Ask HN: Why can't Germany just go cold turkey and turn off Russian Gas?
I picked up this comment from a HN user in another thread but it got no traction, seeing Germany drag it's feet on sending arms and Zelensky's recent comments about blood money I think it's especially relevant... "seeing as we're heading into spring, seeing Germany has quite a wealthy economy and QOL, that many if not most workers get 5 weeks of holiday, the chip shortage is leading to slowdowns in the automotive industry etc... why doesn't the government just go cold turkey, give people a month or 2 free holidays while drastically reducing public lighting, telling businesses to stop heating their premises at night etc etc... I mean we had a dress rehearsal 2 years ago with the onset of Covid, this would be better ,for a good cause, probably give a boost to domestic spending and send a f...U to the rest of the world saying we too can think outside of the box :-)"
I know it may seem naive, but how so? The best part around the comments, that they are written by people not involved or linked to Germany at all. I as a German, ask you to go cold on your heating and kill your industry - but don't tell people what to do -> at all -< Why Germany? Why not the Austrians? I did not want to suggest "ask you to go cold on your heating and kill your industry " ...maybe you're overreacting.... I suggested giving Germans some time out to extend their Easter celebrations... why not italy or austria or Switzerland? someone needs to show the way and Germany has a wealthy economy with gas reserves that would last apparently at current consumption rates till the summer so who knows how long they could last in reality...... but as one young man remarked when I met him in 2019 in Hamburg on a Saturday among 100 000 other demonstrators wanting the government to do something about climate change... Germans don't really want change, they're too comfortable... I think that goes for much of the western world, covid was an opportunity , this war is one too, for us to rethink our economics into terms more caring and sharing rather than people being run around like well paid slaves by companies whose end effect is? producing more ICE cars, fertilizers for the wheat/meat industry (Fast food Nation is an enlightening book-film as is Demain or Tomorrow a french film...) I'm sorry if I hurt your patriotism, but I do appreciate very much your and the other comments contributing to helping me flesh out an idea.. as one commentator mentioned rebuilding Ukraine...and helping break Putin's teeth on the Ukrainian rock go hand in hand... You're warmly welcome.
It's not about patriotism - which is also the very reason for conflicts of the times. It's just, that one should not rely upon the health of others. Germany realized that a long time ago. Did a lot to curb up their economical Situation and doing some serious reforms. Also, the whole people think in terms like "we're a social democracy". Other EU-members, like the Southerns, they did not realize that. Actually, they see Europe as a Money-Transfer-mechanism and are not willing to change anything at all. They get the eu-money and make "presents" for their voters. Of course it's the same in Germany and may be everywhere around the world - there need to be done some reforms in terms to set the railings of the future. So you may see, that the wealth of Germany is something not falling from the sky, but rather is a result of people's work hours. Germans do care. They "care" for all the members of the EU.
They already gave a lot of more of money. More than others in the EU. Poland and Germany take the biggest amount of refuges (with the latter, Poland, the biggest amount). One also needs to understand that there is no "one has to start". It's already like that . Everyone is already paying a toll. The political decisions made, the sanctions - all that will cost us trillions. We're moving out of the tubed gas (energetically: stupid).
We're accepting the whole self-cutting.. So, actually, what is actually expected from Germany? To give heavy artillery? Tanks? Soldiers? LoL. After the second world war Germany has been demilitarized by the block-forces. That laws didn't change since then. We're not having big army. We can develop weapons and sell them. Ukraine got something like 1 billion from Germans with the words "we can't give you. But you can buy with that money what ever you need" So ... They help. They suffering, too. What about the U.S. should pay Europe money, because the whole war wouldn't even have started without the U.S. keeping promising (and deliver) help? If Ukraine would know some other big players wouldn't help in conflict with the "big enemy", it would not come to such escalation at all. So, why should everyone pay, deliver, kill contracts and kill their economy, when there is a clear misbehaving of the bigger politics? And why it have to be the Germans? :)
This is kind of "you have, me not, you help, I watch" Political discussion is very necessary here. Thank you very much for the discussion, and, truly, don't be sorry for hurting one's patriotism. If one is hurted soo much by (sometimes very true words) - that's not the guy who's gonna change anything in the world. Cheers from Germany Atm I don't know how to answer, history itself is writing on the wall, I just came across Charlie Chaplin's last speech from the dictator and think it quite relevant "I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an emperor. That’s not my business. I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone - if possible - Jew, Gentile - black man - white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness - not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost… The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men - cries out for universal brotherhood - for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world - millions of despairing men, women, and little children - victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say - do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed - the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish… Soldiers! don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural! Soldiers! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the 17th Chapter of St Luke it is written: “the Kingdom of God is within man” - not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people have the power - the power to create machines. The power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then - in the name of democracy - let us use that power - let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world - a decent world that will give men a chance to work - that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfil that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people! Now let us fight to fulfil that promise! Let us fight to free the world - to do away with national barriers - to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness. Soldiers! in the name of democracy, let us all unite!" Nice! Good say! 32% of their gas power comes from Russian gas. Covids economic shock would be nothing by comparison. French nukes running 24/7 could not make up the shortfall, there would be more than a small% contraction in the economy. Probably, technically a recession would follow. Aside from electricity manufacturing is a direct consumer, gas is feedstock for