie / German, I am appalled at the trajectory both countries are taking.

    You get what you deserve and hopefully this cost of living crisis will be the beginning of the green death knell. I’m not particularly optimistic but we will see.

    171

  • #
    David Maddison

    The United States and the West in general took centuries to build up.

    Our civilisation was reaching its highest peaks of excellence in many ways.

    But the Left and their policies show how quickly civilisation can be destroyed.

    The US is a remarkable example with two polar opposites for President.

    Trump who was a patriotic supporter of the US and its foundational principles and a supporter of the West in general and Biden’s handlers who are out to destroy everything that is good and decent about the United States and the West generally.

    Biden hasn’t even been “president” two years and in that short time he has caused more destruction of the US than any other President, economic crisis or war in history.

    And it is a very deliberate, well crafted plan they are following. It is not incompetence even though that is its superficial appearance.

    Biden and his handlers are the ones that should be impeached, not Trump.

    211

    • #
      OldOzzie

      Are Dems Crushing the Poor & Middle Class on Purpose? Roger Kimball, Spectator

      Taking a page from Lenin’s playbook

      It’s like Biden wants us to be poor

      I have often been struck by the number of pithy observations — revelatory, pointed or simply true — that were not said by the person to whom they are attributed. Vladimir Lenin apparently never said (in Russian or in English) that “the way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation.”

      This was an insight that Lenin thoroughly grasped. It stands behind his chilling observation that “communism means keeping track of everything.” (Another attribution, true, but if he didn’t say exactly that, he assuredly meant it.) Imagine if Lenin had had the surveillance tools provided by Google, Facebook and other social media. His agenda of dependency would have proceeded even further than it did.

      As it happens, we do not need to imagine such a contingency. We have our very own made-in-America variety present and accounted for. Over the course of a few months, we have gone from a situation where all the beautiful people running our lives were telling us that inflation was merely “transitory,” that it was a “high-class problem” because it meant that more people were buying things (yes, Jen Psaki actually said that), to screaming headlines that inflation is out of control, that it is the worst in forty years, that it is tanking the economy.

      The real question is whether Biden — or whoever is pulling his strings — is deliberately taking a page from Lenin’s playbook or (is this more or less frightening?) whether it is simply the supreme incompetence of his entire administration.

      I do not know the answer. But here’s a thought experiment. Ask yourself what Biden and his minders would have done differently had they actually intended to impoverish the American citizenry.

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    rowjay

    Good Morning Victoria (the down under one)

    With the gas-fueled energy crisis happening in Europe, I took a look at what would be needed (hypothetically) to convert all of your gas use to electricity.

    According to this source, your total 2020/21 electricity consumption was 43.4 Terawatt hours.
    According to this source, your total gas consumption for calendar year 2021 was 195.8 Petajoules, which multiplied by .2778 converts to 54.4 Terawatt hours.

    So get cracking – you need to at least double your current firm electricity generation to cover the withdrawal of gas to avoid a Europe-style crisis.

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      rowjay

      I see that Loy Yang B has been running at 117% today for some time. Is there a problem with power in Vic today?

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      Ross

      The government here in Victoria has been pushing gas for heating etc for probably about 40 years. We had oodles of supply of it (from Bass Strait via Longford), so it was relatively cheap. When I say pushing, I mean huge marketing campaigns. Th majority of new houses in that time would have installed gas hot water and probably some form of gas heating. We did for our new house in 1996 in regional Victoria. Even now, there are towns you drive through with signs proclaiming how they are connected up to piped gas , as opposed to the old bottled bottled gas. Throw in processing industries where gas is probably king ( eg. food processing ) and there is no surprise the split is almost 50:50. That will take a boatload of reversal to change, which means its not practical.

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        rowjay

        To add to the impracticability, about 22 Terawatt hours, or 40% of gas consumption, takes place during the three winter months when renewables are least effective.

        Average daily July gas demand of 245 GWh (energy equivalent) would need at least 10 GW of an additional installed 100% dispatch-able power to cover it. As a comparison, Vic now is running at about 6 GW dispatchable from all sources.

        Why is it so hard for people to understand the scale of the changes that are being proposed?

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        • #
          Ross

          Send all that info to our lovely Vic Energy Minister Rowjay. Lily D’ Ambrosio. Who was asked once if the Labor govt had any plans to build some more dams. Her answer – no, because it’s not going to rain any more. She went to the Chris Bowen school of impractical thinking.

