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Comment by Barrin92 | Hacker News Reader

what stands out to me is that hopefully this crisis has broken up some of the static mentality we've had here. We had for the most part adopted the narrative that Russian energy is necessary, the economy will die otherwise, and so on.

Now we're building LNG terminals in Germany, we're building a pipeline to Norway for hydrogen, all that stuff is suddenly possible in months when it took us decades to built a trainstation in Stuttgart. When shit hits the fan apparently we can still move things.

The entire last year has made me oddly enough more optimistic. The continent is holding together, in addition to the weather the demographically tight labor market is sort of a blessing as unemployment remains low even with economic hickups and there's a real awareness that the status quo on many fronts wasn't sustainable.

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Things are not that simple unfortunately. The lack of an energy crisis this winter due to warm weather should not be mistaken for absence of economic harm, as in demand destruction. A high gas import bill is problematic for European economies, especially the ones that have a well-developed heavy industry, which tend to be also heavy gas users. This means the Europeans won’t be able to compete on international markets due to the higher cost of energy. IIRC I read somewhere (dbresearch probably) that chemical industry shrank by ~21% in Germany in Q4. Lost production will have to be replaced by imports, adding to the trade deficit caused by higher energy prices/LNG.

There is economical harm and that cannot be changed. But GP has a point in that Germany seems to have abandoned its stance of weathering crises by mostly waiting them out. The consequences of the Ukraine war for Germany are serious and will have to be dealt with, but there is a lot of potential to do so, and I agree with GP it's a good sign that there appears to be both willingness and ability to make use of that potential, though Germany will need a lot more of that in the coming months and years.

We have learned nothing. Europe is nestling close to China. Environmentalists continue to block all efforts to wean us off Russian gas. The real economic adjustment to higher energy costs has not come with hundreds of billions of subsidies (so environmentalists win the day politically...everyone thinks it will be fine, they don't see that German unemployment would be north of 20% if this ran it's course).

It has just started.

That’s just all FUD.

> Now we're building LNG terminals in Germany, we're building a pipeline to Norway for hydrogen, all that stuff is suddenly possible in months

Building something does not mean that you will be able to fill it. The LNG comes from the US, who source it themselves from domestic and arab sources. The next biggest source of gas is Qatar and they explicitly said that they couldnt fulfill Europe's gas demand even if they sold their entire stock to Europe directly. Russian gas and energy still are the only sources that can supply the world globally.

Even the US strategic petroleum reserve is dwindling as the US makes a quick buck selling its oil to Europe on inflated prices to the extent that it started making German and French governments complain publicly. Of course, there is also the Russian gas and oil that they buy from intermediaries and then sell to Europe - a fine example of US corporate-state mentality.

> Now we're building LNG terminals in Germany

That's not a good thing. LNG is not a good solution, apart from being easy and readily at hand.

I honestly thought Trump was mad when he told Germany off for Russian imports. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nato-summit-pipeline-idUS...

Yes, it was definately a highlight of his political career when he was able to semi-coherently express the standard US policy on something.

Trump said nothing new. The issue was known for decades but Germany liked cheap gas too much(i.e like the U.S liked cheap labour from China). Not to mention that Trump also said EU is a foe for the U.S and Russia is treated unfairly. Trump was a true clown that just said a lot of things hoping something will stick. It's amazing that people still quote him.

In a single paragraph you condemn from multiple sides. Too much and too little controversy, too meaningful yet too insubstantial, subjectively both wrong and right. There should be weight in your efforts.

German delegation’s response at UNGA when Trump says “Germany will become totally dependent on Russian energy if it does not immediately change course.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfJv9QYrlwg

Isn't this the same speech that he started by saying "my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country"? No wonder they're laughing.

Every administration says nonsense like that because there is no way to measure such fluff.

No, other administrations have some humility.

Driving to my in-laws in Niedersachsen up from northern Bavaria through the former East on Christmas Eve was revelatory: not only a slight increase in windmills, along with several of those enormous blades parked on the side, but banks of solar panels along with Autobahns everywhere, in various states of construction, but the ones with panels up were of course more conspicuous.

Those solar panels weren't there back in June.

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