The energy thread

[Jimbuna]

India's imports of Russian oil rose tenfold last year, according to Indian state-controlled lender Bank of Baroda.

The figures show Asia's third largest economy saved around $5bn (£4bn) as it ramped up crude purchases from Moscow.

It comes as Western countries have been cutting their imports of energy from Russia after its invasion of Ukraine.

Russia has been selling energy at a discount to countries like China and India, which is the world's third largest importer of oil.

In 2021 Russian oil accounted for just 2% of India's annual crude imports. That figure now stands at almost 20%, Bank of Baroda said.

India's purchases of oil from Russia during the last financial year, saved it around $89 per tonne of crude, the figures show.

Despite pressure from the US and Europe, India has refused to adhere to Western sanctions on Russian imports. New Delhi has also not explicitly condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

India has defended its oil purchases, saying that as a country reliant on energy imports and with millions living in poverty, it was not in a position to pay higher prices.

Since the Ukraine war began, Europe had imported six times more energy from Russia than India, the country's External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said in a TV interview last year.

"Europe has managed to reduce its imports while doing it in a manner that is comfortable," he said.

Mr Jaishankar added: "If it is a matter of principle why did Europe not cut on the first day?"

With no end in sight to the conflict, some analysts expect Russia to continue to offer cheap oil to Asia's biggest energy importers.

"We expect Russian crude intake to remain limited to these two countries [India and China], sustaining the steep discounts," Vandana Hari, from energy analysis firm Vanda Insights told the BBC.

India's oil refiners will continue to maximise their profit margins for as long as they can, but will simply "go back to their usual crude diet" if the sanctions were to be lifted, she added.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-65553920

[Skybird]

The heat pump craze is not only raging in Germany:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/202...-been-exposed/

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/202...ctable-fiasco/

Meanwhile, economic experts of the German FDP (a member of the coalition government!) recently calculated the real full costs for the Green-wanted enforced exchange of all heating for heatpumps alone: with all the addon costs, their calculaiton shows, the costs are not 150 billion, as the Greens claim, but 6.5 trillion - Factor 43. And that are costs that for the very most are to be shouldered by property owners. Consequently, prices for houses have gone into a steep dive. Peopel have started emergency-sellings, because they fear the money avalanche aiming at them. While the law has not even been passed, it is clear that the fincail, fiasco will remain to be an existential threat for many, even if they water it down in the process.

Add to this the costs of the exploding electricity demand in winter.

The German annual GDP btw. is 3.8 trillion.

Well, math has never been the strength of the Greens. And with the rule of three they are already completely overstrained.

They all seem to have declared the population fair game. The economic war against their own citizens has begun. No prisoners are being taken.


Find the end of a rainbow
Fly wherever the winds blow
Laugh at life like a sideshow
Just what you need to make you feel better
Satisfaction altogether
Guaranteed by Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether
(Alan Parsons Project, Edgar Allan Poe)

That story by Poe is so very true today.

[Skybird]

As a result of the Ukraine war, the gas price rose to over 300 euros per megawatt hour last August. In the meantime, the trend is moving in the opposite direction: on Thursday, the price fell to below 30 euros for the first time since June 2021. Gas prices are thus continuing their downward trend, which has been ongoing for months.


CO2 certificate trading will put an end to this over the years, however, and is expected to make fossil energy ultimately unaffordable.

[Jimbuna]

European natural gas prices have fallen back to normal trading levels for the first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, delivering a blow to Vladimir Putin in his energy war.

Dutch front-month futures, the continent's pricing benchmark, slipped below €30 per megawatt hour on Thursday and again briefly today to reach the lowest level since June 2021.

Europe's energy market is finding a lower limit after a seven-week streak of declines, the longest in six years driven by stable supply, mild weather and stronger renewable generation.

Europe began the refilling season for gas storage with already high storage levels after the mild winter which has helped to keep a lid on prices.

Energy Aspects analysts said that recent injections mean Europe is on track to fill sites by early summer, which is a significant downward risk to late-third quarter prices.

[Skybird]

Germany is pouting! Alliance of 16 EU states want to raise nuclear energy from currently 100 GW to 150 GW in 2050, and signed according papers already in March.

https://www.euractiv.com/section/ene...eu-by-2050/#-1


This chart shows net power exports and imports in Europe in May so far (source: eneryg-charts.info). Germany, Britain. Italy. LOL Mind you, this is May, not really deep winter when no sun shines and no wind blows.






Nuclear weapons are only held by France in the EU, and nuclear power also sees a strong French dominance. Both is not good. Not because I fear war with France, but because I do not believe one minute that France would risk the pulverization of Paris and Marseille because Russia decides to nuke say Latvia. Or Germany. The Brits would also not do it. And the Yanks not as well.

[Jimbuna]

I think the bottom line in any eventuality would be each country doing what best helps themselves.