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        rowjay

        Ross – when you think about the history of energy in Victoria using last century logic, the use of gas for heating was a no-brainer – it meant that they did not have to build power generation infrastructure that would remain idle and unwanted for the 6 months of the year that domestic heating was not needed. Gas was easy to store – just leave it in the ground and open the tap when needed.

        New century energy logic has nothing to do with practicality.

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    It’s all BS

    If Adam Bandit gets his way, the hammer and sickle will soon replace the Australian National Flag. Like the hammer and sickle NEVER oppressed anyone…

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    Philip

    If only they had Chris Bowen for energy minister they would be right. Haha, we’ve got him, bad luck Fritz.

    If they listened to Chris, they would know that all Germany has to do is build batteries and more windmills. Not enough windmills in Germany.

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      Dennis

      Considering the way he waves his arms around in frustration trying to make a point I suspect he wants to be a wind mill.

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  • #

    What I especially enjoy is that these are greens hoping out loud that fossil fuels will somehow save them. A little shortage goes a long way.

    And our US high gas prices only have to last 4 more months, until Election Day, which seems likely. Actually I think people are so angry it would not matter if they came back down.

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      Ronin

      I was kind of secretly hoping the coal power stations would get together and give the govt a ‘taste of the future’, looks like that’s exactly what has happened, however the lesson hasn’t sunk in so we are headed for a fail, a big one.

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        el+gordo

        It was heaven sent and all of a sudden the people woke up, coal is our main source of energy.

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    Philip

    There will be rationing here too. It is clear the plan is pushing prices up to justify battery purchase, either large or small scale.

    Last I looked it was $10K for a small house battery, $15K for a bigger one. This article claims the pensioner who installed a battery will break even in 3 years, he must have a large electricity bill to claim that.

    https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/markets/no-home-solar-battery-rebates-on-offer-in-queensland-as-the-government-opts-for-large-scale-projects/ar-AAYRRFr?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=c31f5cf5db0746a4aaf005438a0d8df7

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      Graeme No.3

      Then there is the extra cost of a switch/controller that allows you to use the stored power when there is a blackout.
      I looked at this a few years ago (along with a generator) and the cost was $14,500 for a 10kWh system. Lithium Batteries haven’t been getting cheaper and you are limited in what you can draw from them. Deep draw lead acid may be better.

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    • #
      Ronin

      No mention of how the battery is charged when the grid is down, it would be interesting to have further info on that aspect.
      During the Melbourne outages due to storms, the home battery systems only lasted a few nights then went flat.

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      David Maddison

      I can see a situation in Australia where people are either encouraged to or forced to install batteries, even without solar panels.

      As more unreliables are installed and more power stations destroyed, it will be important to capture and store solar and wind power on those rare occasions when it is available.

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      • #
        Ross

        I nearly bought a Tesla wall a few years ago, but decided to wait for upgrades. I wouldn’t charge it via solar, but rather the normal grid. Have it as backup for those shorter lasting outages. Storms etc. I did purchase a petrol generator instead and rejigged the house with an inlet.

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        Graeme#4

        Not financially viable David.

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      Graeme#4

      As usual, no data or calculations that prove what he is saying is correct. I challenge anybody to prove a solar system with backup battery will be paid off during the system component’s lifetimes. So far nobody has come forward to verify that this is possible.

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    Curious George

    The problem is much older than powerful German Greens. Remember a Social Democrat Chancellor Schroeder and his baby Nord Stream? Is he still on the board of Gazprom?

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    Zane

    Doesn’t one of Putin’s daughters live in Munich? She may have a word with daddy.

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    Ronin

    “It was all totally avoidable. A wholly Green-made crisis. They could have gone nuclear, kept using coal, and explored for more gas and then they could have laughed at GazProm. Instead talk of rationing has already started, and the event horizon now includes the possibility of mass industrial shutdowns and recession.”

    Germany pretty much had it all, efficient industry, respected products, but then they got ‘green’, and it’s all been downhill since then.
    A good wakeup call for the rest.

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    Ronin

    There was a short segment on their Abc about a small business in Logan who repower older and classic cars with battery electric power, they also ‘recycle’ old but good batteries into home battery units that work like Tesla powerwalls but for a lot less cost.
    These cars were on their way to the scrapyard but now can live on for decades, the cheapest conversion gives 100km range plenty for local running.

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    • #
      Dennis

      Save on rising fuel costs, only $16,000 for a conversion and range of under 150 kilometres, not too modern vehicles suitable for conversion.

      Now do the maths.

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      David Maddison

      I think it is a shame to destroy the authenticity of classic (i.e. collector) cars by converting them to electric.

