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DAILY ENERGY NEWS | 07/12/2022

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Too bad Elmer Fudd isn't in charge of the wind...

Bloomberg (7/11/22) reports: "Wind power -- a key source of electricity in Texas -- is being sidelined just when the Lone Star State needs it most, with turbines generating less than a 10th of what they’re capable of. A scorching heat wave is pushing the Texas grid to the brink. Power demand is surging as people crank up air conditioners. But meanwhile, wind speeds have fallen to extremely low levels, and that means the state’s fleet of turbines is at just 8% of their potential output. Texas may be America’s oil and gas hub, but it’s also long been the country’s biggest wind-power state. The renewable energy source has become highly politicized: Some critics blamed frozen wind turbines for the Texas grid’s failure during a deadly winter storm last year, even though disruptions at plants powered by natural gas were the bigger culprit. Texas grid operators had accurately forecast that wind output would be low Monday, yet it points to a broader struggle facing the world as it transitions to cleaner energy sources. While countries across the globe are generating more electricity from intermittent wind and solar sources, large-scale, battery storage is still in its ascendancy. That leaves major grids more fragile and vulnerable to shock. Depressed wind power during heat waves isn’t a new phenomenon. Powerful high-pressure systems that cause intense heat often squelch wind production -- just when more power is needed to meet higher electricity demand."

"After more than a decade of forcing unreliable wind and solar on the grid, reliable generation has been forced off the grid because of low margins and unavailable financing. Gas-fired and coal-fired units have been prematurely retired, new capacity has not been added, and surviving capacity has been poorly maintained. It is a triple Atlas Shrugged."

– Robert L. Bradley, Jr.,
Master Resource

You can't help people who refuse to help themselves.

Wall Street Journal (7/11/22) editorial: "Europe’s climate obsessions have led to an energy crisis, and who would have thought the Germans would choose to make it worse. That’s what happened last Thursday when the Bundestag voted to shut down the country’s remaining nuclear power plants by the end of the year. Lawmakers, mainly from the Social Democratic and Green parties in the ruling coalition, nixed an effort to extend the lives of three nuclear reactors. Those are the last three standing after former Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision in 2011 to phase out nuclear power. Killing them has become an article of faith for Germany’s eco-left even as Ms. Merkel’s center-right Christian Democratic Party (CDU) has thought better of the policy after her retirement. The CDU sponsored the pro-nuclear resolution that was defeated 249-393. This is the same Germany that’s in the grip of an energy crisis threatening to cripple Europe’s largest economy this winter. The paramount challenge is replacing energy imports from Russia, which supplied more than half of the natural gas Germany consumed before Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Berlin is belatedly discovering that dependence on its own unreliable renewable energy and Russia for fossil fuels is a strategic vulnerability. As if to emphasize the point, Nord Stream 1, Russia’s direct gas pipeline to Germany, shut down for 'maintenance' on Monday, or so owner Gazprom says."

You don't get your "great reset" without a few broken eggs...and a global famine...and widespread energy shortages...and massive social unrest...

Forbes (6/10/22) column "The nation of Sri Lanka has an almost perfect ESG rating of 98.1 on a scale of 100, according to WorldEconomics.com. But the government which had forced the nation to achieve that virtue-signaling target in recent years collapsed over the weekend because it led the country into self-declared bankruptcy, leaving it unable to purchase adequate supplies of fuel and feed its population. Thousands of angry Sri Lankans stormed the presidential residence on Saturday, forcing President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to step down and reportedly flee the country. Should current trends in global energy supplies continue, Sri Lanka could end up being just a harbinger of larger things to come around the rest of the world in the months and years ahead. Somewhat ironically, an analysis of the full ESG rankings linked above shows that many of the nations with the highest scores are developing nations with the highest degrees of famine risk. Haiti, as an example, has an ESG score of 99, while the well-fed United States stands far down the list at just over 58. Frans Timmermans, Vice President of the European Commission, seems to understand the reality his own continent faces should it be left without adequate energy supplies this coming winter. Last week, Timmermans urged EU and national leaders to make efforts to beef up their fossil fuel energy supplies and delivery systems in the near term in order to try to head off disaster. 'If our society descends into very, very strong conflict and strife because there is no energy, we’re certainly not going to make our [climate] goals,' he said, adding 'we need to make sure people are not in the cold in the coming winter.'"

ICYMI: High gas prices are a deliberate choice being made by the Biden administration.

Epoch Times (6/15/22) op-ed: "President Joe Biden is a real pain in the pump. Yet you’ve probably heard Biden say it seemingly 100 times: 'I’m doing everything I can to bring down gas prices.' Sure you are, Joe. When you came into office, the prices at the pump averaged $2.49 per gallon, and now we’re at $5 nationally in mid-June. So whatever you’re doing to bring down gas prices clearly isn’t working. Yet the media does everything it can to cover for him...But this is a big lie. The Biden administration and the climate-change fanatics want high gas prices so people will use less of it. They would be overjoyed if gas were $100 per gallon because nobody would fill their tank with it...Far from trying to bring gas prices down, nearly every Biden administration policy has been designed to make it more expensive. My friends at the indispensable American Energy Alliance have identified—count ’em—'100 initiatives' enacted by Biden to restrict U.S. oil and gas development. These range from canceling pipelines to taking hundreds of thousands of prime drilling lands offline to enacting environmental regulations that make drilling prohibitively expensive. Would you invest in oil and gas with this president in office? The media has conveniently forgotten the last presidential debate, when Biden admitted to Donald Trump that he would want to 'close down' oil production 'because the oil industry pollutes'”"

Energy Markets

WTI Crude Oil: ↓ $99.46
Natural Gas: ↑ $6.59
Gasoline: ↓ $4.65

Diesel: ↓ $5.62
Heating Oil: ↓ $369.31
Brent Crude Oil: ↓ $102.66
US Rig Count: ↓ 815

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