Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-23 and Invasion

[Zanza]

Germany currently has 200 TWh stored and this is planned to be filled up to 235 TWh by November. There are also flows of about 2-3 TWh per day from Norway, Netherlands etc. Some of that is exported as Central Europe gets most of its gas via Germany. Let's say about 60 TWh remain in Germany.

Consumption in November and December will likely be around 100 TWh, January maybe 120 TWh, February and March again 100 TWh. That would mean it is roughly enough. If the winter is really cold, it might not be enough. If we can further decrease consumption, especially for industrial processes and maybe electricity (e.g. by not having German gas power plants substituting shutdown French NPPs), that would help. By end of this year, the first LNG terminals should come online as well,which will help.

[Sheilbh]

It's one of those things - a bit like Sarko and Gordon Brown buying loads of flu vaccines in 2009 with swine flu, or maybe Y2K - where if it's a mild winter or everything goes to plan everything right now will look like wildly overblown panic. If it's a bad winter or one or two bits don't go as planned then I think we'll need rationing to ensure fair distribution of energy.

[Zanza]

Even with a mild winter it will not look overblown. With a harsh winter, it will not be enough despite the great efforts now.

[Legbiter]

On the bright side Europe only has to make the switch from Russian oil and gas once.  I'm not sure how Russia thinks it will get back it's reputation as a reliable business partner/ gas supplier. Not even Germany will ever want to  be reliant on them again for a generation at least.

[Jacob]

I guess China and India and points East? Once they build the infrastructure, of course

[Legbiter]

I guess China and India and points East? Once they build the infrastructure, of course

A sound 10 year project yeah. The interim will be interesting though...

[Sheilbh]

On the bright side Europe only has to make the switch from Russian oil and gas once.  I'm not sure how Russia thinks it will get back it's reputation as a reliable business partner/ gas supplier. Not even Germany will ever want to  be reliant on them again for a generation at least.

It doesn't matter too much? Who are they competing against - Iran, Saudi, Venezuela, the Gulf monarchies?

There are reliable, pleasant, even guilty fossil fuel providers out there like Canada and Norway - but fossil fuel economies have been full of nationalisations, windfall taxes, capricious state actions. It'll still get bought not because they're reliable business parties you want to work with but because it's necessary for their economy.

On gas they'll move to the Chinese pipelines they're building and with oil it's already trading, I think India's a big buyer (and it's being shipped primarily on Greek-flagged ships which is not ideal). Also while it won't replace European pipelines, Russia's been building up its capacity to export LNG - I think BP, Shell and maybe Total were involved?

[Jacob]

How vulnerable are LNG pipelines to sabotage or conventional attacks?

[Tamas]

I don't care much where Russia sell their stuff as long as Europe stop being dependent on them.

[Zanza]

Russia will have a hard time building new pipelines or LNG terminals while being sanctioned. They don't have the technology themselves. Losing Europe as a market is not replaceable. China does not pay enough to be profitable. 

Their oil is their main income source though, so Western sanctions need to target that even more. Much easier to deliver without pipelines though.

[Zanza]

On the bright side Europe only has to make the switch from Russian oil and gas once.  I'm not sure how Russia thinks it will get back it's reputation as a reliable business partner/ gas supplier. Not even Germany will ever want to  be reliant on them again for a generation at least.

In a generation we should ideally not need much or any fossil fuels anymore anyway.

[Josquius]

I am hoping that is a big bright side out of all this shit.
Short term pain with gas bills for Europe, massive pain with war for Ukraine, but in the long term better for all with the clean transition sped up significantly

[Sheilbh]

Russia will have a hard time building new pipelines or LNG terminals while being sanctioned. They don't have the technology themselves. Losing Europe as a market is not replaceable. China does not pay enough to be profitable. 

I'm not so sure on China - either as an alternative source of tech (often, no doubt, reverse engineered from Western partners - like the USSR in the 20s and 30s) or an alternative market. And I'm not sure that'd be hit by secondary sanctions given that the West hasn't banned energy from Russia either?

But I think aside from the energy angle it's also true that this winter is when Western sanctions on Russia will start really biting.

[OttoVonBismarck]

The reality is on a long enough time scale Russia is fucked in a number of ways. India and China will certainly (at a discount) buy up fossil fuels at increased rates, but there are throughput issues there. There is no easy replacement given geography and other realities for the European gas market for Russia. Yes, there are pipeline projects to move some gas beyond what is moved now, to China and India, their demand is not infinite, and the feasibility and cost / return on investment gets worse the longer and more complicated the pipelines get, especially depending on what sort of terrain/geography they have to go through.

The existing heavy pipeline network between Russia and Europe, for what it was worth, was not built by Russia know how, it was largely built by Western engineers. All of these major Euro/Russia pipelines were setup with joint ventures between European fossil fuel firms and various Russian quasi-state entities, with the vast majority of the technology, engineering etc being done by Westerners.

Russia launches people into space and builds nuclear bombs, so obviously it does have the ability to build gas pipelines. But there is more to it than just "can they theoretically do this", it's still a matter of how many experienced, trained engineers and technical staff do they have, how fast can they make more of them, all the various complex equipment that goes into a modern pipeline--how much of that can be acquired as easily in Russia in face of sanctions etc etc.

On a longer time span things look even bleaker. China views energy strategically, unlike the United States which has a large political faction desperate to prop up fossil fuels forever, China is not a country that is particularly fossil fuel rich given its vast needs for energy. This is a major strategic weakness for China, and China wants to solve it. There has been massive investment by the Chinese into diversifying away from fossil fuels--in fact I think by some measures China has been building out more renewable technology in raw numbers, than any other country on earth. I think China's renewable energy generation has multiplied something like 90 fold in the last 10 years, and their current 5 year plan calls for even more aggressive build out.

This isn't really that complicated--most petro economies have at least some recognition this is not a permanent situation, the time to make hay on petro resources is now, and it is not expected to last forever. There is a reason all of the Arabian petrostates are desperately (and with fits and starts, often unsuccessfully) trying to prop up domestic industries that aren't related to extraction of fossil fuels. Russia is terribly positioned for this changing economy.

In Putin's lifetime, it's not a problem. He will be long dead before the petrostate model becomes non-viable, but the dream of rebuilding the Russian Empire is multi-generational, and being able to continue that post-Putin, and not only that--just avoid losing even more ground as it gets harder to control various entities like Kazakhstan / Belarus etc on a longer time scale, Russia can't afford to be economically backwards, and Putin has more or less guaranteed they will be for a generation and only a strong leader willing to find a new direction could fix it.

[Admiral Yi]

It doesn't matter too much? Who are they competing against - Iran, Saudi, Venezuela, the Gulf monarchies?

I can't think of a time since the 73 embargo that SA and the Gulf have been unreliable suppliers.