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Europe is locking itself in to US LNG

(davekeating.substack.com)
151 points hunglee2 | 1 comments | 16 Sep 25 13:56 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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mytailorisrich ◴[16 Sep 25 14:06 UTC] No.45262444[source]▶
Another level of irony is that this is partly because Europe does not want to develop shale gas for environmental reasons, so it imports US LNG... which is mostly shale gas [1].

The US love Europe's policies...

[1] https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/surging-us-lng-expor...

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GuB-42 ◴[16 Sep 25 14:15 UTC] No.45262558[source]▶
Also, both Europe and the US are happy to have China do the dirty jobs so that they stay clean in their countries. With the consequences we all know today in terms of dependence.

Furthermore, China doesn't want to be dirty anymore, in fact they are maybe the ones who take green technologies the most seriously. So the dirtiest jobs are pushed to other countries, mostly in southeast Asia.

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llm_nerd ◴[16 Sep 25 14:22 UTC] No.45262639[source]▶
> Also, both Europe and the US are happy to have China do the dirty jobs so that they stay clean in their countries

Can you give examples? What "dirty jobs" is China, and now apparently other countries, being purportedly forced to do? So is Trump really an environmentalist when he levied massive tariffs on countries in the region?

No, when countries devastate their environment they do it on their own volition. China was disastrously dirty mostly due to domestic reasons like the absolute lack of pollution controls, coal burning, and so on. China introspected and decided that they wanted to be better than that (the Olympics might legitimately have been a major turning point) and have done an amazing job cleaning the country up, and many areas are now truly Western. Air quality is infinitely better...at the same time that the country is making more than ever for the rest of the world.

Other countries haven't got there yet. India, the Philippines and so on have only themselves to blame for the state of their country, however self-comforting the delusion that it's really outsiders that are to blame might be.

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1. altcognito ◴[16 Sep 25 14:40 UTC] No.45262921{3}[source]▶
There are no outsiders when it comes to pollution. We get one planet. That's it.

So, China is free to choose to pollute, as is Europe and the US free to choose production from a source that doesn't pollute as much.

Their electrical infrastructure that is built on coal (60% of current generation) even if they've made huge improvements. Rare earth mining and building of all those electrical batteries and solar panels is a pretty dirty business. Reality is China produces a colossal amount of stuff, and much of it is pretty dirty (it would probably be dirty anywhere as that's the nature of making things at an industrial scale)

Right now China seems headed in the right direction for pollution, moreso than the US. And probably the only way they end up reducing pollution completely is to grow wealthy enough to replace old methods.