Russian gas will eventually return to Europe as nations ‘forgive and forget,’ Qatari energy minister says

Published

2 years ago

January 16, 2023

admin

On Friday, Russian energy supplier Gazprom said it would not resume its supply of natural gas to Germany through the key Nord Stream 1 pipeline, blaming a malfunctioning turbine.

Hannibal Hanschke | Reuters

The European Union’s rejection of Russian energy commodities following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine won’t last forever, Qatar’s Energy Minister said during an energy conference over the weekend.

“The Europeans today are saying there’s no way we’re going back” to buying Russian gas, Saad Sherida al-Kaabi, energy minister and head of state gas company QatarEnergy, said at the Atlantic Council Energy Forum in Abu Dhabi.

“We’re all blessed to have to be able to forget and to forgive. And I think things get mended with time… they learn from that situation and probably have a much bigger diversity [of energy intake].”

Europe has long been Russia’s largest customer of most energy commodities, especially natural gas. EU countries have dramatically cut down their imports of Russian energy supplies, imposing sanctions in response to Moscow’s brutal, full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Gas exports from Russian state energy giant Gazprom to Switzerland and the EU fell by 55% in 2022, the company said earlier this month. The cut in imports has dramatically increased energy costs for Europe, sending leaders and oil and gas executives scrambling to develop new sources of energy and shore up alternative supplies.

“But Russian gas is going back, in my view, to Europe,” al-Kaabi said.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has so far taken tens, if not hundreds of thousands of lives, destroyed entire cities, and exiled more than 8 million people as refugees. Russian missiles and drone strikes regularly hit and decimate residential buildings, schools, hospitals, and vital energy infrastructure, leaving millions of Ukrainians without power.

A residential building destroyed after a Russian missile attack on Jan. 15, 2023, in Dnipro, Ukraine.

Global Images Ukraine | Getty Images News | Getty Images

Europe has managed to avert a major crisis this winter, owing to mild weather and substantial stocks of gas amassed over the last year. Energy officials and analysts warn of a more precarious situation in late 2023, when these supplies run out.

“Luckily they [Europe] haven’t had a very high demand for gas due to the warmer weather,” al-Kaabi said. “The issue is what’s going to happen when they want to replenish their storages this coming year, and there isn’t much gas coming into the market until ’25, ’26, ’27 … So I think it’s going to be a volatile situation for some time.”

Later during the conference, CNBC spoke to the CEO of Italian energy company Eni, Claudio Descalzi, who pushed back on the Qatari minister’s comments.

“I think that the war is still there, and it is not easy to forgive anybody when you kill innocent people, women and children and bomb hospitals,” Descalzi told CNBC’s Hadley Gamble. “And so I think that more than forgive, we have to understand the sense of life for our words. For our modern war, because that is [what is] happening there. So, when we talk about energy security, we talk about financing how you allocate your money, how much in the gas, how much in the renewables, and you think that people are killing close to you or far from you… That is the priority, that is the thing we have to solve.”

In 2023 the priority is Ukraine, Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi says

“Otherwise,” the CEO added, “there is a big elephant in the room. We hide to ourselves this kind of stuff, and when we hide something [it] is coming back bigger and bigger. If you’re forgiving, it means you are not looking at that, you are not thinking we have to solve this kind of issue.”

Descalzi said that the war in Ukraine and energy security are front of mind for him and his industry. Italy has dramatically reduced its reliance on Russian gas by replacing it with energy sources from alternative producers, such as Algeria. On Sunday, Eni announced a new gas discovery in an offshore field in the eastern Mediterranean, off the coast of Egypt.

“Honestly, energy security is a big problem… but I think that, in 2023, the priority is Ukraine,” Descalzi said. That’s from my point of view. It’s Russia. It’s the relationship with China.”

“I’m not a politician,” he added, “but I think you cannot manage and talk about money and talk about energy and industry — it’s clear that, if you are not looking at that, a lot of people are going to suffer. But from the other side you talk about freedom, democracy, and people that are dying.”

"This year is going to be about the war" in Ukraine, says presidential advisor Amos Hochstein

Environment

Cybertruck backlog runs out, Model S gets stuck, GM hits a sales milestone

Published

7 hours ago

November 5, 2024

admin

Cybertruck backlog runs out, Model S gets stuck, GM hits a sales milestone

On today’s episode of Quick Charge, Tesla’s Cybertruck is now available in Canada – and, like in the US, there’s no waiting! Plus, we’ve got an “actually” smart summon Tesla that’s actually stuck, GM reaches a sales milestone, and we get a brand-new title sponsor!

Today’s episode is the first with our new title sponsor, BLUETTI – a leading provider of portable power stations, solar generators, and energy storage systems.

Source Links

Prefer listening to your podcasts? Audio-only versions of Quick Charge are now available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, TuneIn, and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

New episodes of Quick Charge are recorded, usually, Monday through Thursday (and sometimes Sunday). We’ll be posting bonusLucid proves than an EV company can keep its promises while Xiaomi teams up with Chevrolet and Honda to prove – at least conceptually – that records are made to be broken. audio content from time to time as well, so be sure to follow and subscribe so you don’t miss a minute of Electrek’s high-voltage daily news!