fertiliser, powers kilns and bakeries and heaps of industry directly. They could. Some argue they should. But they won't. I'm thousands of km away, I wish they would but I don't have to suffer the consequences in terms of unemployment, economic damage, and loss of life and livelihood. The immediate ramifications of shutting off Russian gas would be akin to 1920’s depression. And German economy going to shit means the rest of Europe and Euro itself tanking. There are other sources of power and gas... Biden said he will 'surge' supplies to Europe... in the medium term they can just write russia out of the equation and stop bankrolling the war. They have to recommission gas handling facilities, industrial plant takes months to bring back from mothballing and worldwide gas consumption is longterm contracts. Even just hiring a gas tanker takes months. If they declare force majure and seized a boat to ship now, there would be hell to pay for some other consumer. They decided to shut down two nuclear power plants, then reversed the decision due to putin's war. So they can make big inroads into their static gas consumption by rolling with that and shutting down some or all of their gas power stations instead... it seems they have options to trim their usage to the point they can prepare for winter without funding their own security threat. Two days ago on MR: “ That’s why the six nuclear reactors that were operating in Germany in 2021 generated 80% as much power as all the gas power plants…” https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2022/04/ge... They have to balance the certainty of russian blackmail over supply with the short and medium-term cost. Only 20% of electricity generation in germany is from gas, even though russia supplies around half that, it's not going to be armageddon. Gas from other sources will take up the slack in the medium term. In the short term gas-specific consumers will have some problems. Not sure about exact numbers, but only minority of gas is used to produce electricity. Most of gas is used directly and it is difficult to replace at this scale. All gas worldwide is on multi year forward contract as is the tankers. They have to bring industrial plant back from mothballing at ports, there is no gas inside of 3-4 months and possibly longer. When all is over it is only fair that Germans will be the ones who will rebuild Ukraine. This shall put things into perspective about the costs, consequences and responsibilities. It's not that they should enjoy the pleasures of cheap oil for free. Where are you from?
Germany won't pay a buck. That's not the war we started and not the war we prolonged. Why don't you pay for everything? That is not the war Germany started but the war Germany plays a significant role. You are so great guys in creating things but here in UA there are some claims that Germany created a warlord Putin... Btw Germany is significantly more northern then we and I think at least they need more gas for heating than we. Would be nice if Germany finds a powerful source of electricity for burning less gas at least for that. This are the claims. Also there are claims that Ukraina created the warlord Putin by doin everything not to stop the start of this war.. depends on the sources one consume. Stealing gas and not wanting to pay for several times in 2004-2008, and more like that. Also, keeping pushing the front lines since 2014, each time advancing more and more and pushing the separatists back, until Putin started the war on other reasons and using his "we save that people" on the forehand, while seeing a different agenda on the backhand. That never ever is a justification of the happenings, but one should consider that both fighting parties are not as clean as they pretend to be, with one being dirtier than the other. If I were in the position, I would try to settle the whole thing down as early as possible in the interest of my people and not try to fight back. Just a few kilometers² of area and very few losses in trade to chances to be a gatekeeper to Europe, less damage/costs, everything being able to operate further.. what would you choose? The Ukraine and Ukrainian people will get as much can be given. Germany was a part of the befriending project in former times and it will be playing the same part in future - it's up to Ukraine to rethink the whole situation. They lost so much. The help, that Ukraine needs from other countries in near future, can't be taken only by a few countries. As one of the wealthiest countries, Germany will be the one who gives the most in Europe. If we cut gas at once, I don't think there will be any money left for helping then. We've twice as much people and the last 20 years opened up the rich-poor-scissors even more. The people wouldn't understand such a decision - the government is forced to walk on a line here.
And yes, the pressure is big enough to minimize gas from RF. and truly, I don't believe it would help anything. We can't cut buying resources from RF. Its not possible. The whole industry has just transformed to EV and stopped/stopping production of NEV. We need what they sell. As long there are no alternatives, I'm sorry, so long there are no alternatives. Nevertheless. I hope it's a bad dream. The vast majority of power usage comes from Industry, not people in their homes, or office lighting left on overnight Cold turkey would be a literal disaster. They can't because Merkel and co led them down this path of increased dependency on Russian natural gas to replace nuclear and coal. They have massively beefed up intermittent / renewable sources, but that cannot replace the nuclear and coal. For that, you need natural gas. Germany already has very high energy prices to pay for this transition. They would have to increase prices even more to back out of this failed bet on Putin. They just turned off 3 nukes in Dec, which could be turned back on. That plus the 3 they will turn off this year constitute 13% of their base load power. To make up for this with gas, they will need a 30% increase in gas capacity from Putin. It's not like they weren't warned that this was a bad bet years ago. In fact, when it became known that Merkel was hell bent on turning off the nukes and depending on Putin, the US offered to put together a different deal to get natural gas from elsewhere (Mediterranean, S America, US), but Merkel turned it down in favor of Putin. At this point 'cold turkey' would be like quitting cigarettes because you have stage 4 lung cancer. Germany is not special. Every Western country is addicted to fossil fuels, because our economic system is built on unsustainable consumption. We have known for (at least) a generation that we must stop burning fossil fuels to prevent catastrophic climate change. If the system can't manage that, then I am not surprised that it can't turn off Russian gas to prevent genocide. We could easily reduce our energy requirements (enough to defund Russia, but it's too late on the climate front!) by simply doing less non-essential stuff. Invest in local food security, health care, sustainable housing, and renewable energy ... and starve everything else. ... but since responsible, managed economic degrowth is capitalist heresy, here we are, paying Russia to holocaust* their neighbours while we burn their gas and seal our fate. (*I first heard 'holocaust' used as a verb by Vitali Klitschko. This guy Englishes.)