Putin’s fossil fuel led invasion of Ukraine hurts everyone

William P. Hall on March 8, 2022

Big Oil in the US hopes to pump a lot more oil for the EU to burn while the EU works to expand renewables

Inside Climate News explores what Russia’s oil and gas industries might have to do with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and how this involvement may affect people around the world and their industries and governments — especially where action on the climate emergency is concerned.

Putin’s war machine is fueled by Russian oil and gas. He turns the money from selling these resources into a powerful military capability to project his ego across the world. As did Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Muammar Qaddafi in Libya.

The oil and gas industry makes up as much as one-fifth of Russia’s Gross Domestic Product, which is relatively small, less than half the size of the GDP of the United Kingdom, even though it has more than double the population. Oil and gas accounts for 60 percent of the nation’s exports and 30 percent of federal budget revenue, giving Putin a large pot of money for which he is not accountable to citizen taxpayers.

From the article:

A convoy of Russian military vehicles is seen as the vehicles move towards border in Donbas region of eastern Ukraine on Feb. 23, 2022 in Russian border city Rostov. Credit: Stringer/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images via Inside Climate News

by Marianne Lavelle 06/03/2022, in Inside Climate News

Whatever His Motives, Putin’s War in Ukraine Is Fueled by Oil and Gas: The U.S. oil industry is hoping to fill the immediate void with increased oil and gas exports, while the EU moves in the longer term to replace Russian gas with renewable energy

In addition to the immediate events of driving fuel prices through the roof, the US petrochemical industry is taking advantage of the situation to expand their export infrastructure in hopes to lock in future supply contracts (and the associated carbon emissions) for years to come. Putin has done them a great favor by creating marvelous new opportunities for their businesses.

As explained in the article Putin’s War has a range of other effects on the American fossil fuel industry. What is not discussed in this article, is that the war is also providing additional incentives to replace fossil fuel power generation with renewable energy resources.

Rather than subsidizing still further expansion of the carbon emissions that are killing Earth’s biosphere, we should take advantage of the price differential between the increasingly costly production and transport of fossil fuels with the rapidly reducing costs of harvesting freely available renewable energy resources to totally eliminate requirements for burning fossil carbon.

Australian prime minister Scott Morrison has committed to mining coal, saying developing economies need Australian coal to grow, after a major report found Australia must keep 95% of its coal reserves in the ground to keep global heating below 1.5C. ‘We will keep mining the resources that we’re able to sell on the world market.’ [Presumably this also applies to gas in the “gas led recovery”.] Though he added: ‘We obviously anticipate that over time world demand for these things may be declining’. Morrison was also asked about news the British government gave up demands Australia make emissions cuts as part of its trade deal.’Well, it was about trade. It wasn’t a climate agreement,’ he said. / Guardian Australia 09/09/2022

To do this most effectively we need to replace our puppet governments and their fellow travelers working for the benefit of fossil fuel industries by electing intelligent and ethical people who are publicly committed to putting action against the climate crisis as their number one priority in Parliament. Vote Climate One’s Traffic Light Voting System is designed to provide you with information about candidates you can use to help you determine your preferences and quickly apply then on your ballot paper when you vote.

Featured image: Russian military weapons destroyed and seized by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. / Uploaded a work by Міністерство внутрішніх справ України from https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=324376199718036&set=pcb.324376259718030 / licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license / Attribution: Mvs.gov.ua

Views expressed in this post are those of its author(s), not necessarily all Vote Climate One members.

Western fossil fuel industry helps to power autocrats

William P. Hall on March 7, 2022

After a long history of helping Putin, the Western oil giants are only now leaving Russia. Perversely this may benefit China.

Thanks to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, several fossil fuel giants are severing long-standing relationships with Russia and its oligarchs, which would seem to put the brakes on the further growth of fossil fuel production in Russia. Foreign Policy reviews the sordid history of these these and similar associations in the past, and considers their likely impacts on the climate emergency, autocrats and their oligarchs, and the fossil fuel special interests.