      As for other non-classic cars, converting them might be fun from a hobbyist perspective but I don’t see any practical advantage in purely economical terms, even up to a very high petrol price.

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      another ian

      A fair guess is that, if they are on the way to the scrap yard, that the body work is knackered beyond restoration.

      And, if it isn’t, then restoring the mechanicals is likely do-able.

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    Mike+of+NQ

    Could be worse, they could be Australia. We actually passed a law to outlaw base load nuclear power. We also produce lots of gas but somehow preference this gas to other countries before Australia. When we close coal mines, we don’t just close them, we blow them up, and to top off the list, we ban mining in many areas – why produce what we can import.

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    Zane

    Has anyone else noticed these electric motorized surfboards turning up on beaches?

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    • #
      Earl

      As in something malfunctioned and it uncontrollably went straight out to sea with the rider who was washed/fell off miles off shore and drowned then the tide brought the board back to the beach weeks later? To greens that would be a nightmare, to other people it would be a …

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        Zane

        I mean with guys on them. I had no idea they existed until a few days ago when I saw a guy skimming through the water on one.

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    Dennis

    Sunday Telegraph (Sydney) today contains two articles on nuclear electricity generation and an editorial, all well worth reading.

    In short, “the cost of building nuclear power stations to replace the nation’s ageing coal fired plants is cheaper than wind and solar and vastly more efficient than reliance of giant batteries or pumped hydro, according to Tony Irwin, a nuclear engineer with SMR Nuclear Technology.

    Nuclear generator power comes in at $5,596/kW, large scale solar at more than $14,882/kW, wind at more than $12,372/kW and fossil fuels (gas and coal with carbon capture and storage) at $10,280kW, by Irwin’s calculation.

    His experience in the industry includes 30 years operating large scale nuclear power plants in the UK and he is a former reactor manager for ANSTO’s Lucas Heights (Sydney) plant.”

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      David Maddison

      I fully support nuclear providing it’s economically viable in a given situation but the comparison made is not fair.

      It is a comparison between nuclear, unreliables and fossil fuel but the fossil fuel is burdened with carbon capture and storage making it appear more expensive. And solar and wind don’t have batteries included making them appear cheaper. Of course, nuclear doesn’t need batteries or CC&S.

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      b.nice

      And what is the cost of fossil fuel without the totally unnecessary CC&S ?

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        RobB

        A nuclear plant is expensive to build, in part due to the burden of green red-tape, but costs way less than coal to operate, even without carbon capture, because it uses practically no fuel. Hence the emphasis now on smaller, modular nuclear plants with lower start-up costs. For some countries, where coal is not cheaply or readiiy available, nuclear is a far better option.

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          Graeme#4

          A recent comment was that in China, the turnkey cost for a standard 2GW nuclear plant is around A7,200/kW, build time four years. But in Europe, it’s A$29bn, 15 years. Quite a difference.

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          Philip

          yes but for countries with lots of coal right beneath the furnace, coal makes way more sense and must be cheaper.

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      Graeme#4

      Yes, the figures I have show that nuclear, coal and gas, when using FCOE over their longer lifetimes, come in around half the cost of wind and solar. And when you add firming/backup to solar and wind, nuclear, gas and coal are one-third the cost of solar and wind. During these long lifetimes, solar and wind both have to be replaced at least once, if not twice.

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      Graeme#4

      Dennis, just re-checked your figures that came from SMR Nuclear Technology. Those figures include CCS for coal and gas generation. Without CCS, using CCS data from CSIRO GenCost, coal and gas are even cheaper. (I’ve done my calculations without CCS.)

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    Zane

    Europe will muddle along. They can always go to Morocco for winter. Half of them probably have relatives there anyway.

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    Dennis

    Why does the renewable energy industry rely on Nameplate Capacity, refer only to Capacity, and ignore Capacity Factor?

    MacIntyre wind farm is a proposed 1,026MW onshore wind complex to be built 200km south-west of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.

    The wind farm is being developed by ACCIONA in partnership with CleanCo, an Australian state-owned electricity generator.

    The MacIntyre wind farm will occupy 36,000ha of leased land and is expected to be ACCIONA’s biggest renewable energy facility. It will also become one of the world’s largest onshore wind farms upon completion.

    Estimated to involve an investment of approximately A$1.96bn ($1.17bn), the wind farm project is expected to fortify the Queensland Government’s decarbonisation and climate change mitigation strategies.

    The construction of the wind farm will commence in mid-2021 and is expected to be completed over a period of 18-24 months. The MacIntyre complex is expected to become fully operational in 2024.

