Steve Bull's Blog, page 210
July 20, 2022
As Fuel Prices Poised to TRIPLE, EU Mulls Rationing Gas Across Bloc Monday
The European Union (EU) is going down in flames as its fuel taps from Russia run dry.
Issues related to the war in Ukraine have resulted in no more gas flowing through the Nord Stream 1 (NS1) pipeline and soon-to-be tripled gas prices across Europe.
To avoid what will inevitably become a widespread catastrophe for the European economy, EU officials are reportedly discussing fuel rationing as the next step in their standoff against Russian President Vladimir Putin, who quite frankly appears to be winning on every front.
Should the NS1 pipeline never get turned back on due to issues with a key engine turbine component that is still stuck in Canada due to sanctions, Western Europe faces a total loss of energy in the coming months.
Up until now, the public was simply hearing about these problems on the news. Now, however, the consequences of failed political leadership are turning into sky-high gas prices and now the potential for forced rationing.
A recent poll found that more than 60 percent of German citizens fear there will not be enough gas to go around this winter, especially since some people will be stocking up and hoarding what they can before prices triple come 2023.
Germans are starting “to sweat” as they realize there will be no gas available for heat this winter
Draft EU measures propose limiting the heating of public and commercial buildings to 19 degrees Celsius, or around 66 degrees Fahrenheit, which is cold enough to require the use of extra layers of clothing indoors.
Private households are also being encouraged to lower their thermostats by one degree, a proposal that was also made back in February right after Russia invaded Ukraine.
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UK shatters record for its hottest day ever; London fire service declares ‘major incident’
People turn out to watch the sunrise at Cullercoats Bay, North Tyneside. Britons are set to melt on the hottest UK day on record as temperatures are predicted to hit 40C. Picture date: Tuesday July 19, 2022.Owen Humphreys | Pa Images | Getty ImagesLONDON — Britain recorded its hottest-ever day Tuesday, with temperatures hitting a high of 40.3 degrees Celsius (104.5 degrees Fahrenheit) in the east of England, as London’s fire service tackled several blazes across the capital.
The provisional figures from the U.K.’s weather service showed Coningsby, Lincolnshire, hit the new high Tuesday afternoon, surpassing two new records set earlier in the day.
The country’s previous hottest temperature was 38.7C, recorded in Cambridge in 2019.
It comes as Brits face the second day of an extreme heatwave, which is causing widespread disruption and raising the risk of wildfires.
“If confirmed this will be the highest temperature ever recorded in the UK. Temperatures are likely to rise further through today,” the Met Office said on Twitter.
Temperatures were forecast to hit as high as 42C in parts of England by Tuesday afternoon, according to the Met Office, which issued a red extreme heat warning. Health authorities urged people to take precautions, including staying indoors and drinking plenty of water.
The country is also on high alert for wildfires, with the southeast of England at “very extreme danger,” according to the European Forest Fire Information System.
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July 19, 2022
Refinery Shuts Down Due To Lack Of Crude
A South African refinery has shut down operations and declared force majeure on the supply of petroleum products due to a delay in the shipment of crude, which highlights the fact that the physical market for crude is tight these days despite a slump in paper-traded oil futures.
Sasol, the biggest fuel producer in South Africa, was forced to declare force majeure on refined product deliveries because of delays in the crude oil supplied to its 108,000 barrels per day (bpd) refinery Natref, a company spokesperson told South Africa-based financial news outlet Fin24 on Saturday.
“These delays have impacted availability of crude oil feedstock for processing at Natref, which necessitates the shutdown of its Natref refinery,” the spokesperson said.
“In the circumstances, Sasol Oil will not be in a position to fully meet its commitments on the supply of all petroleum products from July 2022,” said the company, adding that it hopes the issue would be resolved soon and the refinery could resume production at full capacity by the end of this month.
The stoppage at Sasol’s Natref refinery now means that South Africa’s entire oil refining capacity is currently out of service, according to Bloomberg’s estimates. Other refineries have closed down production since COVID erupted, either because they would be converted to terminals or because of operational issues. Only Sasol’s synthetic fuel output using coal as a feedstock, of which South Africa has huge amounts, remains fully operational.
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July 18, 2022
War with Iran
The United States, Saudi Arabia and Israel, responsible for military fiascos, hundreds of thousands of deaths and innumerable war crimes in the Middle East, are now plotting to attack Iran.
Biden at Bat – by Mr. Fish
The United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia are plotting a war with Iran. The 2015 Iranian nuclear arms accord, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which Donald Trump sabotaged, does not look like it will be revived. U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) is reviewing options to attack if Teheran looks poised to obtain a nuclear weapon and Israel, which opposes U.S.-Iran nuclear negotiations, carries out military strikes.
During his visit to Israel, Biden assured Prime Minister Yair Lapid that the U.S. is “prepared to use all elements of its national power,” including military force, to stop Iran from building a nuclear weapon.
