Making Space for Sanctions: The Economics of German Natural Gas Imports from Russia, 1982 and 2014 Compared

2016 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-25
Author(s):  
Stephen G. Gross

This article explores the economic context behind Germany’s decision to impose sanctions on Russia in 2014 in response to the Ukraine crisis, through the lens of energy and natural gas. It does so by comparing 2014 with another moment in German-Russian relations when questions of energy, economics, sanctions, and transatlantic politics converged—the Yamal natural gas pipeline in 1982. Then, West Germany had little economic latitude to disrupt trade with Russia because of its high unemployment rate, its balance of payments problems, and the large investments major German corporations had made in Yamal. Consequently, Bonn broke with the United States over the question of sanctions. In 2014, by contrast, Germany’s strong economy, robust balance of payments, and the absence of a united business front opposing sanctions gave Berlin the space to pursue a non-economic agenda and support the United States in imposing sanctions. The article concludes that these cases illustrate how Germany should not be characterized as a “geo-economic power,” insofar as Berlin still has the space to prioritize goals such as the advancement of democracy and human rights over its need to promote exports and secure imports of raw materials.

1980 ◽  
Vol 91 ◽  
pp. 8-26

The United Kingdom economy remained almost stagnant in 1979 with GDP being only 0.6 per cent higher than in 1978. Not only is this a dismal end to a generally depressed period of seven years but the outlook for the beginning of the 1980s is even worse, as we discuss in chapter II on the home economy. In comparison with the United States, Japan, West Germany, France and the OECD countries as a whole the UK performance has been slow, as is clear from chart I. However if similar comparisons with the other countries had been made in 1969 or 1959 the UK performance would also have been seen to be relatively slow. This picture of a stagnant aggregate economy in 1979 covers up an underlying picture of considerable fluctuation in the components of the economy.


1989 ◽  
Vol 43 (4) ◽  
pp. 543-584 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Reich

The United States faces a formidable and growing economic challenge from Japan. Over the last decade, the American state has characteristically responded to the loss of domestic market dominance in the manufacturing sector to foreign firms by invoking the principles of free and fair trade in order to delegitimate this foreign competition and legitimate the imposition of trade barriers designed to encourage the investment of multinational corporations (MNCs) in the United States. These tactics have largely succeeded in attracting investment and thus aided domestic employment and the balance of trade. The short-term benefits, however, have been achieved at long-term, unforeseen, undesirable economic and political costs in terms of both the balance of payments and state autonomy. Alternative state responses to the threat posed by Japanese MNCs, while consistent with principles of free trade, challenge the traditional liberal conception of the scope and domain of state behavior and provide more effective policies in achieving both short- and long-term objectives. This article draws on data relating to the treatment of subsidiaries of American automobile manufacturers by European governments with competing indigenous producers in specifying two variables critical to identifying policy alternatives: first, the degree of access granted by the state to foreign firms (limited or unlimited access) and, second, the type of support provided by the state to domestic firms (discriminatory or nondiscriminatory intervention). The analysis suggests that there are four possible policy combinations, which generally reflect the four different postwar state policies pursued by West Germany, France, Britain, and the United States. Of these four, the combination employed by West Germany has proved most effective in pursuing policies consistent with liberal trade principles while reconciling short-term employment and fiscal goals with the broader long-term objectives of sustaining state autonomy and balance-of-payments surpluses in the face of foreign competition. British policies, which have consistently proved the most ineffective, have sacrificed long-term objectives for short-term ones. As a result of structural changes during the 1970s, the American state's chosen policy combination was altered and now replicates the traditional British formula. The United States therefore risks comparable economic and political consequences.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Nick Cozens

<p>This thesis aims to assess the potential of unconventional gas accumulation of Danevirke aged (65-43 Ma) mudrock of the Canterbury Basin, South Island, New Zealand. Unconventional hydrocarbon resources contained in low-porosity, low-permeability rocks are potentially a large source of natural gas. Recent developments throughout the United States and increasingly so in Australia, signify a shift in exploration efforts from conventional natural gas targets towards unconventional shale gas plays and basin centred gas systems. Despite extensive international progress made in this field of exploration, little is known about New Zealand unconventional hydrocarbon systems.  The Canterbury Basin is approximaty 360,000km² in area and is located approximately between 44°S and 46°S. The deepest part of the basin is located offshore and is known as the Clipper Sub-Basin, which exhibits economic basement depths of 6500m. The Clipper Sub-Basin is a late Cretaceous syn-rift horst and graben feature which trends north east-south west and is bound basinward by the Benreoch High and landward by the Canterbury Bight High. Dannevirke aged transgressive rocks overlay these structures and intermittently exhibit gas-charged intervals in low porosity facies.  Elevated gas concentrations are recorded in four exploration wells in the Clipper Sub-Basin from gas chromatograph readings (up to 2 .7/00.4%). These high-gas zones correspond to intervals of elevated quartz (up to 72wt%), whereas non-gaseous intervals corresponded to quartz values as low as 30wt%. Scanning electron microscopy results do not reveal biogenic silica populations in the cutting samples examined. High silica is related to diagenetic silica transformations of mica, various clay minerals, pyrite and silica transformations. Although no visible porosity is observed in thin sections, FMI wireline analysis illustrate natural fractures predominately occur in siliceous intervals, where resistive fractures can account up to one fracture per 10m of stratigraphic thickness. These fissile or laminated brittle lithologies are likely hydrocarbon conduits or accumulation intervals for wet gas. RockEval pyrolysis results indicate the siliceous mudrocks are organic le-n, comprising an immature gas-prone source rock which averages 1.5% total organic carbon.  Findings made in this research are compared to the. Whangai Formation, considered in this study to be a comparable shale gas system and also to the Monterey Formation of the United States which is a known basin centred gas system. Dannevirke aged sediments found in the Clipper Sub-Basin appear to constitute the requisites of a near-to-source, direct type., basin centred gas system. Implications of this study open up the possibility that New Zealand's widespread Paleocene-Eocene mudrocks are capable of natural gas accumulation and therefore viable natural gas exploration targets in New Zealand.</p>


