6 ms·

Opening survival north stream single pipe for Russian gas is no brain solution. Europe break records importing relabeled Russian gas last month anyway

by yanko 2mo ago

scotty79 2mo ago
It's way better to buy re-labelled, because russia earns less from that when intermediaries take their cut, because it's buyers market.
atwrk 2mo ago
The no brain solution is to electrify everything and switch legacy infrastructure to renewables, just like China does. Gas usage is down in the EU anyway.
- c0l0 2mo ago
  Long-term, that's the smart and also necessary move. But it can't be done overnight, and the transition has its significant challenges. I hope they don't mess it up it and will address these problems rationally - but given how most EU leaders have acted over these past few years, I remain painfully unconvinced that they will.
  - tapoxi 2mo ago
    Isn't solar the fastest energy source to spin up? Just take them out of the crate, put them on racks, tie them to the grid.
    - c0l0 2mo ago
      I guess it is, but solar can only be part of the answer: You need a solid plan (and all the infrastructure that implementing this plan involves) for when the sun does not shine, because in the more northern parts of Europe especially, energy consumption is highest during seasons in which sunlight is (relatively) scarce. Also, "the grid" cannot absorb any amount of solar energy - so if you choose to address (at least parts) of the above challenge with a photovoltaic build-out that results in massive excess capacity during summer, there needs to be a plan (and again, its implementation) to handle that.
      - mrguyorama 2mo ago
        Excess capacity (literally free power) is only a problem because we mandate that electricity generation can only be done as a business that has to earn profit margins. Because of economics, this means it makes sense as a business to sell power that requires a purchased input commodity, and doesn't make as much sense as a business to build enough solar to sell power during darker months. This is absurd, backwards, and is hampering our ability to deploy clean and affordable power. National Governments should be massively overbuilding solar and just handing out the resulting power. It's really difficult to mismanage a solar farm. Maybe instead of a deregulated generation market, we should focus on a barely regulated power storage market.
      - 2snakes 2mo ago
        Iron air batteries.
    - toasty228 2mo ago
      Not to sound like an ass but that's your typical HNer hot take on a topic they don't know anything about (which is 99% of topics outside of tech). I know that I don't know jack shit about the topic, but I can already tell you that if you do what you describe you'll quickly learn about why grids have frequencies, what generate these frequencies, and what happens when they drift.
      - tapoxi 2mo ago
        Yeah that's what an inverter does, the "tie them to the grid" part. Every solar system has them, and they can islanding or not.
        toasty228 2mo ago
        > Yeah that's what an inverter does No, that's not what an "inverter" does, not most inverters at least, you need grid forming inverters and batteries for that... which is my whole point, you don't just take them out of the crate and plug them in the grid, that only works if most of the grid is powered by legacy plants stabilising it. Do you describe nuclear power plants as "just putting two rocks next to each other and plugging them in the grid"
        tapoxi 2mo ago
        You don't need a grid forming inverter to re-synchronize with the grid, you only need a grid forming inverter if you need a complete cold start or to support a grid island. In the context of our discussion, adding more capacity, that's exactly what's needed here. We're not replacing 100% of energy sources with solar, we are replacing energy sources with _renewables_ which is hydro, solar, wind, arguably nuclear as well. Even extending your argument to "well we need to only have solar" then you need a grid forming inverter with batteries. That's not a massive increase in complexity or time and supports the "just tie them to the grid" statement. Trying to use the analogy of a nuclear power plant, which requires 10-15 years (including permitting), is ridiculous. A solar plant is 2-5 (including permitting) - by comparison.
- Saline9515 2mo ago
  China still uses a massive amount of coal, and has a lot of southern idle land. Germany has been doing what you say for the last 15 years, it didn't seem to work out so well.
  - atwrk 2mo ago
    What makes you think Germany didn't do well with renewables? This almost looks like a hockey stick graph: https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/topics/climate-energy/renewable-energies/renewable-energies-in-figures https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/topics/climate-energy/rene...
    - leonidasrup 2mo ago
      Germany invested a lot money and still burns coal, imports a lot of natural gas for electricity production, has higher electricty prices then France and higher emmisions then France. "The energy transition will require considerable added investment. Estimates of the total amount of annual investment vary from 15 to 40 billion euros, or 0.5 to 1.2 percent of Germany’s current gross domestic product (GDP) of around 3,200 billion euros." https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/how-much-does-germanys-energy-transition-cost https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/how-much-does-ger...
  - inigyou 2mo ago
    China's really big. Australia is advancing faster per capita due to having less capita. Can we be Australia?
notrealyme123 2mo ago
no brain in the truest sense of it.
maxdo 2mo ago
No brain because there is lack of survival instincts in such phrase? Russia openly declares willingness to destroy europe, your lifestyle, way of thinking etc. They claim they are better. Sure , sponsoring this country is no brainer lol. Germany already financed biggest war in europe since WWII by flooding russia with oil money. Is that not enough? Amount of money EU spent to tame the fire of war could easily cover building 20-30 nuclear plants across the europe to solve the heat/cooling problem once and forever.
- sajithdilshan 2mo ago
  The primordial interest of the United States, over which for centuries we have fought wars the First, Second, and Cold Wars has been the relationship between Germany and Russia, because united, they're the only force that could threaten us. And to make sure that that doesn't happen. - This is a direct quote by George Friedman. This[1] is a good read to entertain the idea more. [1] https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/the-crisis-in-ukraine-is-not-about-ukraine-its-about-germany/ https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/the-crisis-in-ukraine-is-not-ab...
  - scotty79 2mo ago
    That's fantasy. Germany tried very hard to civilize russia through trade over few past decades. Everybody tried. Turned out russia is just to stupid for any kind of advancement. Did not learn a thing. Everybody else did though.
- pydry 2mo ago
  >Russia openly declares willingness to destroy europe There is not a scintilla of evidence for this. They're trying to keep the same violent and aggressive American dominated military alliance that is currently and actively trying to destroy Iran far away from their most vulnerable border. They also tried to pursue the diplomatic route multiple times before invading and after invading and were always rebuffed.
  - inglor_cz 2mo ago
    They started the largest war in Europe since 1945 and I fervently hope that Putin will pay for that in a way similar to Hitler. That entire war is a massive, futile attempt to revive their glorious imperial days by annexing lands that they consider their alienated property. Fuck them and their bombs and their disgusting oscillations between paranoia and megalomania. Contemporary Russia has fewer people than Pakistan and a smaller economy than Italy. It has no business playing a "mighty superpower" role anymore, but it ignored that reality (Putin is very much a person of the past, as is his inner circle of post-Soviet siloviks in their 60s and 70s) ... and it is learning the hard way. The best possible outcome of this war from Kremlin's point of view is that they will become a de-facto resource colony for China, somewhat benevolently managed by actually competent people.

