Russia is a major global commodity producer and exporter. The country’s invasion of Ukraine has already pushed commodity prices to historically high levels and could also lead to commodity shortages. This situation may cause considerable economic damage, with far-reaching consequences for EU industry. Why is there a Russian-Ukraine war? What's the connection with Europe's Green Deal? And what's the role of the USA? Geologists call it the Ukrainian shield. That land in the middle which starts from the northern border with Belarus up to the shores of the Azov Sea, in the south of Donbass. According to the studies of the Ukrainian geological service, in the ancient rocks of this shield are hidden lithium deposits with great potential. Findings that have been identified mainly around the area of Mariupol, the port city of Donbass torn apart by Russian bombing. Lithium deposits in Ukraine “This may not be the main reason for the invasion, but undoubtedly Ukraine's mineral wealth is one of the reasons why this country is so important to Russia,” said Rod Schoonover, former director of the Environment and Natural Resources Section of the U.S. National Intelligence Council. A wealth confirmed by the fact that Ukrainian lithium had begun to attract global attention as early as last year, before the Russian invasion halted exploration. Last November, in fact, the Australian company European Lithium said it was close to securing the rights to two promising deposits of lithium in the region of Donetsk (eastern Ukraine) and Kirovograd, in the center of the country. In the same month, the Chinese company Chengxin Lithium has also asked for the rights on some deposits, a move that would allow China to win the first deposit in Europe. “Since there are no developed deposits, I highly doubt that lithium resources are the motivation for attacks in the Southeast,” Schoonover tells Renewable Matter. “But if this region falls under Russian control, lithium reserves would certainly be a co-benefit for the Kremlin. Certainly, the rest of the world would have a say. It would not import lithium from a pariah state (a nation that is not recognized by the governments of other countries due to human rights violations), especially when there are better alternatives in geopolitically more favourable countries.”
Dini tells Renewable Matter, “ and are problematic for the metallurgical processes of extracting the metal. Since 1991, Ukrainians here have been extracting mostly precious stones.”
The other mineral resources in Ukraine Ukraine has 10% of the world's iron reserves, 6% of titanium and 20% of graphite. “In geology, this extremely flat region is called peneplain,” Andrea Dini points out, “because it is so ancient that it has been flattened by erosion. Many of the rocks are billions of years old and you don't see them on the surface because they are covered by layers of sediment.” There are more than just minerals in Ukraine, however. In the northeast, near the Russian border, there is a 400-million-year-old sedimentary basin filled with organic material and black shale rocks. “These are black slates with large amounts of coal and methane. For example, part of US energy independence is due to the extraction of methane (Shale Gas) from these rocks on US soil.” There is also another sector that has a close link with Ukraine's resources: Italian ceramics. The ceramic industrial district of Sassuolo is one of the most important in the world and the quality of its tiles also depended on the importation from Ukraine of clay and kaolin, a mineral that is extracted from the quarries of Donbass. In the Italian ceramics industry, 25% of raw materials – including clay considered prized – came from Ukraine. After the Russian invasion, companies in the district will have to find compatible and competitive alternatives. According to insiders, first of all they need to find another recipe, that is, a new mixture of clays, kaolins and feldspars with material imported from other countries.
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In support of BALTOPS, U.S. Navy 6th Fleet partnered with U.S. Navy research and warfare centers to bring the latest advancements in unmanned underwater vehicle mine hunting technology to the Baltic Sea to demonstrate the vehicle’s effectiveness in operational scenarios. Experimentation was conducted off the coast of Bornholm, Denmark, with participants from Naval Information Warfare Center Pacific, Naval Undersea Warfare Center Newport, and Mine Warfare Readiness and Effectiveness Measuring all under the direction of U.S. 6th Fleet Task Force 68.
“In prior BALTOPS we demonstrated advanced capabilities to detect, reacquire and collect images of mine contacts, and transfer those images in near real-time to operators through the use of a specialized Office of Naval Research UUV,” said Anthony Constable, Office of Naval Research science advisor to U.S. 6th Fleet. “This year, through the work of NIWC Pacific and NUWC Newport, we are showing that this capability can be integrated into programs of record by executing complex multi-vehicle UUV missions with modified U.S. Navy fleet assets.”