Saudi Arabia, Israel and the U.S. function as a troika in the Middle East. The Israeli government has built a close alliance with Saudi Arabia, which produced 15 of the 19 hijackers in the September 11 attacks and has been a prolific sponsor of international terrorism, supporting Salafi jihadism, the basis of al-Qaeda, and such groups as the Afghanistan Taliban, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and the Al-Nusra Front.
The three countries worked in tandem to back the 2013 military coup in Egypt, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who overthrew its first democratically elected government. He has imprisoned tens of thousands of government critics, including journalists and human rights defenders, on politically motivated charges. The Sisi regime collaborates with Israel by keeping its common border with Gaza closed to Palestinians, trapping them in the Gaza strip, one of the most densely populated and impoverished places on earth.
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Germany’s Energy Crisis About To Get Even Worse As Rhine Water Levels Plummet
What has already been a year from hell for Germany, which is suffering energy hyperinflation as a result of Europe’s sanctions on Russia, and which is “facing the biggest crisis the country has every had” according to the president of the German employers association, is about to get even worse as the declining water level of the Rhine river, which has historically been a key infrastructure transit artery across Germany, continues to fall and as it does, the flow of commodities to inland Europe is starting to buckle threatening to make an already historic crisis even worse.
The alarming lack of water is contributing to oil product supply problems in Switzerland and preventing at least two power plants in Germany from getting all the coal they need, and what’s more, the continent’s sizzling summer temperatures are forecast to climb even higher in the coming week, leading to even lower water levels.
The 800-mile (1,288-kilometer) Rhine river runs from Switzerland all the way to the North Sea and is used to transport tens of millions of tons of commodities through inland Europe. But with water levels at their lowest for the time of year in 15 years, there is a limit how much fuel, coal and other vital cargo that barges can carry up and down the river.
Low water levels on the Rhine River mean that barges hauling middle distillate-type oil products – typically gasoil/diesel – past Kaub in Germany, are limited to loading about 30% of capacity, according to maritime brokerage services firm Riverlake.
A barge loading in the energy hub of Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (or ARA), which can haul 2.5k tons when fully laden, is restricted to taking on about 800 tons if sailing to destinations beyond Kaub…
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Gazprom Reportedly Declares Force Majeure, Will Halt Gas Flows To Germany Indefinitely
Already days before the July 22 European “Doomsday” when the scheduled Russian 10-day maintenance of the crucial Nord Stream pipeline to Germany is slated to end – but which was thrown into deep doubt given Gazprom recently said it can no longer guarantee its “good functioning” due to crucial turbines being previously held up in Canada related to sanctions – the Russian energy giant has declared Force Majeure to one major European customer.
Simply put, Gazprom declared extraordinary and extreme circumstances to void itself from all contractual obligations to this customer, thus the gas will stop flowing indefinitely, as Reuters reports in a breaking development Monday, “Russian gas export monopoly Gazprom has declared force majeure on gas supplies to Europe to at least one major customer starting June 14, according to the letter seen by Reuters.”
The letter invoked “extraordinary” circumstances outside the company’s control, Reuters continues, citing a source saying the customer in question is Germany via the Nord Stream 1 pipeline.
As we’ve been detailing, German authorities have of late taken unprecedented steps in anticipation of an enduring Russian gas halt, essentially dimming the lights across the country – which has included everything from limiting hot water, to shutting down swimming pools, to quite literally dimming city street lights as it entered “alarm” stage over dwindling supply.
It seems this letter declaring its legal release from supply obligations going back to June 14 is in preparation for definitive action on July 22, namely that the pipeline’s operations are likely to remain suspended.
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July 17, 2022
California went big on rooftop solar. Now that’s a problem for landfills
Solar panels purchased for home use under incentive programs many years ago are nearing the end of their life cycle. Many are already winding up in landfills. (Jim Cooke / Los Angeles Times)California has been a pioneer in pushing for rooftop solar power, building up the largest solar market in the U.S. More than 20 years and 1.3 million rooftops later, the bill is coming due.
Beginning in 2006, the state, focused on how to incentivize people to take up solar power, showered subsidies on homeowners who installed photovoltaic panels but had no comprehensive plan to dispose of them. Now, panels purchased under those programs are nearing the end of their typical 25-to-30-year life cycle.
Many are already winding up in landfills, where in some cases, they could potentially contaminate groundwater with toxic heavy metals such as lead, selenium and cadmium.
Sam Vanderhoof, a solar industry expert and chief executive of Recycle PV Solar, says that only 1 in 10 panels are actually recycled, according to estimates drawn from International Renewable Energy Agency data on decommissioned panels and from industry leaders.
The looming challenge over how to handle truckloads of waste, some of it contaminated, illustrates how cutting-edge environmental policy can create unforeseen problems down the road.
“The industry is supposed to be green,” Vanderhoof said. “But in reality, it’s all about the money.”
California came early to solar power. Small governmental rebates did little to bring down the price of solar panels or to encourage their adoption until 2006, when the California Public Utilities Commission formed the California Solar Initiative. That granted $3.3 billion in subsidies for installing solar panels on rooftops.