Opening survival north stream single pipe for Russian gas is no brain solution. Europe break records importing relabeled Russian gas last month anyway

by yanko 2mo ago

Opening survival north stream single pipe for Russian gas is no brain solution. Europe break records importing relabeled Russian gas last month anyway

scotty79 2mo ago

It's way better to buy re-labelled, because russia earns less from that when intermediaries take their cut, because it's buyers market.

atwrk 2mo ago

The no brain solution is to electrify everything and switch legacy infrastructure to renewables, just like China does. Gas usage is down in the EU anyway.

c0l0 2mo ago
Long-term, that's the smart and also necessary move. But it can't be done overnight, and the transition has its significant challenges. I hope they don't mess it up it and will address these problems rationally - but given how most EU leaders have acted over these past few years, I remain painfully unconvinced that they will.
- tapoxi 2mo ago
  Isn't solar the fastest energy source to spin up? Just take them out of the crate, put them on racks, tie them to the grid.
  - c0l0 2mo ago
    I guess it is, but solar can only be part of the answer: You need a solid plan (and all the infrastructure that implementing this plan involves) for when the sun does not shine, because in the more northern parts of Europe especially, energy consumption is highest during seasons in which sunlight is (relatively) scarce. Also, "the grid" cannot absorb any amount of solar energy - so if you choose to address (at least parts) of the above challenge with a photovoltaic build-out that results in massive excess capacity during summer, there needs to be a plan (and again, its implementation) to handle that.
    - mrguyorama 2mo ago
      Excess capacity (literally free power) is only a problem because we mandate that electricity generation can only be done as a business that has to earn profit margins. Because of economics, this means it makes sense as a business to sell power that requires a purchased input commodity, and doesn't make as much sense as a business to build enough solar to sell power during darker months. This is absurd, backwards, and is hampering our ability to deploy clean and affordable power. National Governments should be massively overbuilding solar and just handing out the resulting power. It's really difficult to mismanage a solar farm. Maybe instead of a deregulated generation market, we should focus on a barely regulated power storage market.
    - 2snakes 2mo ago
      Iron air batteries.
  - toasty228 2mo ago
    Not to sound like an ass but that's your typical HNer hot take on a topic they don't know anything about (which is 99% of topics outside of tech). I know that I don't know jack shit about the topic, but I can already tell you that if you do what you describe you'll quickly learn about why grids have frequencies, what generate these frequencies, and what happens when they drift.
    - tapoxi 2mo ago
      Yeah that's what an inverter does, the "tie them to the grid" part. Every solar system has them, and they can islanding or not.
      - toasty228 2mo ago
        > Yeah that's what an inverter does No, that's not what an "inverter" does, not most inverters at least, you need grid forming inverters and batteries for that... which is my whole point, you don't just take them out of the crate and plug them in the grid, that only works if most of the grid is powered by legacy plants stabilising it. Do you describe nuclear power plants as "just putting two rocks next to each other and plugging them in the grid"
        tapoxi 2mo ago
        You don't need a grid forming inverter to re-synchronize with the grid, you only need a grid forming inverter if you need a complete cold start or to support a grid island. In the context of our discussion, adding more capacity, that's exactly what's needed here. We're not replacing 100% of energy sources with solar, we are replacing energy sources with _renewables_ which is hydro, solar, wind, arguably nuclear as well. Even extending your argument to "well we need to only have solar" then you need a grid forming inverter with batteries. That's not a massive increase in complexity or time and supports the "just tie them to the grid" statement. Trying to use the analogy of a nuclear power plant, which requires 10-15 years (including permitting), is ridiculous. A solar plant is 2-5 (including permitting) - by comparison.
