I'd wager most Europeans are willing to sacrifice comforts.
I'm not aware of EU wide polling around this theme, but look at page 7 of the latest Infratest-Dimap survey[0] for example. A majority of Germans want an oil boycott, even if that is forecast to bring a -3% negative effect on German GDP. The only population subgroup with a clear majority against a boycott are AfD supporters.
> The only population subgroup with a clear majority against a boycott are AfD supporters.
Seriously, what is it with far right groups and Russophilia ? One would think they'd be against the menacing nationalistic foreign power. Like the various quislings, it's funny how they square their nationalism with cooperation with another people's nationalism against their own's.
Or maybe it's simpler and it's just a matter of money. It's well documented Le Pen was saved by Russian loans, who knows if AfD aren't also on Russian payroll.
> I haven't run my gas boiler in 30 days. No heating. No warm showers.
> Sadly most people I have suggested this to think I'm nuts.
there's probably thousands of times more gas used to produce all the commodities you buy and use in your everyday life. so this strategy of individualist 'sacrifice' (vs. systemic change) is merely a fart in the wind.
Exactly. Thank you for reusing cardboard while the airlines fly empty planes just to maintain their slots.
It makes you feel better for having a moral high ground, sure. Objectively it's not that big of a change, while systemic social changes take time. For the most people, it feels like not in their lifetime.
no, it's actually worthwhile. Studies for Germany said that reducing room temperature by 1 degree Celsius mean that 5-6% less gas would be used for that. Households account for like 43%[1] of gas consumption in Germany and within that it's 80% for heating and 20% for water heating; so we're talking about a few percent reduction in overall gas consumption just by heating a little less. German politicans are already asking (politely) that the citizens should do it.
[1]https://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/service/gasimporte-aus-rus... [sorry it's only for paying customers but there are the numbers]
Unfortunately they don’t go into any second order effects. In particular I’d be curious about how many hospitalizations it would take to zero out the advantage of reducing ~2% gas usage.
The problem we have right now is: we literally don’t know what the consequences of going cold turkey would be. It’s very likely, that creature comfort would be _completely_ unaffected.
The problem lies within the industry. And it’s unclear how elastic the demand there can even be. E.g. things like ceramic burners, it’s unclear whether you can reactivate them after you let them cool down or whether they’d burst. Same goes for nearly every intermediate stage in chemical processes and storages. It’s unclear if “pausing” production doesn’t also imply “rebuilding”.
And depending on the elasticity of the demand (which will probably be surprisingly high, since these companies are _extremely_ well motivated to find solutions to a problem they hadn’t had before) it’s unclear how much gas we need (both in storage and by implication still buying from Russia).
We now have best-case scenarios talking about ~6% GDP loss max. But that assume practically no second order effects and is based on GDP numbers. Ie i wouldn’t be surprised, if that requires gas to go where there simply is no pipeline.
As I said in the beginning: The problem is we don’t know how things are interconnected. Yes by all means: if you feel comfortable with a lower room temperature then lower your temp. But these 1-2% things… we don’t have 30 of those. And they are extremely costly in terms of political capital
> no, it's actually worthwhile. [...] Households account for like 43%[1] of gas consumption in Germany
no it isn't.
does Germany produce the smartphones its citizens use? does it mine the rare earth minerals inside those phones? to pretend that we originate from inside of imaginary lines on a map and therefore should only be concerned with national issues is false. our world is one whole and we are all children of the same tribe.
Global North capitalists hoard science, send commoditized 'intellectual property' recipes for black boxed hardware to the Global South, collect rents on those recipes while not physically producing anything themselves... all while plundering the resources and labor/life-energy of people in the Global South.
this is a dirty rentierist black-box technological hellworld through and through. causing ecological and social damage and externalizing responsibility/costs is the name of the game here.
adding this as a source these highlights from a recent paper (especially the last point is relevant to this convo):
• Rich countries rely on a large net appropriation of resources from the global South.
• Drain from the South is worth over $10 trillion per year, in Northern prices.
• The South’s losses outstrip their aid receipts by a factor of 30.