Got news? Let us know!
Drop us a line at tips@electrek.co. You can also rate us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, or recommend us in Overcast to help more people discover the show!

FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.

Environment

This ‘supercharger on wheels’ brings fast charging to you [update]

Published

9 hours ago

November 4, 2024

admin

This 'supercharger on wheels' brings fast charging to you [update]

Mobile car care company Yoshi Mobility launched a DC fast charging EV mobile unit that it likens to “a supercharger on wheels.”

November 4, 2024 update: Yoshi Mobility will only be charging EVs on the side of the road now – it announced today that it’s selling its fleet fueling operation to EZFill Holdings (Nasdaq: EZFL).

It was originally founded as a direct-to-consumer, mobile fueling business in 2016, but now it’s going to focus on mobile EV charging, virtual vehicle inspections for partners like Uber and Turo, and onsite preventative maintenance.

Bryan Frist, Yoshi Mobility’s CEO & cofounder, said, “By spinning off our fuel business and focusing all of our energy on solving hair-on-fire problems that fleet owners face, we are meeting the changing needs of enterprise customers while making the future of transportation safer, cleaner, and more sustainable.”

May 22, 2024: Yoshi Mobility saw that its existing customers needed mobile EV charging in places where infrastructure has yet to be installed, so the Nashville-based company decided to bring the mountain to Moses.

“We recognized a demand among our customers for convenient daily charging, reliable private charging networks, and proper charging infrastructure to support their fleet vehicles as they transition to electric,” said Dan Hunter, Yoshi Mobility’s chief EV officer and cofounder.

The company says its 240 kW mobile DC fast charger, which can turn “any EV” into a mobile charging unit, is the first fully electric mobile charger available. It can provide multiple charges in a single trip but doesn’t detail how they charge the DC fast charger or who manufactured it. (I asked for more details, and they replied that they won’t disclose client names or the manufacturer of its DC fast charger yet.)

Yoshi is launching its mobile charger on two GM BrightDrop Zevo 600s and will introduce additional vehicles throughout 2024. It aims for full commercialization by Q1 2025. (I wonder if the Zevo 600 ever charges itself? Yes, I asked that too.)

Yoshi Mobility says it’s already deployed its EV charging solutions to service “major OEMs, autonomous vehicle companies, and rideshare operators” across the US. Its initial customers are made up of large EV operators managing “hundreds” of light-duty vehicles requiring up to 1 megawatt of energy per day that don’t yet have grid-connected EV chargers. I’ve asked Yoshi for details of who it’s working with, and will update if they share that info.

The company says pricing is based on location and enterprise charging needs. Once under contract for service, the service will be deployed to US-based customers within 10 days.

To date, Yoshi Mobility has raised more than $60 million, with investments from GM Ventures, Bridgestone, ExxonMobil, and Y-Combinator in Silicon Valley.

If you’re an electric vehicle owner, charge up your car at home with rooftop solar panels. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing on solar, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. They have hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.

Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisers to help you every step of the way. Get started here. –ad*

FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.

Environment

Marqeta shares plunge more than 30% on big forecast miss

Published

9 hours ago

November 4, 2024

admin

Marqeta shares plunge more than 30% on big forecast miss

Marqeta celebrates its initial public offering at the Nasdaq on June 9, 2021.

Source: The Nasdaq

Marqeta shares tumbled more than 30% in extended trading on Monday after the company issued weaker-than-expected guidance for the fourth quarter.

Here’s how the company did compared with Wall Street estimates, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:

Loss per share: 6 cents adjusted vs. a loss of 5 cents expected
Revenue: $128 million vs. $128.1 million expected

While third-quarter results showed a slight disappointment on the top and bottom lines, Marqeta’s forecast for the current period was more concerning.

The payment processing firm said revenue in the fourth quarter will increase 10% to 12% from a year earlier. Analysts were looking for growth of more than 17%, according to LSEG.

Marqeta, which primarily functions as a card-issuing platform, attributed the guidance miss to “heightened scrutiny of the banking environment and specific customer program changes.” The company has been struggling for a while, and its stock is now down more than 80% from its peak in 2021, the year it went public. The stock was down 15% for the year prior to the report.

Total processing volume of $74 billion was up more than 30% from a year earlier. Net revenue and gross profit were up 18% and 24%, respectively.

Marqeta’s digital commerce business sells payment technology designed to detect potential fraud and ensure that money is properly routed. It also issues customized physical cards that look like a credit or debit card that can be used for point-of-sale purchases.

The company has been trying to break into the buy now, pay later business with a recently launched product called Marqeta Flex. The service brings BNPL from lenders such as Affirm or Klarna to any credit card wherever Mastercard and Visa are accepted.

“It’s an orchestration layer, but it’s tied to issuing and processing and disputes and chargebacks,” CEO Simon Khalaf told CNBC at Money2020 in Las Vegas last week. “So it is not actually a Wild West in BNPL. It is actually very well established. And there is a reason why a lot of people are jumping to it.”