Energy companies cite Ukraine as prices increase

[ch33zw1z]

um, i am for being green, did you miss where i went all electric three years ago, updated my home and it just slightly raised my electric? actually saving money too, because not buying firewood, having to go cut it, and it is better for the environment. I have said it, i am in the middle, both sites are good and bad, didnt know caring about the environment was bad

Lol, I’m sure this is what you meant by the weird question.

 

[iRONic]

Uhh, you make up for it in the summer. 90 days above 90 in swamp ass humidity in summers. And when I was in Kentucky in 2015 it hit -17.

Nope, my ng & electic coop bills here beg to differ.

This home is 1400 sq feet. CT home was 1500 sq feet. Propane & Eversource electric in CT were insanely high in the winter.

I will admit this was the hottest and most expensive utility bills-wise summer for us in the five years we’ve been here. Still ~30% less than a CT winter!

 

[iRONic]

Could have put a bunch of solar and battery capacity on your house and then you wouldn’t have to live in Kentucky.

I’m going to pay for the 100% renewable option, won’t make that much of a difference to me with solar on my roof and heat pumps for HVAC.

Nope. I had my roof solar survey done back when fed/state rebates were high there. Too many trees. 😤

 

[dainthomas]

And a lot of oil companies flare the natural gas produced by oil wells that could otherwise be collected.

I was in the Persian Gulf when I was in the Navy, and it was never really dark at night. The horizon was lit in all directions with oil wells being flared. Even at the time it seemed super dumb and wasteful.

 

[iRONic]

And a lot of oil companies flare the natural gas produced by oil wells that could otherwise be collected.

I was in the Persian Gulf when I was in the Navy, and it was never really dark at night. The horizon was lit in all directions with oil wells being flared. Even at the time it seemed super dumb and wasteful.

I worked as a helicopter technician in the Gulf of Mexico on both oil production platforms, NG production platforms, and drilling platforms for both.

According to the operators of those rigs gas in an oil well is flared because the pressure is too high. Same during a drilling operation. Mud/grout is pumped down into the holes while they set casing. Too mich ng pressure in an oil well is no bueno.

There’s a member here who used to be a gas logging engineer. I wish I could remember their username…

 

[pmv]

seems like a thorough write up. Fwiw, if the hike on my end is as high as expected, my electric bill is going to be between 5-6K yearly, and oil for heat is about 2-3K yearly

I don't know that even that article fully explained the background.

The lack of gas storage here I suspect owes a lot to the privatisations. Just as the privatised water companies have failed to build sufficient reservoir capacity - there's really not much financial incentive for them to spend money on such facilities preparing for possible future supply issues -, that's the sort of strategic national-level issue that governments are supposed to worry about. But when you privatise everything and leave it to 'the markets' it doesn't seem to get done. In general, with the railways, the water companies, the power infrastructure, Thatcherism demonstrated a complete lack of strategic and long-term thinking.

Seems to me there's a contradiction between thinking the state is not competent to run industries directly, but at the same time believing it's competent enough to regulate and negotiate contracts with powerful wealthy multinational corporations. If it's not smart enough to do the first, why would it be any better at the second?

And our over-dependence on gas is partly due to the way the system was privatised. By separating the generators from the suppliers it created a rush to build new power plants as quickly and cheaply as possible, which created an incentive to turn to imported gas (as gas power-plants are quick to build and get running), leading to a shift to gas as our main source of power.

Then there was the traditional Tory hatred of the miners, that meant a turn away from coal (though, to be fair, the huge complication there is climate change, as coal produces more CO2 than natural gas..which is the reason why the Thatcher government actually kick-started much of the research into climate change in the first place when they set up the Hadley Centre).

Meanwhile the power companies are making record profits out of the war in Ukraine. And paying shockingly low levels of tax . (Not surprising when our PM couldn't, when he was Chancellor, even get his own billionaire wife to pay UK taxes.)

Shell and BP paid zero tax on North Sea gas and oil for three years

Firms defend paying no corporation tax after government handed out billions to energy giants

www.theguardian.com

Shell paid zero windfall tax in UK despite record global profits

Labour calls for ‘proper windfall tax’ on oil and gas while TUC describes profits as ‘obscene’

www.theguardian.com

James Meek · How We Happened to Sell Off Our Electricity · LRB 13 September 2012

Does it matter that the power Britain relies on to make the country glow and hum no longer belongs to Britain...

www.lrb.co.uk