[aluminum96]

> The EU will need to dramatically reduce energy dependence on Russia after this

This has been clear for quite some time now, but Germany chose to move in the opposite direction by shutting down its nuclear plants. As long as Russian energy remains cheap, I expect that that Central Europeans will continue to vote with their wallets after the current crisis blows over.

[skybrian]

Perhaps they have adjusted their plans a bit:

Germany to push ahead with two LNG terminals to reduce Russian gas dependence: Scholz https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-ne...

[aluminum96]

That’s pretty encouraging news if they follow through with it.

Things are changing these last few days faster than I can keep up; perhaps this actually will be a historical inflection point.

[kragen]

That's an impressive vote of confidence that the war won't spread beyond Ukraine: an LNG terminal is really not at all the kind of thing you want to have around in a war.

[adrianN]

A major use for Russian gas in Germany is heating. Nuclear power doesn't really help with that. The second important use is in peaker plants that go online when there is no wind. Nuclear doesn't really help with that either.

[PixyMisa]

Electric heating is a thing that exists. With heat pumps it's quite efficient too.

Switching wholesale from existing gas heating is not a trivial exercise though.

[adrianN]

Sure heat pumps are the future. But it will take decades to replace existing heating systems with heat pumps. We still install hundreds of brand new gas heaters every day in Germany.

[paganel]

It may exist somewhere (especially in France, if I'm not mistaken), but it doesn't exist in all of our (I'm European) houses. Good thing that spring is coming but I don't see our houses getting converted to electric heating till next winter comes. Or maybe the hope is that Putin will fall by then or that a nuclear winter will make all these concerns obsolete, anyway.

[hef19898]

Shutting down nuclear power plants affects electricity, if memory serves well Russian gas is used mainly for heating. The USSR delivered said gas reliably all the time during the Cold War. And Germany built a LPG terminal at the North Sea for US fracking gas. Guess why the current and last US administration was so oppossed to North Stream 2?

[Gareth321]

The reason Germany so heavily relies on gas for heating is the relative cost of LPG vs electricity for heating. If electricity were cheap and plentiful, new builds and renovations would be using heat pumps. Because of Germany's insistence on closing nuclear plants, electricity is not cheap and plentiful.

Given their recent about-face on several key positions, I am hopeful that they revisit their position on nuclear. Renewables should of course be prioritised, but until mass storage becomes realistic, reliable electricity generation needs to be available. Now that it is clear that Russia cannot be trusted as a reliable source of cheap energy, I hope Germany takes energy independence much more seriously.

[hef19898]

Even before we closed down our nuclear plants, Germans heated mainly with gas. Electric heating was a thing for a while, it was basically phased out over 30 years ago. The other alternative is oil. Replacing for 80+ million people is a gargantuan task. One you don't start unless there are issues with gas, and there were none so far. Not even now I'd say, except pricing.

[Gareth321]

>Even before we closed down our nuclear plants, Germans heated mainly with gas.

Because electricity was not cheap and plentiful. There are three plants still in operation in Germany, with 10 having closed in the last decade. France has 56 currently in operation, with more planned. This is not a problem which occurred overnight for Germany. They've been focusing on LPG for heating for decades. They made the wrong call; in large part because of the polling for German citizens. Most are against nuclear electricity generation.

[hef19898]

So minus ten nuclear plants in ten years vs. gas heating since the 60s (?). Guess what migjt be the real reason. And even France is more and more getting of electrocity for direct heating. Heat pumps are rather new tech in the context of this discussion.

[AtlasBarfed]

All I track is EROEI / LCOE of alt energy in the US. Is Russia able to undercut solar/wind economics in eastern europe?

The economics for migrating from Russian sources is already there. You're already losing money with coal plants, and natural gas will soon be more expensive to keep running than replace. Storage/level generation is a secondary concern, but as stated the extant nuke plants coudl do that.

[kragen]

It isn't able to undercut it, no, but it's able to supply the energy now, while transitioning to wind and solar is going to take about 8 years, maybe longer in places like Estonia.

[beberlei]

This is the important point, no matter how much we push, 100% renewable is still many years away.

[kragen]

100% will probably never arrive, but >50% renewable is about six years away. Denmark's almost there now, but their transport system is still almost all fossil fuel.

[ephbit]

It's always the diesel powered trucks.

Will they be replaced by battery powered electric ones? I don't think so.

What then? LNG-powered trucks?

Methanol fuelcell powered?

[kragen]

For long-haul land shipping, the simple solutions are electric trains or Fischer–Tropsch-powered diesel trucks. Maybe methanol-powered trucks or CNG-powered trucks can beat those (not LNG obviously!) but it's going to be an uphill battle.

For short-distance delivery, battery-powered electric trucks probably work fine—battery-powered forklifts have been common inside factories since well into the previous millennium, EVs' regenerative braking dramatically improves energy efficiency in city driving, the high peak power density and rapid slew rate that was such a selling point for the Tesla Roadster is another big plus over diesel, and if necessary fleet organizations can swap batteries daily in ways that would be unacceptably risky for Teamster OOs who could get stuck with a dud battery.

For fast shipping, Fischer–Tropsch Jet A-1.

Sea shipping is a somewhat tougher problem; obviously it's feasible to do with 99% renewable energy, as it was for all of human history until 250 years ago, but today's depreciation rates, geographical specialization and long multinational supply chains, and JIT practices strongly incentivize the much higher power densities of modern shipping. And the cost premium for Fischer–Tropsch diesel over modern bunker fuel is much larger than what truckers and diesel locomotives face.

Fortunately, though very dirty, sea shipping is a tiny fraction of the overall energy mix.