The energy crisis hits global economic recovery
Electricity cuts leave the streets in the dark and make factories in China..The poor in Brazil choose between paying food or light.German corn and wheat producers do not get fertilizer because manufacturing it requires natural gas.And the fear that Europe will have to ration electricity does grow if winter is cold.
The world is immersed in an energy crisis, an aggressive adjustment on some of the most important markets of natural gas, oil and other fuels that keep the global economy and turn on the lights and heat of households.
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With the winter just around the corner, that has meant higher bills, more expensive products and growing concern about how they will recover from the Pandemia of the Chinese COVID-19 and Europe, regions with high energy demand.
The greatest adjustment affects natural gas in Europe, which imports 90% of its supply-mainly from Russia-and where prices have risen five times compared to the early price of the year, from 19 to 95 euros per Megavatio-Hora.
He has hit the food chain in Italy hard, where methane prices are expected to multiply by six, promoting the cost of grain.That would end up rising the price of bread and pasta in supermarkets, although the halls of the meat and dairy products are more vulnerable because dairy and veal producers are forced to pay more to feed their animals and transfer that rise in the cost to the clients.
"Since October we begin to suffer a lot," said Valentino Miotto, from the AIRES Association, which represents the grain sector.
Analysts blame for a combination of factors for the gas crisis: demand suddenly rose with economic recovery after pandemic, while a cold winter reduced reserves.The main supplier of Europe, the Russian company Gazprom, retained the additional summer supply beyond its long -term contracts to restore its domestic reserves for the winter.
On the other hand, Chinese electricity demand has resumed with force and consumed limited supplies of liquefied natural gas, which is transported by boat and not by gas pipelines.There are also limited facilities to export natural gas from the United States.
In addition, the upper cost of natural gas has promoted oil prices because some electric power plants can change to use oil derivatives instead of gas.The American crude is above $ 83 per barrel, the highest price in seven years, while the Brent reference barrel around 85 dollars.The OPEC oil cartel and its allied countries have been cautious about restoring production to novels prior to pandemic.
It is likely that the crisis is short -term, although it is difficult to say how much the highest prices of fossil fuels will last, said Claudia Kemfert, an energy economy expert at the German Institute for Economic Research in Berlin.
But "the long -term response that must be taken out of this is to invest in renewables and energy saving," he said.
The European Commission, the EU Executive Branch, urged member states to accelerate the authorization of renewable energy projects such as solar and wind, and said that “the transition to clean energy is the best insurance againstthe auges of price in the future, and must be accelerated ".
Meanwhile, some European gas -dependent industries are reducing the production of again.German chemical firms Basf and Skw Fieteritz have lowered their ammonia production, a key fertilizer ingredient.
That caused Hermann Greif, a farmer from the Pinzberg village, in the German region of Bavaria, to run into an unexpected emptiness when he tried to commission fertilizer for next year.
"There is no product, no price, not even a contract," he said."It is a situation that we had never seen".One thing is safe, he explained, “if I do not give the crops the food they need, they respond with smaller crops.It is as simple as that ".
The high energy prices had already affected the farmers in the region, who need diesel for machinery and heat for animals, said Greif, that cultivates corn for a biomass power plant that introduces emission free energy into the electricity grid.
Similarly, in Italy the cost of energy is expected to process wheat and corn.That includes converting wheat into flour and corn into feed for cows and pigs.
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Giampietro Scusato, energy consultant that negotiates contracts for the AIRES and others association, expects volatility and high prices to continue during the next year.
High energy prices also move to the production of bread and pasta through the costs of transport and energy consumption, which could affect the sales prices to the public.Dairy and meat sections are especially exposed because current prices are low and producers could be forced to transfer the increase in the cost of feed to consumers.
Supply invoices will rise worldwide this winter.US authorities have warned that domestic heating prices could rise up to 54%.The governments of Spain, France, Italy and Greece have announced measures to help low -income households, and the EU has urged to apply measures of that class.
Winter time will be decisive.European gas reserves, which are usually recovered during the summer, are at unusually low levels.
"A cold winter both in Europe and Asia would be a risk that European reserves levels fall to zero," said Massimo Di Odoardo, of the Wood Mackenzie research firm.
In that case, Europe would depend on more natural gas from a newly finished Russian gas pipeline or that Russia was willing to send more for the ducts that Ukraine are going through.But the new Nord Stream 2 duct has not yet obtained authorization from European regulatory agencies and may not transport gas until next year.
The decision of the Russian suppliers to sell less gas to concrete markets reflects "an intention to put pressure on the rapid certification of the Nord Stream 2," said Kemfert, the expert in energy economy.
In China there have been light cuts after the prices of coal and gas rise.Electrical companies subject to limits to transfer the cost to customers and at the orders of the Government to meet the reduction objectives of greenhouse emissions, choose to interrupt the service.
The factories in the province of Jiangsu, in the northwest of Shanghai, and Zhejiang, in the southeast, closed in mid -September, and dozens of facilities warned of possible delays in deliveries before the Christmas shopping season.
The Chenchen jewelry factory in Dongyang, a city in Zhejiang, suffered about 10 days of electricity cuts, according to its general director, Joanna Lan.The factory produces hair tapes, desktop material and promotional gifts, and exports between 80% and 90% of its products to the United States, Europe and other markets.
Deliveries were delayed "at least a week," Lan said."We had to buy generators".
The largest city in the Northeast of China, Shenyang, turned off the lamppings and elevators and cut the light to restaurants and shops for a few hours a day.
Chinese imports of gas have risen, but the growing demand in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan has also helped to boost global prices, said Jenny Yang, Gas and Energy Future Research Manager in China in IHS Markit.
In Brazil, gas and crude prices have joined the worst drought in 91 years, which has made hydroelectric plants unable to produce electricity and cause higher invoices.
Rosa Benta, 67 and resident in a working -class neighborhood of Sao Paulo, gave fear that she could no longer keep her grandchildren and her unemployed children.
“(The electric company) Enel called me several times saying that I had debts.I told them ‘I'm not going to stop feeding my son to pay them,” Benta said before his concrete house on a narrow and steep street."If you want to cut electricity, they can come".
Benta lives with 1.400 reais (about 250 dollars) per month and says that you often have to choose between buying gas for cooking or rice and beans.
"I don't know what we are going to do with our lives," he said.
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