    MacIntyre wind farm location
    The wind farm will be located 50km south-west of Warwick and 60km south-south-east of Millmerran in Queensland, Australia

    MacIntyre wind farm development
    ACCIONA will submit the development application to the State Assessment and Referral Agency (SARA), requesting a development license for a material change of use (MCU) to allow construction and operation of the wind farm in mid-2020.

    “The MacIntyre wind farm will become one of the world’s largest onshore wind farms upon completion. “
    CleanCo entered an agreement with ACCIONA to become an independent owner and operator of 100MW wind farm in the MacIntyre complex in March 2020. The agreement allows ACCIONA to own 926MW of the power complex, while the remaining 100MW will be owned by CleanCo.

    CleanCo will also purchase 400MW of renewable energy from ACCIONA’s facilities for a period of ten years under a power purchase agreement (PPA).

    The Queensland government-owned electricity transmission system operator Powerlink is responsible for providing a new connection from the project to the grid.

    MacIntyre wind farm details
    The MacIntyre wind farm will feature 180 Nordex Group’s Delta4000 turbines rated at 5.7MW each. It will have a total of three substations, each holding a power transformer.

    The project will also include 200km of access tracks and up to 250km of 33kV underground electrical cabling.

    The wind farm will be commissioned in phases and will be connected to the grid through 64km of 330kV transmission lines.

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      Zane

      What a waste of money. Could have built half of a big CCGT generator for that and had real usable power.

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      David Maddison

      An additional cost of wind subsidy farms is that they depreciate rapidly.

      These depreciation costs are tax deductible so a lot of tax revenue is not collected because of the extremely high depreciation costs due to the short lives of these monstrosities.

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        Graeme#4

        Also checks on older wind turbines are now showing that they have to be derated at around 12-15 years by 30-50% to protect against turbine blade failure. I doubt that this derating is being taken into account with current wind energy modelling.

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      Graeme#4

      If it costs around $2.4m for every km of overhead transmission lines, surely the 250kms of HV underground cables will cost a fortune.

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    el+gordo

    A victory for commonsense.

    Bloomberg News: ‘Germany is pushing for Group of Seven nations to walk back a commitment that would halt the financing of overseas fossil fuel projects by the end of the year, according to people familiar with the matter. That would be a major reversal on tackling climate change as Russia’s war in Ukraine upends access to energy supplies.’ (WUWT)

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      David Maddison

      It would be better to let them freeze in the dark.

      If there is no pain they will never learn the lesson.

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    Zane

    List of countries by exports 2020: (USD)

    1. China $2.7 trillion
    2. USA $2.1 trillion
    3. Germany $1.7 trillion
    4. Japan $0.8 trillion

    22. Australia $0.3 trillion

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    Zane

    Greta Thunberg at Glastonbury.

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      Forrest Gardener

      There was a line in Good Morning Vietnam about an overly aggressive military officer being more in need of a blow job than anybody Williams character had met.

      I wonder what would bring Greta Thunberg inner peace.

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    Zane

    Any thoughts on the mooted new Cadillac EV, the US$300k Celestiq?

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    Dave in the States

    Among the fools who followed the green energy path to its dead end are:

    The high clergy of AGW: Among this group are sub groups of the true believers who knew it would painful for their congregations but think that it must be done, and those that don’t care about their congregations but they think they will not be effected.

    Those among the congregations who actually believed that somehow-some way belief would overcome reality.

    Those among their congregations who believed the lies.

    Those who didn’t believe but were/are opprotunists, who take advantage of their fellow man.

    Those who were/are ambivilent but who trust what “scientists say…”

    Those who can’t be bothered one way or the other.

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    CHRIS

    Napa Valley California…the graveyard of wind turbines that are past their expiry date. This is a window into the future; where to store expired solar panels, wind turbines and storage batteries??

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    RicDre

    Great Reset: Economically Crippled Germany Pushes ‘Climate Club’ Global Tax Scheme at G7

    Germany is aiming to found a global “climate club” taxation scheme designed to force countries worldwide to adopt a hardcore green agenda.

    Seemingly unhappy with just destroying its own economy, eco-crazy Germany is now reportedly aiming to found a so-called “climate club”, a group that would punish countries not perceived as green enough.

    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2022/06/26/great-reset-economically-crippled-germany-pushes-climate-club-global-tax-scheme-at-g7/

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    Pete of Charnlop

    Why have the WA wholesale power prices that were on opennem.org.au been disappeared? I am highly suspicious of this and found it useful to demonstrate to people how badly the East side was being gamed. Anyone know the reason?

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