An additional critical objective was to continue to increase the communication range and data transfer capability to give the operators more flexibility in mine hunting operations. Advancements in communication technology, demonstrated this year, have shown a significant improvement in operating ranges over currently used systems. This provides additional standoff flexibility to the U.S. Navy in conducting safe mine hunting operations. BALTOPS also provides a unique opportunity for the U.S. research, development and acquisition communities to exercise the current and emerging UUV technology in real-world operational environments. This year featured the current and future programs of record for mine hunting UUVs in the Mk18 and Lionfish systems. Both systems were put through the paces over 10 days of mine-hunting operations, collecting over 200 hours of undersea data. “The major benefit of the BALTOPS experimentation is to provide advanced mine hunting capabilities to the operator in the field. By exercising the future capabilities, U.S. 6th Fleet can provide valuable feedback to help guide the Navy acquisition community responsible for mine hunting UUV development and procurement,” said Lt. Joshua Lynn, U.S. 6th Fleet experimental lead for BALTOPS. “This year we have seen the near- and long-term future in mine hunting UUV technology and we are excited to see how quickly the technology and capabilities are improving.” Source: seapowermagazine.org
Sweden's Maritime Authority issued a warning about two leaks in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, the day after a leak on the nearby Nord Stream 2 pipeline was discovered that prompted Denmark to restrict shipping and impose a small no fly zone. Denmark's armed forces released a video showing bubbles boiling up to the surface of the sea. The largest gas leak had caused a surface disturbance of well over 1 km (0.6 mile) in diameter, the armed forces said. "Today we faced an act of sabotage, we don't know all the details of what happened, but we see clearly that it's an act of sabotage, related to the next step of escalation of the situation in Ukraine," Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said at the opening of a new pipeline between Norway and Poland.
Berlin has formed the opinion that a loss of pressure in three natural gas pipelines between Russia and Germany on Monday was not a coincidence, but a “targeted attack” from either Ukraine or Russia, the Tagesspiegel newspaper has reported. Pressure in one of the Nord Stream 2 lines dropped sharply overnight, followed by both of Nord Stream 1's on Monday afternoon. Denmark announced that a gas leak was spotted off the coast of Bornholm Island in the Baltic Sea and closed the area for maritime traffic, but could not confirm if this was what caused the situation. According to TagesSpiegel, the German government and agencies investigating the incident “can’t imagine a scenario that isn't a targeted attack,” according to an anonymous source familiar with their assessments. “Everything speaks against a coincidence.” The outlet explained that a deliberate attack on the bottom of the sea has to involve special forces, navy divers or a submarine. Berlin is reportedly examining two possible scenarios. In the first, Ukraine or “Ukraine-affiliated forces” could be behind the attack. The second option is that Russia did it as a “false flag,” to make Ukraine look bad and drive EU energy prices even higher. With Nord Stream offline since late August, Russian gas can only be delivered to Germany and central Europe via the older pipelines going through Poland and Ukraine, Tagesspiegel noted. Far-right leader Giorgia Meloni has been elected as Italy’s next Prime Minister, making her the nation’s first female prime minister. The head of the nationalist Brothers of Italy party will take over from Prime Minister Mario Draghi.
The 45-year-old Giorgia Meloni is expected to form Italy’s most right-wing government since Benito Mussolini was prime minister during World War II. Meloni’s victory comes after she ran on anti-immigration policies, plans to limit LGBTQ+ rights, and restricted access on abortions. She has also voiced her support for Ukraine amid the ongoing conflict with Russia. Following the vote, Meloni said that the Brothers of Italy party would “govern for everyone”. She said during her victory speech, “If we are called on to govern this nation we will do it for all the Italians, with the aim of uniting the people and focusing on what unites us rather than what divides us.” Who Is Giorgia Meloni?
Fender has announced its 2022 Masterbuilt and Custom Shop Collections from Fender, Jackson, Charvel and Gretsch. So, let’s cut to the chase, shall we? Here’s a look at just some of the models created when the master builders at the Custom Shop were given the opportunity to go completely ham and craft a guitar with zero limits.
From Fender, a Custom Buffalo Telecaster by Dale Wilson was built for “the musician who appreciates a solid playing and sounding guitar married with a rustic southwestern vibe”, and visually it’s nothing short of striking. Its specs are Josefina Hand-Wound Original Blackguard Tele (Bridge), ‘51 Nocaster (Neck) Pickups, modern Tele wiring, single-ply parchment pickguard with painted artwork, and a ‘51-‘54 Tele bridge with brass barrel saddles. Further creations from Fender include a Custom Purple Sparkle Stratocaster by Dennis Galuszka, which is being described as “the result of a happy accident”. It was created when a typo on its specification sheet resulted in the body being sprayed in NOS urethane instead of relic-ready lacquer. It’s loaded with Josefina hand-wound Fat ’50s Strat pickups, vintage wiring and American vintage synchronised tremolo, just to name a few features. Many of the other models in Fender’s collection toy with exciting finishes including TV Yellow, Candy Tangerine and even an “Electric Lettuce” Strat. The builders at Jackson brought their usual metal approach, with one offering being a Custom Shop Dinky with “Space Tiger” artwork (priced at a whopping $6,6999.99 USD by the way), which has a fast caramelised flame maple neck with black sharkfin inlays. It’s got DiMarzio Dreamcatcher and Rainmaker pickups, a Floyd Rose bridge and Gotoh tuners. Charvel crafted a Signature Model So Cal Bass for Anthrax’s Frank Bello which has a quartersawn maple neck, block inlays, hipshot tuners and a brass nut. The gloss black alder body features Bello’s custom EMG pickup set, Hipshot Hi-Mass Bridge and a custom mirrored pickguard. A G6128 Baritone Duo Jet Closet Classic Relic model from Gretsch was designed for those who like to keep things looking classic but want to reach into those low-register tones and play around with down tuning.