Saline9515 2mo ago
China still uses a massive amount of coal, and has a lot of southern idle land. Germany has been doing what you say for the last 15 years, it didn't seem to work out so well.
- atwrk 2mo ago
  What makes you think Germany didn't do well with renewables? This almost looks like a hockey stick graph: https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/topics/climate-energy/renewable-energies/renewable-energies-in-figures https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/en/topics/climate-energy/rene...
  - leonidasrup 2mo ago
    Germany invested a lot money and still burns coal, imports a lot of natural gas for electricity production, has higher electricty prices then France and higher emmisions then France. "The energy transition will require considerable added investment. Estimates of the total amount of annual investment vary from 15 to 40 billion euros, or 0.5 to 1.2 percent of Germany’s current gross domestic product (GDP) of around 3,200 billion euros." https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/how-much-does-germanys-energy-transition-cost https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/how-much-does-ger...
- inigyou 2mo ago
  China's really big. Australia is advancing faster per capita due to having less capita. Can we be Australia?

notrealyme123 2mo ago

no brain in the truest sense of it.

maxdo 2mo ago

No brain because there is lack of survival instincts in such phrase? Russia openly declares willingness to destroy europe, your lifestyle, way of thinking etc. They claim they are better. Sure , sponsoring this country is no brainer lol. Germany already financed biggest war in europe since WWII by flooding russia with oil money. Is that not enough? Amount of money EU spent to tame the fire of war could easily cover building 20-30 nuclear plants across the europe to solve the heat/cooling problem once and forever.

sajithdilshan 2mo ago
The primordial interest of the United States, over which for centuries we have fought wars the First, Second, and Cold Wars has been the relationship between Germany and Russia, because united, they're the only force that could threaten us. And to make sure that that doesn't happen. - This is a direct quote by George Friedman. This[1] is a good read to entertain the idea more. [1] https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/the-crisis-in-ukraine-is-not-about-ukraine-its-about-germany/ https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/the-crisis-in-ukraine-is-not-ab...
- scotty79 2mo ago
  That's fantasy. Germany tried very hard to civilize russia through trade over few past decades. Everybody tried. Turned out russia is just to stupid for any kind of advancement. Did not learn a thing. Everybody else did though.
pydry 2mo ago
>Russia openly declares willingness to destroy europe There is not a scintilla of evidence for this. They're trying to keep the same violent and aggressive American dominated military alliance that is currently and actively trying to destroy Iran far away from their most vulnerable border. They also tried to pursue the diplomatic route multiple times before invading and after invading and were always rebuffed.
- inglor_cz 2mo ago
  They started the largest war in Europe since 1945 and I fervently hope that Putin will pay for that in a way similar to Hitler. That entire war is a massive, futile attempt to revive their glorious imperial days by annexing lands that they consider their alienated property. Fuck them and their bombs and their disgusting oscillations between paranoia and megalomania. Contemporary Russia has fewer people than Pakistan and a smaller economy than Italy. It has no business playing a "mighty superpower" role anymore, but it ignored that reality (Putin is very much a person of the past, as is his inner circle of post-Soviet siloviks in their 60s and 70s) ... and it is learning the hard way. The best possible outcome of this war from Kremlin's point of view is that they will become a de-facto resource colony for China, somewhat benevolently managed by actually competent people.