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The Schwedt refinery in Brandenburg supplies fuel to the north-east. With a planned oil embargo against Russia, the city fears economic repercussions and therefore brings back memories of the turmoil after reunification. The minister is furious. “Druzhba” – Russian for “mateship” – is the name of one of the longest oil pipelines in the world, […]

In Germany and Europe, a complete raw materials embargo against Russia has been discussed for some time. All EU states agree on coal, but only Hungary and Slovakia are demanding transitional periods for oil. These raw materials are relatively easy to obtain from other regions of the world. However, economist Prof. Dr. Tom Krebs (University

In order to become independent of Russian natural gas, Economics Minister Habeck is counting on liquefied natural gas (LNG), but Germany does not have an LNG terminal. That is why he wants to have four LNG terminals built in Germany in a rush. The first facility in Wilhelmshaven is to go into operation by the

The administrative court in Cottbus has decided, following a complaint by the German Environmental Aid, that the Jänschwalde opencast mine will only receive an operating permit until 14 May this year. The Jänschwalde power plant is the third largest power plant in Germany. The power plant is fired with lignite from the Jänschwalde opencast mine.

Russia has already suspended gas supplies to Poland and Bulgaria because they refused to pay roubles. The same threatens all European countries. The EU is therefore asking countries to share gas if Russia stops supplying it. The Spanish newspaper El País has now published the contents of a leaked document. EU wants to shut down

What we initially only suspected in our recent article “How effective is an oil embargo?” has now demonstrably come true based on new figures. In the second month of the war against Ukraine, Russia exported more oil than a year before, despite the oil embargo. And this despite the fact that several countries are already

In response to a question from the Left Party in the Bundestag, the Federal Statistical Office has released data on the price increase for fuel. This shows that Germany has recorded the highest price increase since the beginning of the Ukraine war. In no other country of the European Union has the price, especially for

The North Sea island of Pellworm is a prime example of the energy transition. It shows on a small scale that the energy transition cannot work as planned, even on a large scale. On Pellworm, there are or were wind turbines in the hands of citizens, solar parks, storage batteries and biogas plants – everything

For the second time in recent months, there has been a fire in a solar storage battery with considerable damage. As we already reported in our article “Apartment building uninhabitable after solar storage battery fire“, a battery storage unit burned in Bondegg, Baden-Württemberg, at the beginning of March. The apartment building was subsequently uninhabitable. Now

All existing gas-fired power plants must be converted to hydrogen in the coming years. At the same time, the federal government is planning to build new gas-fired power plants in order to meet the goals of the energy transition. But the technology is far from ready for this step. The switch from natural gas to

Natural gas production in the North Sea must be stepped up. In the meantime, the German and Dutch gas storage facilities are threateningly empty. One expert demand is therefore: the existing gas fields must be used even more. This applies, among other things, to the area around the Dutch city of Groningen. This is where

On the surface, France is better prepared for failures of fossil energy imports than almost all other countries: the country has traditionally relied on nuclear power. The 18 nuclear power plants in France could actually supply the electricity needed reliably and independently, but only in theory. In practice, a large part of France’s nuclear power

The Opel boss already made critical comments about electric cars a few weeks ago. Now he is going one better. Opel boss Uwe Hochgeschurtz no longer sees any market opportunity for small electric cars in the event that state subsidies are phased out. Economics Minister Habeck has already reduced the electric car purchase premium from

The EU plans to reduce Russian gas supplies by two thirds by the end of the year. At the same time, the EU is requiring its member states by law to fill their gas storage facilities to at least 80 percent by November. Calculations by the Jülich Research Centre now show that it will not

The EU Commission wants to impose an oil embargo on Russia. A corresponding oil embargo could take effect as early as the turn of the year. In this way, the EU Commission wants to prevent Russia from continuing to collect money to finance the war in Ukraine. At the same time, the EU wants to