2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 31-65
Author(s):  
Brian J. Galli ◽  
Aamir Khizar

In the United States today, there are thousands of miles of an extended network of natural gas pipelines across the nation. Current pipeline explosions and leaks in several regions have challenged the natural gas industry to re-evaluate efforts and to pursue proactive strategies. Safety and the environmental threat has become a primary concern in the United States and around the world, but mostly in cases where natural gases, oil, and other hazardous wastes are intricate. Thus, a significant point in the natural gas pipeline industry that signifies both the economic and social issue is the unplanned pipeline risk. In this article, a quantitative data analysis was performed for Downstate New York companies, Con Edison and National Grid. There, the data from various natural gas pipelines was observed for the trend regarding failing material, failure cause, aging characteristics, and perform a risk assessment to come up with training and risk checklist that could be crucial for risk handling strategies. The statistical analyses of the natural gas pipeline-related incident data for distribution pipelines between 2012 and 2016, which were composed from Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration (PHMSA) of the United States Department of Transportation (DOT), are compiled. The total miles in the gas distribution pipelines in downstate New York is approximately 48,539 as of 2016. The equipment failure, other incident cause, other outside force, and excavation damages are the leading causes of the pipe-related incidents, which are responsible for over 20% of the total incidents between 2012 and 2016. As a result, a quantitative research methodology has been developed as the suitable approach to achieve risk assessment. Mainly, this approach aims towards risk management in natural gas industry projects using the maximum likelihood method on 70 rupture incidents between 2012 and 2016, which were collected from the PHMSA pipeline incident database. The hypothetical quantitative risk assessment of the gas distribution pipelines are illustrated by combining the statistics of the pipeline rupture incidents, as well as risk assessment performed in the present study.


1976 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 74-99
Author(s):  
Albert L. Michaels

In retrospect John F. Kennedy's foreign policy has become more and more controversial. Recent studies have stressed the dichotomy between Kennedy's idealistic rhetoric and the moves he made in carrying out an interventionist, counter-revolutionary foreign policy. He acted not only to check his two great socialist adversaries but also to stifle nationalistic revolutions in the underdeveloped world (Walton, 1972; Fitzsimmons, 1972). Under Kennedy, the United States launched a great offensive on real and imagined enemies. This offensive led to intervention in Laos, South Vietnam, Cuba, Guyana, and the Congo as well as to international confrontations over Berlin and missiles in Cuba. Idealistic-sounding programs like the Peace Corps and the Alliance for Progress were launched but they were coupled with counter-insurgency studies and the formation of the Green Berets. All had the same aims: to retrieve the deteriorating economic and worldwide political situation inherited from Eisenhower. Above all, although the United States might have to learn to live with the Soviet Union and China, she could not afford to lose the markets, raw materials, and investment opportunities in the underdeveloped world.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Nick Cozens

<p>This thesis aims to assess the potential of unconventional gas accumulation of Danevirke aged (65-43 Ma) mudrock of the Canterbury Basin, South Island, New Zealand. Unconventional hydrocarbon resources contained in low-porosity, low-permeability rocks are potentially a large source of natural gas. Recent developments throughout the United States and increasingly so in Australia, signify a shift in exploration efforts from conventional natural gas targets towards unconventional shale gas plays and basin centred gas systems. Despite extensive international progress made in this field of exploration, little is known about New Zealand unconventional hydrocarbon systems.  The Canterbury Basin is approximaty 360,000km² in area and is located approximately between 44°S and 46°S. The deepest part of the basin is located offshore and is known as the Clipper Sub-Basin, which exhibits economic basement depths of 6500m. The Clipper Sub-Basin is a late Cretaceous syn-rift horst and graben feature which trends north east-south west and is bound basinward by the Benreoch High and landward by the Canterbury Bight High. Dannevirke aged transgressive rocks overlay these structures and intermittently exhibit gas-charged intervals in low porosity facies.  Elevated gas concentrations are recorded in four exploration wells in the Clipper Sub-Basin from gas chromatograph readings (up to 2 .7/00.4%). These high-gas zones correspond to intervals of elevated quartz (up to 72wt%), whereas non-gaseous intervals corresponded to quartz values as low as 30wt%. Scanning electron microscopy results do not reveal biogenic silica populations in the cutting samples examined. High silica is related to diagenetic silica transformations of mica, various clay minerals, pyrite and silica transformations. Although no visible porosity is observed in thin sections, FMI wireline analysis illustrate natural fractures predominately occur in siliceous intervals, where resistive fractures can account up to one fracture per 10m of stratigraphic thickness. These fissile or laminated brittle lithologies are likely hydrocarbon conduits or accumulation intervals for wet gas. RockEval pyrolysis results indicate the siliceous mudrocks are organic le-n, comprising an immature gas-prone source rock which averages 1.5% total organic carbon.  Findings made in this research are compared to the. Whangai Formation, considered in this study to be a comparable shale gas system and also to the Monterey Formation of the United States which is a known basin centred gas system. Dannevirke aged sediments found in the Clipper Sub-Basin appear to constitute the requisites of a near-to-source, direct type., basin centred gas system. Implications of this study open up the possibility that New Zealand's widespread Paleocene-Eocene mudrocks are capable of natural gas accumulation and therefore viable natural gas exploration targets in New Zealand.</p>


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