Greece: unpaid electrical bills amount to 1.7 billion euros, 2.16 Billion $

Greece: unpaid electrical bills amount to 1.7 billion euros, 2.16 Billion $. (Ansamed)

As of the end of June, the Greek public power company DEI is owed about 1.7 billion euros, which it intends to claim back through the courts as daily To Vima online reports today.

Prior to the introduction of the special tax on electrified real estate (Eetide) in 2012, unpaid electrical bills amounted to less than 300 million euros.

As a result though many customers were unable to pay the tax and ended up not paying their electricity bills at all. Even though the government later tried to improve the tax, customers were still unable to pay as necessary. Based on DEI's data, unpaid bills amounted to 1.4 billion euros at the start of the year and increased to 1.7 billion by the end of June.

About 950 million euros is attributed to households, 430 million euros to high voltage users and a further 180 million euros is owed by the greater public sector.

At this rate, the power company has estimated that unpaid bills will amount to 2 billion euros by the end of the year. In order to curb this increase, DEI has assigned the collection of 20,000 unpaid bills to experienced legal service providers. Hmmmm.....Good luck, as the saying go's 'You can't skin a stone' (ANSAmed).

"You will drive Electric Cars" - President Obama continues his Global War on Cheap Energy.

"You will drive Electric Cars" - President Obama continues his Global War on Cheap Energy.HT: What'sUpWithThat.By Willis Eschenbach.

President Obama continues his Global War on Cheap Energy, this time under the guise of avoiding “spikes” in gasoline (petrol) prices. He wants to pass gas without regrets and move post-haste to electricity and biofuels, although both are more expensive than gasoline and diesel for road and rail transport. According to the Associated Press, in a speech at the Argonne National Laboratories Obama said:

The only way to break this cycle of spiking gas prices — the only way to break that cycle for good — is to shift our cars entirely, our cars and trucks, off oil.

Let me start by saying that I’m greatly encouraged to hear that Obama has solved the problem of price variation in capitalist societies. It’s simple. Are you like me, bothered by gas prices going up and down, tired of seeing peaks and valleys in the cost of gasoline, fed up with price spikes because of e.g. unregulated speculation in commodities? The answer is obvious.

Stop using gas.

We can extend that to other areas, of course. Food prices spiking? Turn your food into gasoline, where there are no longer any price spikes. I see a future industry here …

I must protest, however, that his claim that shifting cars and trucks to electricity and biofuels will break the cycle of spiking gas prices is all too true … and that’s very bad news.

It’s bad news because the way he plans to get past spiking gas prices is to go to high, constant alternative fuel prices, higher than even the spikes of today. 
And just as he promised … no spikes. The high prices, just like the outrageous thirty-cent per kilowatt-hours electricity prices in California resulting from this same kind of backwards thinking, get locked in by long-term contracts.

No more price spikes. What’s not to like?

Unfortunately, the brilliant Obama plan is the same trademarked plan the Government always seems to have, to wit:

THROW MONEY AT THE PROBLEM

In this case, it’s two BILLION dollars. With a B.Read the full story here.


The exchange starts at around the 1:50 mark. Obama tells someone concerned about gas prices to trade in that SUV. The exact quote is, “If you’re complainin’ about the price of gas and you’re only getting 8 miles per gallon…”Hmmm....The 'Messiah's' first muscle car? Chicago Jesus drove a Chrysler 300c Hemi.

U.S. Shed 9,000 Mining, Energy Jobs in October, 17,000 Since May.

U.S. Shed 9,000 Mining, Energy Jobs in October, 17,000 Since May.(Heritage).By Lachlan Markay.Buried in Friday’s Bureau of Labor Statistics report on the country’s unemployment situation was this disheartening fact: 9,000 employees of the mining and resource extraction sector lost their jobs in October.
That brings total job losses in that sector to 17,000 since May, according to BLS.
The Bureau, which is a division of the Labor Department, defines the “mining” industry thusly:

The Mining sector comprises establishments that extract naturally occurring mineral solids, such as coal and ores; liquid minerals, such as crude petroleum; and gases, such as natural gas. The term mining is used in the broad sense to include quarrying, well operations, beneficiating (e.g., crushing, screening, washing, and flotation), and other preparation customarily performed at the mine site, or as a part of mining activity.

