Net Zero: The last chance to save The Planet, but never mind! Get ready for the Great Reenergize-ment, we’ve reached a tipping point. Even the elite believers know a real threat when they see one. Russia has been sending Kalibr after Kalibr into Ukraine, creating worldwide energy concern! The ruling class, sitting on cushy taxpayer salaries, weren’t threatened by higher fuel prices and carbon taxes, but Russian missiles are another thing. Only a few months ago we had only “ten years till the next mass extinction”. Now, everything coal is good again, and years of pompous energy policies are on fire, exposing the real truth about Global warming! In normal times these would be monster headline backflips with mass protests in the streets from fifteen-year-old school-skippers., but reality can be a wake-up slap in the face! Germany to fire up mothballed coal power stations. One of Europe’s biggest energy companies is preparing to bring a string of German coal power stations out of retirement aa part of efforts to wean the country off Russian gas. Rheinisch-Westfälisches Elektrizitätswerk Power Plant (RWE) said it was reviewing which plants could be brought back online and stood ready to fire them up should they be needed. These include plants that have been decommissioned, those that are scheduled to go off-grid this year and others that are currently kept on standby. RWE added: “It is up to the German government to decide if these units will need to operate on a temporary basis” Robert Habeck, Scholz’s economy minister, has insisted there will be “no taboos”, throwing into doubt plans for the country to ditch coal by 2030. Nothing, bar anything, is a cheaper way of making electricity than waking up a dead coal plant. UK Retinks Net Zero Meanwhile the UK rethinks everything, and considers a last-minute stay of execution for fracking wells. They have two viable fracking wells in the UK which sit on 50 years of gas, but were due to be concreted to oblivion, by the end of June. These were the wells closed for fear of seismic activity so small people can’t even feel it. Net zero rules for the North Sea are to be watered down under proposals aimed at freeing the West from its reliance on Russian fossil fuel in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine. Officials are examining a plan that would allow new oil and gas drilling to go ahead on national security grounds, even if it violates a ban on schemes that could damage Britain’s bid to go carbon neutral by 2050. The move – which would be a major policy reversal just months after Boris Johnson pledged to lead the fight against climate change at the Cop-26 conference – comes as the Prime Minister pushes for more energy imports from Saudi Arabia and contemplates ending a ban on fracking. The rumors from the UK have been released to soften up the news when it comes, though Johnson’s hotly anticipated energy strategy is not expected this week, raising questions over what exactly is holding it up. Much of the work that has taken place on the strategy so far has centered on the government’s legal net zero climate change commitments. In order to accelerate licensing for new North Sea oil and gas fields, a key expectation of the PM, government lawyers are having to redraw the so-called climate checkpoints imposed by ministers, which block new licenses if they don’t align with Britain’s net zero pledges. Ministers are looking at adding a “national security” or “geopolitical consideration” clause that would allow them to bypass net zero red tape and quickly drill for more oil in emergency circumstances. AWhitehall source said that this was one of the main areas of focus in terms of North Sea oil and gas, with much of the rest of the package centered around accelerating renewable energy such as onshore wind and solar. There is also talk the PM could unveil the strategy in a major speech later this month. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak – who said last week he wanted to encourage more investment in new fossil fuel drilling – is reported to have pressed the business secretary to fast-track applications. A new oil and gas field in the North Sea has already been given the green light. – just two months after the UK held the global climate Cop26 summit. Green groups fiercely criticised the move, accusing the government of hypocrisy and taking action that “only worsens the climate crisis. It is set to be followed by half a dozen more approvals for fossil fuel drilling this year. The sites have reportedly already been given a preliminary licence by ministers and are expected to be approved by the Oil and Gas Authority (OGA), the UK regulator. Nothing refreshes the mind like a bunch of cruise missiles, interrupting energy flows. The Sun Bay Paper Page 26 International News Russia's Kalibr Cruise Missile just Blew up "Net Zero": Germany Wakes Old Coal Plants, UK Talks of Backflip on Gas, oil, Fracking Too Cont. from pg 1 economics supposes that the relatively low prices for a barrel of oil until now have been because of corporate altruism on the part of the same companies now being maligned as greedy. The true explanation is a tad more complex than policymakers would care to admit. Oil companies are responding to global economic forces, which at the moment are making it more costly to bring supply to the market. Prices are rising, producers are incurring greater costs and markets are anticipating the need for new sources of supply. Another contradiction in the way Washington Democrats are approaching this issue is in their discussion of supply. In a public comment, White House press secretary Jen Psaki accused the oil industry of purposely refusing to drill so prices would go up. Psaki cited the fact that there are 9,000 permits not in use. This also misses the mark. While there are unused permits, the federal government has paused leases on federal lands for oil companies. Permits and leases are only one part of a longer production process where the federal government has erected and maintained barriers to increased production. At a time where U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm has pushed oil companies to produce more oil, the administration has a pause on leases and Congress is trying to further dissuade more production. Rapidly ramping up production would create millions of dollars of risk for these companies. Costs will rise, and prices usually follow. Bills like the Whitehouse-Khanna proposal would obliterate the incentive to assume such risks. The messaging is not in sync with actual policy coming from Capitol Hill. Further, the guidelines set in the Whitehouse-Khanna bill are arbitrary at best. The $66 per barrel threshold is based on “the average price of oil between 2015 and 2019.” No justification was given for why that metric was used or why such a short window of time was used to generate it. In the midst of rampant inflation, a waning pandemic, and conflict in Eastern Europe, the current global market price sits at just under $100 per barrel. A $66 benchmark is out of touch with clear and present realities in the market. The solution to lagging global oil supply is to incentivize production wherever possible, not to seek out ways to punish those who might. Higher prices are part of incentivizing said production. The solution to rising inflation is to cut government spending, not to create a new entitlement on the back of that aforementioned punishment. The Khanna-Whitehouse proposal on oil “windfalls” manages to consolidate much of what has gone sideways in Washington in recent years. Not only will it fail to address the current issues, it will exacerbate those problems. Daniel Savickas Oil Windfall Tax Makes a Bad Situation Worse March 18, 2022 - March 24, 2022
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