[Jimbuna]

Ine small step but a step in the right direction.

This will mean a decrease of approximately £10 per week on my energy bill.

Energy bills set to stay high despite price cap cut
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-65695752

[Skybird]

I put this in here. Could also be the economy thread.


https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/...ie-in-the-sky/


They are not about different (electric) car traffic. They are about NO CAR TRAFFIC.

[Skybird]

How Italy drove the heating transition against the wall: warning for Germany, which German politics studiously ignores.


https://www-focus-de.translate.goog/..._x_tr_pto=wapp

[Jimbuna]

The windfall tax on oil and gas firms will be suspended if prices fall to normal levels for a sustained period, the UK government has announced.

Halting the windfall tax would cut the overall tax rate on energy firms from 75% to 40%.

It was introduced last year to help fund a scheme to lower energy bills for households and businesses.

Energy firm profits have soared recently, initially due to rising demand after Covid restrictions were lifted, and then because Russia's invasion of Ukraine raised energy prices.

But oil and gas prices have now come down from their highs.

In a statement, the Treasury said the windfall tax would remain until March 2028 but that the tax rate would fall if the average oil and gas prices fall to, or below, a set level for two consecutive three-month periods.

The level has been set at $71.40 per barrel for oil and £0.54 per therm for gas.

Brent crude oil was trading at $75 per barrel on Friday morning, with gas prices at around £0.62.

[Skybird]

I just red an economic report on Chile (in the NZZ-LINK). For various reasons, the solar and wind energy industry there currently is completely collapsing, the financial fundament is going down the drains, the windparks and solar farms die like the flies. Without green electricity there will be no green hydrogen.


"Hey Europe: Guck-guck...!"

[Jimbuna]

BUCHAREST (Reuters) -Romanian oil and gas group OMV Petrom, majority-controlled by Austria's OMV, said on Tuesday it discovered new crude oil and natural gas deposits equal to about three quarters of its overall 2022 production.

The deposits are the largest crude oil discovery OMV Petrom has made in decades, it said, and were found in southern Romania holding over 30 million barrerls of oil equivalent (boe) of recoverable resources.

"The new discoveries will contribute to reducing the decline of our production and to the continuity of the supply of essential products for the economy," said Cristian Hubati, a company board member responsible for exploration and production.

The discoveries were in three areas, with the largest in the Verguleasa area that is near existing production, part of a strategy of exploring near infrastructure already present.

The find comes as the company gears up for a final investment decision on a large Black Sea offshore gas project together with state owned gas producer Romgaz.

OMV Petrom has said it expected a decision around the middle of this year for the Neptun Deep gas project, estimated to cost around 4 billion euros ($4.32 billion). Plans to develop the project were previously delayed by taxes and regulations introduced without notice.

In May, Romanian lawmakers changed the law to enforce an additional tax on refined crude oil which applies to OMV Petrom.

OMV Petrom shares were up 0.65% on the day on the Bucharest Stock Exchange by 1135 GMT.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/othe...7014985a9&ei=8

[Skybird]

When it comes to solar energy expansion, the EU is more dependent on China than it used to be on Russia for gas supplies - and wants a renaissance for the domestic solar module industry. The chance? Rather bad.
(...)
The annual production capacity of the European solar industry currently amounts to modules with a total output of a good 8 gigawatts. The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems estimates the European share of global production at one percent and the Chinese at 75 percent.

The aim of the EU as part of its Green Deal is for the domestic solar industry to produce modules with an output of 30 gigawatts again by 2030. But according to an analysis by management consultancy PWC, the largest Chinese manufacturer Jinko alone is currently producing 45 gigawatts. According to the Jinko website, the capacity at the end of 2022 was already much higher at 70 gigawatts. By the end of this year it should be 90 gigawatts. The group has made provisions for the rapid growth it is hoping for in the coming years and is apparently increasing its capacity faster than the entire European industry.
(...)

https://www-focus-de.translate.goog/..._x_tr_pto=wapp

[Catfish]

I just read China is building more than 300 new coal power plants.
Also this.
https://www.newscientist.com/article...-power-plants/

[Skybird]

I would not mind seeing Germany's energy policy blowing up in flames soon (it will, just later), unfortunately that will not happen before I have been forced to waste an awful lot of money and throw it uselessly out of the window, due to "rules" and "regulations". For the house I live in I expect total costs in the range of 300,000 to 350,000, 15% of that will be my share.

And thebest of it: the whole energy-political nonsense will not create less but more CO2.

If the Greens were about climate, they would not have killed nuclear energy, and would not reducing electric power availability by increasing the demand without servicing it. They say poriuces will drop over thge years. The whole system is designed to push prices upowards even if there would be oversupply. Prices will not drop.

We are the laughing stock of the Western world, in pretty much all respects.