What do we learn from having our own energy policy? Being reliant on other countries, some of whom are run by very bad dudes, is a self defeating policy for many industrialised democracies. America’s decline as a world power could be linked to it’s self flagellation at the altar of alternative energy. When you elect your leaders at the ballot box, there are various obligations, to put it mildly, that they are committed to ensuring remain intact. These include control of your borders, law and order, an independent judiciary, a defence force capable of defending it’s country from malevolent outside forces and to generally try to improve the lot of the people in your respective country.
The problem is that the US and Europe have allowed themselves to be taken over by fanatics who worship at the altar green energy, to the exclusion of any other energy provider. So we have the height of insanity in the US when Biden closed down the Keystone XL Pipeline project and declared a guerrilla war on oil explorers and drillers whilst continuing to utter the mantra that green energy is not just the way forward but is the only way to go at the exclusion of using your own abundant resources,
The net result of this insanity has been to drive up energy prices at the pump whilst trying to blame it on “Pootin” whilst ignoring that gas prices had already risen a dollar before the invasion of Ukraine.
Now we have a similar problem in Europe where the increasingly tarnished track record of Mutti, aka Angela Merkel has been exposed by Germany’s and many other European countries reliance on Russian energy. The Nord Stream 2 Pipeline has been closed down leading to energy shortages in one of the world’s largest export manufacturers following Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine. But fear not folks, some European countries continue to buy gas from Russia and to pay in roubles which funds their military spending. The EU continues to insist that they are doing everything they can to stop the war by issuing meaningless sanctions whilst funding Russia’s continuing ruthless occupation.
To cap it all, last weekend Germany and Austria decided to power their plants by using coal with Holland joining suit. The Greens in Germany must be having a collective heart attack.
The one bit of good news is that the world’s biggest polluter is also struggling.
Carbon dioxide emissions in China have sunk lower than those measured during the Covid-19 pandemic after continued lockdowns across the country, potentially signaling a major recession.
Eurasian nations have seen carbon emissions fall close to those of March 2020 which preceded the last recession, according to climate data company Kayrros which uses satellites to track greenhouse gases.
China’s emissions are lower than they were throughout 2021, when the majority of the world was in the grips of new Covid-19 variants, with CO2 levels hovering just above the time the pandemic first struck.
“High energy prices are stopping countries from growing their economies, said Kayrros.
So high energy prices create inflation which in turn cause higher rates and then recession. So one can only hope that the West has learnt something of the importance of having your own independent energy policy. Particularly those with their own abundant natural resources and the US and the UK stand out as two primary examples of counties which taken the wrong path as far as energy is concerned. So, it’s time for Geriartric Joe and Bonking Boris to get their acts together and resume their own independent energy policies which means licensing the resource companies to drill and frack to their hearts content.
Meanwhile in the real world, the stock market is inured to the plethora of doom and gloom and is progressing with a nice and calm rally. A fall in bond yields, crude prices and a rally in Bitcoin has been enough to provide markets with some short term relief. It’s just a question of how far the rally continues before the next inevitable down turn. Be careful out there.