"It seems clear that for us there are no other ways out than a decisive shift toward renewables, already today much cheaper than fossil fuels and capable of completely replacing them. Politicians have not yet understood this, but moving to renewables would protect us from new crises of energy availability and from blackmail by producers. But it's not something that can be done overnight."
Will that be soon enough for the Aluminium, steel and fertilizer plants that are currently idling and have fired 90% of their work force?
In NL we even have food packing companies shutting down production this winter for 6 weeks.
How many months/years of idling will it be before they go bankrupt or the owners decide to pull the plug?
Also I don't believe for a minute that natural gas production in the US supplying Europe was the driver for this war. If it was, wouldn't have the push from Russia been towards securing the path of their pipelines instead of the Crimean peninsula?
The driver was to prevent the possible rise of Russia. Had Nordstream 2 been allowed to come online. Russia would have reaped enormous benefits and its influence in Europe would have strengthened.
This was clearly not in the US’s geopolitical interest.
Renewable energy doesn't supply the chemical feed stocks that we currently obtain from fossil fuels. Those are essential to industrialized society and there are no cost-effective substitutes.
"It seems clear that for us there are no other ways out than a decisive shift toward renewables, already today much cheaper than fossil fuels and capable of completely replacing them. Politicians have not yet understood this, but moving to renewables would protect us from new crises of energy availability and from blackmail by producers. But it's not something that can be done overnight."