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Dutch Nitrogen Scientist Questions the Basis of Government Climate Mandates
Dutch farmers are protesting against what they see as harsh measures to cut down nitrogen emissions. (PMVfoto/Shutterstock)Dutch Nitrogen Scientist Questions the Basis of Government Climate Mandates‘We now treat farmers as polluters … which is a very strange perspective’Jaap Hanekamp is skeptical of the received wisdom in science. He won’t stop asking a simple question: “But, is this true?”
When it comes to the Dutch government’s calculations of ammonia and nitrogen oxide deposition—the basis of climate mandates that would slash livestock numbers and put many farmers out of work—Hanekamp is especially critical of “the science.”
He thinks it relies on vague definitions, excessive deference to expert judgment, and a narrow focus on costs rather than both costs and benefits.
“We now treat farmers as polluters, end of story, which is a very strange perspective,” he said.
Hanekamp, an associate professor of chemistry at University College Roosevelt in the Netherlands, made the comments in an interview with Roman Balmakov, host of EpochTV’s “Facts Matter.”
A 2019 Dutch court decision that hindered the construction of livestock facilities triggered an earlier round of protests by farmers.
A Science article on the protests described some of the harms attributed to nitrogen emissions: “In 118 of 162 Dutch nature reserves, nitrogen deposits now exceed ecological risk thresholds by an average of 50 percent.
“In dunes, bogs, and heathlands, home to species adapted to a lack of nitrogen, plant diversity has decreased as nitrogen-loving grasses, shrubs, and trees move in.”
“Nitrogen chemicals are nutrients—you need them for growing plants,” Hanekamp said.
Hanekamp believes the government has focused on nitrogen almost to the exclusion of other factors that affect nature, such as the location of groundwater relative to the surface.
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July 16, 2022
After Biden Rehabs MbS’ Image, Saudis Announce Increase In Oil Production Capacity
After Joe Biden’s red carpet fist bump with the “pariah” it appears Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman got what he wanted – namely the necessary optics of being deemed “back in” with Washington and having his blood stained reputation rehabilitated on a global stage, signaling that everyone can finally “get over” the heinous murder of Jamal Khashoggi… and now it seems MbS is following through with his part of the quid pro quo, on Saturday announcing the kingdom will increase its oil production capacity to 13 million barrels per day.
Speaking at Saturday’s Jeddah summit of Middle East leaders the day following his closed-door meeting with Biden, MbS stressed investing in fossil energy but according to “clean techniques” – saying at a moment the war in Ukraine and resulting oil supply crisis is on everyone’s minds (or rather the soaring price boomerang in the wake of the West seeking to “punish” Putin), “It’s important to reassure investors that the policies adopted don’t threaten their investments, to avoid discouraging them from investing causing a shortage in energy supplies.”
“The kingdom has announced an increase in its energy capacity to 13 million barrels a day. After that the kingdom will have no further capacity to increase production,” the Saudi ruler unveiled, per Bloomberg.
Saturday Jeddah summit, via Saudi Press Agency (SPA)With the US administration having provided the ‘wayward’ crown prince a rehabilitating photo op, Biden too now has enough to claim ‘victory’ and return home proclaiming an ease to the supply problem.
Though it remains that not everyone is buying it, even in the mainstream media, with for example The Washington Post, Khashoggi’s former employer, on Friday slamming Biden for the “shameful” fist-bump, writing in a statement that it “projected a level of intimacy and comfort that delivers to MBS the unwarranted redemption he has been desperately seeking.”
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Why We Ignore the Obvious: The Psychology of Willful Blindness
How to counter the gradual narrowing of our horizons.
“Keep your baby eyes (which are the eyes of genius) on what we don’t know,” pioneering investigative journalist Lincoln Steffens wrote in a beautiful 1926 letter of life-advice to his baby son. And yet the folly of the human condition is precisely that we can’t know what we don’t know — as E.F. Schumacher elegantly put it in his guide for the perplexed, “everything can be seen directly except the eye through which we see.” What obscures those transformative unknowns from view are the unconscious biases that even the best-intentioned of us succumb to.
In Willful Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at Our Peril (public library), serial entrepreneur and author Margaret Heffernan examines the intricate, pervasive cognitive and emotional mechanisms by which we choose, sometimes consciously but mostly not, to remain unseeing in situations where “we could know, and should know, but don’t know because it makes us feel better not to know.” We do that, Heffernan argues and illustrates through a multitude of case studies ranging from dictatorships to disastrous love affairs to Bernie Madoff, because “the more tightly we focus, the more we leave out” — or, as cognitive scientist Alexandra Horowitz put it in her remarkable exploration of exactly what we leave out in our daily lives, because “attention is an intentional, unapologetic discriminator.”
The concept of “willful blindness,” Heffernan explains, comes from the law and originates from legislature passed in the 19th century — it’s the somewhat counterintuitive idea that you’re responsible “if you could have known, and should have known, something that instead you strove not to see.” …
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