• Unequal exchange is a major driver of underdevelopment and global inequality.
• The impact of excess resource consumption in the North is offshored to the South.
40% of gas usage in Europe is domestic. I think that's not insignificant.
I agree my individual action is not very relevant but I think a widespread adoption of such measures would have an impact on political thinking in Europe. Obviously that hasn't happened.
You're overdramatizing. At worst, your 80-year old man would get double or triple the heating bill, then probably demand that to be paid from taxes via subsidies. And that is what people don't want.
Money doesn't create natural gas. If you shut down a pipeline bringing in some amount <x>, and you cannot find a new source to get that amount, somthing has to give, somewhere, you have to use less of the stuff.
You don't need natural gas for housing heating. Buy an electrical heater, pay "exorbitant" electricity bills, get electricity rerouted from other sources (you could still, like, import coal by sea if you don't like nuclear).
True, industrial users can't just start using something else instead of gas in their processes. And if they go out of business, that's production gone, supply chains gone, workplaces gone. Certainly not a good thing, but please – it's not elderly frozen to death by this Christmas.
Do electric heaters magically appear? You do know that stores don't stock enough electric heaters for an entire country to go out and buy them, right? An economic and manufacturing powerhouse like the US couldn't even deal with people buying extra toilet paper. What would happen if everyone in the EU all at once tried to buy electric heaters?
Electric heaters don't go down the sewer shortly after being turned on, and Europe is not embargoed to not be able to import some in the coming months. Surely, the price is going to jump up.
My point being, it's not about individual heaters and house heating. That would be a solvable problem – an expense. However, making that expense is a different thing, since now you'd gotta convince your citizens that they must – not should, but must pay up in taxes for that solution to be enacted. And why? Because some other country got invaded and that pro-o-o-obably might cause something bad in the future for your country.
The other side of the coin being that some things are harder to solve: you can't import on a short notice a replacement for, say, chemical plants that need gas and everything that's connected to them.
Maybe Americans or Libertarians don't want that, but average people do want that, Hungary's govt has been doing that for years and they have supermajority (70+%) in a free election. Subsidizing utilities is a populist way to get re-elected, but of course it's distorting the market and making everyone else look stupid.
Now in France Macron and Le Pen are looking to do the same as Hungary, handing out meal vouchers and subsidizing utilities. They are polling the voters and that's what the voters want.
Almost no one in Hungary is investing into renewables, since energy prices are frozen to 2017 levels (around a quarter of what it should be on the free market).
Why would that 80-year old man just not wear more clothes instead of freezing to death? Is the implication that he lacks the mental capacity to do so because of old age?
Does the old man just not own enough clothes? If so, why would gas prices be the problem instead of his lack of clothes?
From the Highlights section in your link: "In 2019, households represented 26% of final energy consumption, or 17% of gross inland energy consumption, in the EU".
So 74% of consumption is not households. What am I missing?
So, what are Americans suspending? After all, American expansionism is what got us into this mess.
That being said: the problem is not necessarily gas-powered heating. The problem is an industry that is hugely dependant on gas, and - specific Ural-originated gas (yes, the factories can be modified to accept gas with a different chemical composition, but that takes time and money).
Actually, it was Russia tearing up the Budapest memorandum, which has far greater future consequences, as now everyone knows if you don’t have nukes you will be attacked.
Putin is a paranoid tyrant who should be put down like a rabid wolf. Nobody should care what Putin thinks or wants. After he's gone let's see what shakes out.
Exactly this. NATO literally ignored Putin. We unfortunately found that the events a while ago were the straw that broke the camel's back. Putin is now angry, and ignoring what he thinks or wants turned out to be stupid.
> or wants.
I don't think not caring about the Ukraine situation is the right call either.
I'm not aware of EU wide polling around this theme, but look at page 7 of the latest Infratest-Dimap survey[0] for example. A majority of Germans want an oil boycott, even if that is forecast to bring a -3% negative effect on German GDP. The only population subgroup with a clear majority against a boycott are AfD supporters.
[0] https://www.infratest-dimap.de/fileadmin/user_upload/DT2204_...