US is making Europe pay dearly for its half-hearted electrification(programmablemutter.com) |
US is making Europe pay dearly for its half-hearted electrification(programmablemutter.com) |
Furthermore, US voters are significantly more sensitive to inflation, and the US administration is more vulnerable to the political fallout of this price spike because they'll be blamed for it more directly by voters.
As for these examples that are meant to sound scary:
> As we speak, jet fuel reprices. LNG cargoes are rerouted mid-voyage. Summer flight schedules thin out. Across the industrial corridors of Germany and the Netherlands, energy-intensive firms that survived the Ukraine war crisis at enormous cost are running the numbers on a second shock.
* LNG cargoes being re-routed to Asia is because Europeans are more willing and able to reduce gas import levels in response to price jumps than Asian countries, because Europe is less gas dependant (especially in the warmer months of the year), and are more able to sit out the bidding war. That's not a bad thing.
* The flights that are being thinned out are almost entirely the ludicrously cheap short-haul flights used by people who decide "hey, why not take this flight, it's only 50 euros". These flights have real substitues with train and car travel. It's not a serious economic indicator if these trips are being reduced in response to fuel price spikes. People have actually been fighting for a while to try and get rid of these flights for climate reasons.
* The energy intensive firms in Germany and the Netherlands are running the numbers and are mostly finding they'll be okay, especially if they speed up on their already ongoing electrification programs.
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I'd love for European electrification to go faster, and I do think that we'd be in a better position right now if it had gone faster over the past couple years.
However, the reality is that electrification in Europe, especially in economic sectors where energy usage is a significant chunk of input costs, has been going forward at a rapid and reliable pace.
Trump's new adventure and its subsequent supply shocks are just going to speed this up even more.
But I also don't believe in some conspiracy by the American oil industry to eliminate other suppliers in order to fleece Europe.
(the article is not by Henry Farrell itself, it seems to be below his niveau)
On the other hand, elevated oil prices are bad for a very large chunk of the other 97% of the US economy, who rely on buying oil and oil derived products in order to operate their industry.
I filled up my car and batteries and even though negative prices will be scrace in the future near 0 euro prices won't be.
I am happy with the high prices because they push us to renewables even faster.
But of course, electrification as soon as possible.
Huh?