Forecasters are Predicting a Cold Winter in Europe
Yesterday, Gazprom announced that one of the two lines comprising the Nord Stream 2 pipeline may still be operational. (Which, incidentally, slightly raises the probability that Russia was behind the sabotage.) Although Line B’s capacity is only a quarter of the total, turning it on could make a tangible difference to European energy prices.
However, this doesn’t seem very likely to happen. Europe has been planning more sanctions on Russia, not fewer – since the latter formally annexed four regions of Ukraine last week. So even if Gazprom can get Line B up and running this winter, Europeans will probably just have to take the pain.
How much pain? For months, analysts have been saying that it all depends on weather. Gas consumption is closely related to temperature because gas is the main source of fuel for domestic heating. Here’s a chart showing the relationship in France, taken from a recent academic paper.
As you can see, the two are extremely closely related; the correlation is on the order of r = –.95. And France isn’t some weird outlier: it’s the same for Italy, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Poland and the U.K. (Note: this only applies to distribution; the industry correlation is much lower in some of the other countries.)
“If we get a mild winter like last year,” Javier Blas noted back in August, “Europe may be able to weather the problem”. Though he added, “If it is cold in Japan, there is also trouble in Europe because it means that Europe is gonna have to compete with Japan for LNG supplies”.
So, will Europe get a mild winter? Unfortunately, it looks like we may not.
On Sunday, the FT reported that scientists at the ‘European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts’ are predicting a period of high pressure over Europe in November and December. This is likely not only to push down temperatures (increasing demand for gas), but also to bring less wind and rainfall (reducing supply from renewables).
As the Centre’s director Florence Rabier noted, “If we have this pattern then for the energy it is quite demanding”.
To add to Europe’s woes, gas demand actually rose during the continent’s first cold snap last week, which indicates that demand-reductions measures are not having their intended effect. Industrial consumption has declined, but that’s not due to voluntary demand reduction; it’s due to factories shutting down.
At this point, Europeans may simply have to hope the forecasters are wrong.
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This is a little bit too much in the mold of MSM fear porn for my tastes.
BTW I have purchased two electric blankets. One an under blanket for the bed. The other a throw for watching TV. They are remarkably effective for enabling you to turn the heat down a few degrees and are very cheap to run. They will certainly be paying for themselves this winter.
It wasn’t so long ago that the notion that the Russians could manipulate the weather was dismissed as fanciful, but research showed that most of the WW2 allies were.It’s what rockets were invented for…
Why then limit the use of such tech to Russians?
Are you saying they are the only ones dastardly enough to weaponize it?
Weather manipulation has been known to work for years. But as far as I understand it, it is called cloud seeding and relates to precipitation. It involves releasing small particles which are required for water to start condensing into rain droplets. I haven’t heard of any other forms of manipulation – which is not to say there are non.
It’s called Geo Engineering
https://www.geoengineeringwatch.org/the-dimming-full-length-climate-engineering-documentary/
And they work much better when there is electricity.
If they were cold fusion blankets you’d be on to something but seeing as they’re electric, you’ll sadly still be in the same hole punched boat as the rest of us.
You don’t seem to be aware the cost per night of an electric blanket (at last years prices) is 2p. So let’s say 4p this year. 4p * 150 cold nights (on a generous measure) = a whopping £6 per year per blanket.
Yeah great. Sounds awesome. I have no problem with your calculations or your inspired frugality but your electric blankets still run on electricity, which means they have a kind of notorious Achilles heel when it comes to blackouts.
And when the power is cut off?
I’ve bought an extra hot water bottle and a large flask which will be filled each day so that if the power is cut I have a litre of just-under-boiling-point water.
What a good idea, I think I might make enquiries. Lets hope the lights stay on.
If you were a gambler, you could try betting on it, perhaps, but statistically last Autumn and Winter were both warmer than the long term average. It would be quite normal for the next one to be colder overall. However, the other prospect could be that another bunch of scaremongers might be forecasting more avalanches, bankruptcy of certain branches of tourism and so on!
Its a very easy mindset to fall into. I found myself fretting over the fate of Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank yesterday, after reading a doom laden ‘the end is nigh’ clickbait headlined news article from the independent media. Only to realise I had taken leave of my senses and had stopped critically thinking. The moment I started interrogating the piece my mood changed and I felt better about life, but not the banks, or indeed the financial system as a whole.
Incidentally, this flight path information analysis increases the likelihood that Russia wasn’t behind the sabotage by far more than the info and suggestion you present here.
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2022/10/james-howard-kunstler/developing-developments/
https://www.monkeywerxus.com/blog/the-nord-stream-2-pipeline-sabotage
Has anyone else noticed the continuous mantra, from politicians, in the media, advertisements, organisations, how we are constantly urged to consume less?
Eat less food, use less water, use less electricity, use less gas, use the car less, buy fewer clothes, fewer air journeys, buy fewer new things.
Consumption is a measure of wealth because it is about fulfilling our wishes and desires which increases our marginal utility – which is why we have an economy – not merely meeting our needs for which we don’t need an economy. Animals meet their needs without an economy.
The more we consume the wealthier we are; the less, the poorer we are. See any poor Country and compare their consumption with ours. What makes a person rich, the amount they consume.
By telling us to consume less we are being told to make ourselves poorer. Why?
Furthermore we are being driven to consuming only what we need – in other words to the point where we won’t need an economy.
And that is because the rate at which our rulers are wrecking our society and ruining our economy, we won’t actually have an economy.