“Mining lost 9,000 jobs in October, with most of the decline occurring in support activities for mining,” BLS reported Friday morning. “Since May of this year, employment in mining has decreased by 17,000.”
Energy has become a hot-button issue of late as the country debates major regulations on industries that fall under BLS’s “mining” rubric and taxpayer incentives for other energy sectors.
While the president often touts his policies as friendly to the conventional fuel industry, BLS’s numbers suggest the sector is hitting a financial rough patch.
“The American people have endured more than four years of economic hardship, yet Washington regulators have continued their assault on affordable energy and the jobs that developing our domestic resources could provide, particularly on federal lands,” said the American Energy Institute in a Friday news release on the BLS numbers. “We cannot experience lasting economic recovery or create the jobs that will drive our energy future with the status quo.”Hmmmm..........Obama: "All the Choices We've Made Have Been the Right Ones".Read the full story here.

America sorry Germany Faces Green Energy Crisis - Network Agency Calls For Suspension Of Emission Laws For Old Coal Plants.

America sorry Germany Faces Green Energy Crisis - Network Agency Calls For Suspension Of Emission Laws For Old Coal Plants.(WUWT).Global-warming-related catastrophes are increasingly hitting vulnerable populations around the world, with one species in particular danger: the electricity ratepayer. Denmark, an early adopter of the global-warming mania, now requires its households to pay the developed world’s highest power prices — about 40¢ a kilowatt hour, or three to four times what North Americans pay today. Germany, whose powerhouse economy gave green developers a blank cheque, is a close second, followed by other politically correct nations such as Belgium, the headquarters of the EU, and distressed nations such as Spain. The result is chaos to the economic well-being of the EU nations. Even in rock-solid Germany, up to 15% of the populace is now believed to be in “fuel poverty.” Some 600,000 low-income Germans are now being cut off by their power companies annually, a number expected to increase as a never-ending stream of global-warming projects in the pipeline wallops customers. In the U.K., which has laboured under the most politically correct climate leadership in the world, some 12 million people are already in fuel poverty, 900,000 of them in wind-infested Scotland alone, and the U.K. has now entered a double-dip recession. –Lawrence Solomon, Financial Post, 12 May 2012
Last winter, on several occasions, Germany escaped only just large-scale power outages. Next winter the risk of large blackouts is even greater. The culprit for the looming crisis is the single most important instrument of German energy policy: the “Renewable Energy Law.” The economic cost of a wide-scale blackout are measured in billions of Euros per day. The most important test of energy policy is now the stability of power – so far only the cost of the green energy transition has been focused upon. Because the federal government does not have the guts to start an overdue and fundamental debate about the usefulness of a 12-year-old, now totally outdated, “launch aid” called EEG, it now threatens to over-steer, with the green energy transition ending up in a crash. Fasten your seat belts. –Daniel Wetzel, Die Welt, 10 May 2012

Old coal power plants need to stay in operation or Germany’s power grid faces collapse. That is the warning of Germany’s national grid agency. Because the danger of blackouts is growing as a result of the shut-down of six nuclear power plants last year, the Federal Network Agency is proposing to suspend legal emission limits for plants. Old power stations, which are due to be shut down due to their high environmental impact, should continue to operate. “Closures of more conventional power plants are currently not feasible in Germany,” it says literally in the grid agency’s report: “Given the present and future tense situation, it is necessary to suspend closures due to the emissions reduction law.” –D. Wetzel und D. Siems, Die Welt, 10 May 2012
The German Bundesnetzagentur (Federal Network Agency) issued a press release warning that the national power grid is in serious trouble and that something needs to be done urgently. Germany’s once impeccably stable world-class power grid has been transformed and is today just one step away from being a developing-world laughing stock. This has all been accomplished in just a few short years – thanks to the country’s reckless and uncontrolled rush to renewable energies, wind and sun, all spurred on by a blind environmental movement and hysteria with respect to nuclear power. –P Gosslin, NoTricksZone, 11 May 2012.Hmmm......Barack Obama: "Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket".Read the full story here.