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Tuco's Child's avatar

Yet another Euro Double-Down Energy Debacle.

Reminds me of the Biden Administration giving oil rich Angola our tax dollars for solar development.

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Mihail Stoyanov's avatar

Excellent take on the South African situation.

EU involvement is another green policy gimmick. Instead of offering a long-term solution to Eskom's infrastructure issues, the EU adds more instability in the grid with renewables.

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The Brawl Street Journal's avatar

thank you! an idea that could only come from a bureaucrat's table.

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Energy Diplomat's avatar

The EU is also looking to build green hydrogen export facilities (well, green ammonia) in Egypt which has similar power grid shortcomings that South Africa does. Can't make this nonsense up!

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The Brawl Street Journal's avatar

This also begs for fraud: Can’t wait for the revelation in a few years that gas-rich countries passed off gray ammonia as green to the EU.

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Patrick McGuire's avatar

The EU nonsense here reminds me of the phrase “you can’t polish a turd”. These people are detached from reality.

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EnergyShifts.net's avatar

Colonialism through debt mechanisms and slanted trade, not dissimilar to the Chinese model, probably worse.

All this highlights why EU will not say a word about 143 race laws in South Africa against the white population and why EU newspapers either completely ignore related issues in SA, or have "fact-checkers" debunk it:

https://factcheck.afp.com/doc.afp.com.36ZD7HY

Now contrast that with how European nations campaigned for sanctions against S.A. in the 80's and 90's. None of this had anything at all to do with easier access to South Africa's resources back then (of course) considering that when whites were in charge they actually used the resources to industrialise and develop the country to it's highest level ever (under apartheid ironically).

Now the country's in the process of de-industrialising (or rather being de-industrialised through climate policies whereby it must decommission its coal-fired power plants which has exacerbated power cuts but at the same time export its coal to Europe - see how that works?).

The country's once great rail network almost completely out of commission and it has some of the worst performing ports in the world due to mismanagement and neglect. Yet, this green miracle deal is going to save South Africa from its woes ... First of all it will never be able to repay the loans. Being a water scarce and electricity-scare country and considering how much water and electricity "green" hydrogen needs ... I think we can all imagine the problems that's going to cause as the water network is already failing in many municipalities, the city of Johannesburg being one of them.

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The Brawl Street Journal's avatar

Appreciate the perspective!

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EnergyShifts.net's avatar

Thanks for your excellent article!

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The Brawl Street Journal's avatar

🫡

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Crunchie1984's avatar

From an EU country that had been importing SA coal in recent times to support their own lack of energy.

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Silesianus's avatar

I find it absurd, where France is a pre-emininent nuclear power, but it doesn't make its technology a primary vehicle for European energy security, especially where the proposal to SA is offering something that isn't quite up to its needs. A good summary.

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The Brawl Street Journal's avatar

Thank you! The Koeberg plant was actually built

by France in the 80s.

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