For example, BP has owned 19.75% of Russia’s Rosneft, supplier of the fuel being used to invade the Ukraine. It’s divestment only executed after the invasion started, has knocked the bottom out of the Russian oil market and may delay key development projects. It should stop financing and technology transfers Rosneft needs for its future growth.

Despite people being shocked by BP’s Russian involvement, Foreign Policy notes that this goes back to before 2014 when Russia invaded and annexed the Crimea – and was clearly favorable to BP’s bottom line – let alone Putin and his cronies.

In fact, Western oil companies often partner with autocratic, corrupt and repressive governments, e.g., in Africa, Arabia, and in the Americas to the detriment of almost everyone else as described in the Foreign Policy article:

Working pumpjacks are seen in the Montebello Oil Field in Montebello, California, on February 23, 2022. FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images / via FP

by Alexandra Gillies, 04/03/2022 in Foreign Policy

How to Stop Oil Companies From Propping Up Kleptocrats: The industry’s belated withdrawal from Russia is a welcome move, but energy giants could do more to avoid bolstering corrupt and repressive regimes.

The profits from these associations, make big oil even more powerful and damaging to the environment than they would otherwise be. One wonders how much Big Oil has contributed to the Australian COALition Government’s love and support of the fossil fuel industry in our country? The political context and implications are crystal clear.

For years as Scotty says below in his own words, our LNP COALition puppet Government has been supporting the mindlessly greedy fossil fuel special interests in preference to ordinary people. Both the industry and the puppets work first, to deny the science that shows us the world is warming at an accelerating rate from the continued burning of fossil carbon; and secondly, to fill our thought space with endlessly distracting humbug and blather so we won’t pay attention to what they are doing. Burning fossil fuel clearly comes first before acting on the climate emergency!

Do something about this. Vote Climate One! our Traffic Light Voting System will help you easily use our preferential voting system.

Featured image: oil refinery plant Yaroslavnefteorgsintez in Yaroslavl town, Russia. Русский: нефтеперерабатывающий завод, вечер / https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en / via Wikimedia Commons / Author Svtk44

Views expressed in this post are those of its author(s), not necessarily all Vote Climate One members.

Ukraine war makes zero emissions nuclear power attractive

William P. Hall on March 7, 2022

CNBC sees possible rosy lining to the colliding black clouds of the Ukrainian War and attacks on nuclear power stations

The Canadian broadcaster, CNBC reviews progress of the nuclear power industry as a zero emissions supplier of energy in the context of the accelerating growth of the climate emergency driven by the greenhouse gas emissions of the fossil fuel industry.

Presently around 10% of the world’s electricity is produced by some 440 nuclear reactors with 55 more under construction. Almost all of these are products of China and Russia — and are pressurized water reactors that are a lot safer to operate than was the case for the unstable RBMK Reactor at Chernobyl that exploded under bad management.

Encouraged in the US by the Biden Government’s Infrastructure bill, nuclear energy projects are rapidly ramping up as driven by climate change concerns. This seems to be especially true in states with dying coal economies. There also seems to be substantial interest in developing inherently safe(r) modular reactor technology.

The Ukrainian War is adding impetus for ramping up nuclear power generation in the West as Russian aggression has disqualified the country both as a supplier of fossil fuels and of nuclear technologies. The US is also seeing the need to outdo the Chinese marketing of its nuclear technologies.

The CNBC article provides more details.

The Vogtle Unit 3 and 4 site, being constructed by primary contractor Westinghouse, a business unit of Toshiba, near Waynesboro, Georgia, is seen in an aerial photo taken February 2017.
Georgia Power | Reuters

by Catherine Clifford, 0f/03/2022 in CNBC/Clean Energy

How the war in Ukraine and climate change are shaping the nuclear industry: The future of the nuclear power industry is being pushed on both by climate change and security fears stoked by Russia invading Ukraine and targeting the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.

Featured image: Fuqing Nuclear Power Station a 6000MW CPR and Hualong one plant / CMG, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Source: http://www.fujian.gov.cn/english/news/202201/120220104_5806821.htm / Author: CMG

Views expressed in this post are those of its author(s), not necessarily all Vote Climate One members.