Very good points, well made
Of course most of this advice comes from rich, powerful people who consume a lot more than the average person and have no intention of cutting down, and from sanctimonious tossers who just think that stupid poor people should consume less of the things that they disapprove of but they don’t see surfing the internet as consumption (as we all know the internet and the cloud are made of fairy dust and powered by unicorn farts)
Yes, good points and well observed. We are effectively being groomed to have less and expect less. I don’t consume much anyway but I reserve the right for those that wish to consume more. It must be a choice. They are taking away our choices, bit by bit.
Coming soon to the UK? All owners of saunas and heated swimming pools must display a large S outside their property so that the local energy vigilante group know whom to target for tar’n’feathering and having their property Occupied by a punk rock band called The Greetuhs? (But you are let off if you can prove you are heating your property by organic, sun-dried, ethically-sourced, renewable wood-chips from United States forests.) OK, I jest. For now.
I have thought for a while that councils might, in the not too distant furure, introduce chimney wardens to go round looking for smoke (as the poor unfortunates inside burn a few sticks to keep warm), and issue fixed penalty notices for ‘polluting’; they could call them carbon wardens.
Shouldn’t joke about these things, they have a nasty habit of coming true
The carbon warden system has started in up-market Grunewald, Berlin. The vigilantes don’t glue themselves to the gated properties, but instead “arrange” pool-side parties open to all, regardless of the consent of the owner. Well, it gives all the mask-enforcing Karens who were exposed during 2020 some new purpose in life.
error! you forgot to qualify ‘forests’ with the phrase ‘never felled first growth’ !
But, but, but, global warming…?
Oh sorry, it’s climate change. My bad. Climate works in mysterious ways.
A bit like God. All powerful, loves us deeply, as demonstrated by all the splendour of the world. Although from time to time He will allow truly horrible things to happen. But that’s because God works in mysterious ways.
Climate change: the perilous increase in global temperatures. Except from time to time ice will grow, cold spells will continue to appear, because the changing climate is hard to understand and lead to “extreme” things. Like cold weather.
The part of ‘Climate Emergency’ that matters, is the ‘Emergency’ bit. The other word is interchangeable on the whim of the elite. Climate, Energy, Food, Sniffles. It doesn’t matter. The ‘Emergency’ word is there to let us know that it is ‘serious’ (it isn’t…), and we must accept radical change to escape it or fix it (we don’t).
“We have to do something and now. So gather yourself and we’ve all got to run in ‘that direction’ “. The only bit that is relevant is where ‘that’ direction leads us to.
Keep watching…once you see it, you can’t un-see it….
If circumstances get too uncomfortable for folk Winter could turn 🔥 Hot.
I honestly think we need this. We need the pampered woke eco-mob to freeze whilst experiencing dead laptops, dead phones, dead X-Boxes, dead e-scooters, dead spinach and lemongrass smoothie makers, dead almond milk fridges, dead vegan coconut Frappuccino machines.
These self-indulgent, self-regarding cake brained fuck heads need to be physically reminded exactly where the luxuries of their lives come from and be made to properly appreciate and cherish the energy sources that make their historically amazing standards of living possible.
I have a dream…
I pointed out to my son the other day that if we get power cuts the internet won’t work; the TV won’t work; the X-box won’t work …. basically nothing he uses to entertain himself in the evening will work. He’s an intelligent young man, but it really hadn’t occurred to him.
I take no comfort from the fact the the Met Office long term probability forecast is for warmer than average. Their computer has long been infected with covwarming virus
I honestly think we need this. We need the pampered woke eco-mob to freeze and experience dead laptops, dead phones, dead e-scooters, dead VW IDs, dead spinach and jackfruit smoothie makers, dead almond milk factories, dead vegan coconut Frappuccino machines, dead Technics turntables, dead e-cigarettes.
These over-indulged cake brained fantasists need to be physically reminded exactly where the luxuries of their lives come from and be made to properly appreciate and cherish the energy sources that make their historically amazing standards of living possible. Then they might want to pick a side.
I have a dream…
Brilliant post
Had me chortling out loud
They really have no clue that their way of living is entirely dependent on the whole range of industrialisation and its whole history. Thinking you can just have bits of it is a childish fantasy
“We’re all doomed Captain Mainwaring we’re all doomed”. I thought the scaremongering was reserved for the MSM but it would appear it’s crept in here.
Oh well, better go and get me shorts and T shirt ready.
If your medium term weather predictions are anything like Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology, one can assume the opposite will be the reality.
I take note annually of our summer/ winter weather predictions, and generally plan the other way. More “modelling”.
A couple of commenters suggest that Daily Sceptic and Noah are scaremongering.
I hope these commenters are right, although I don’t remember them as being those few who were relaxed and confident that the Covid “Vaccines” would be harmless and effective.
But it would cheer me if the magic prognosticators with their Xbox programs (Professor Pantsdown, the MET, the CRE boys and girls and etc.) and the media who propagandise for them, were held to account.
No one expects anyone to be a 100% correct prophet. But after two or three ‘projections’ turn out to be bollox, they should have their hard drives shoved where the sun don’t shine.
Combine the grand solar minimum with the Mikankovitch cycles and another mini ice-age is on the way sometime soon.
I’m very dubious about medium term weather forecasts. It seems like about this time every year papers such as the Mail and Express run headlines claiming that the coming winter is going to be one of the coldest on record, quoting one of numerous commercial forecasting agencies. Once every 50 or so years they will be correct, putting me in mind of the old saying that even a stopped watch is right twice a day.
The prediction of high pressure over Europe in Nov/Dec may be correct, but in itself doesn’t mean a prolonged cold spell. It simply means a kinked jet stream, i.e. a series of peaks and troughs in the jet rather than it flowing roughly west to east. If Europe is under a peak then pressure will be high but the centre of the high will be towards the south and temperatures will be above average due to winds from the South or South West. If we’re under a trough then pressure will be high but the centre of the high will be towards the North and temperatures will be be below average due to winds from the North or East.