The S&P 500 also took a nosedive, dropping to its lowest point of the year at 3,667, a decline of more than 15% since March. The Nasdaq fell to 10,847, down 20% since March. The market-wide drop came days after the Fed’s latest 75 basis-point interest rate hike, which brought the current federal funds rate to between 3.00% and 3.25%. The central bank is struggling to tamp down the highest inflation numbers seen in four decades. Although annual inflation fell to 8.3% in August, down slightly from July, the monthly headline figure was up 0.1% over July, a higher reading than expected. That triggered another sharp selloff in markets earlier this month, sending stocks on September 13 to their worst day of trading since June 2020.
The Fed plans to increase rates still further before the end of the year and projects a rise to 4.60% in 2023 before any potential cuts, even as many economists fear further hikes will tip the economy into a full-on recession. Indeed, Fed Chair Jerome Powell has acknowledged that the central bank’s efforts have contributed to “declining activity of all kinds” in the housing market and could cause unemployment to climb. The majority of economists forecast the US entering a recession by mid-2023, according to a survey conducted by the National Association of Business Economics last month, while 20% believe that it is already there. President Joe Biden, however, insisted earlier in the month that things are “going to be fine,” reminding the population that “the stock market doesn’t necessarily reflect the state of the economy, as you well know.” “The economy is still strong,” he claimed. “Unemployment is low. Jobs are up. Manufacturing is good. I think we’re going to be fine.” The world’s indifference to the prospect of a nuclear disaster, today, is frankly insane. For the past few months, Western experts have downplayed the probability that the Ukraine war would lead to nuclear escalation between Russia and the West. Since Putin first put Russia’s nuclear arsenal on alert back in February, many experts have argued that he was merely posturing in a bid to throw his “adversaries off balance”. However, Putin’s most recent threats of using such weapons — made in a televised speech on Wednesday morning — must not be taken lightly, regardless of his motivation or intention.
He said that Western officials have threatened Russia with nuclear weapons, a charge that US President Joe Biden denied during his speech to the United Nations General Assembly hours later. Putin also announced a partial mobilisation and his support for upcoming referendums in four Russian-controlled regions of Ukraine that could pave the way for their annexation by Moscow. It’s one thing for the West to dismiss as irrelevant the threat of Putin firing, for instance, a secretary. However, any chance he may fire his nukes should be taken seriously, regardless of how remote the possibility is. In fact, the West has so far avoided imposing a no-fly zone over Ukraine or transferring long-range missiles and other weapons that may threaten Russian territory for fear of the Kremlin’s retaliation against Europe. Yet, the sophisticated military assistance that the US and its allies have provided to Kyiv has begun to change the balance of power on the battlefield in favour of Ukraine. Russia’s mounting losses in the past few weeks are clearly pushing Putin into a corner. He is angry, humiliated and is losing clout at home and abroad. That’s why he has decided to mobilise 300,000 extra troops to try to reverse his setbacks in Ukraine. However, as past Russian and American wars have shown – whether in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq or elsewhere – a troops surge may win him time but won’t necessarily win him the war. That’s why he coupled his decision for a military surge with a nuclear warning, putting the West on notice: back off or face the consequences. Hence the seriousness of Putin’s threat to use weapons of mass destruction. The threat is “not a bluff” as he put it, nor a bluster; it rather sounds desperate and deliberate. It is also the biggest escalation since the invasion began seven months ago and the biggest troop mobilisation since the end of the Cold War. Some are now sounding a warning about Putin’s potential use of tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield. Or as one analyst put it: “Russia is willing to use nuclear weapons if Ukraine continues its offensive operations”. Indeed, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said on Thursday that the Kremlin could use tactical nuclear weapons to defend its occupation of parts of Ukraine that it annexes. In theory, the use of these weapons, which are short-range and designed for limited strikes, sounds implausible considering Ukraine’s geographic proximity and Russia’s nuclear doctrine which underlines the defensive use of nuclear weapons or when the very existence of Russia is threatened. The world is not doing enough to end the conflict in Ukraine, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told journalists in New York on Thursday. International leaders should focus on diplomacy and talk more with both Moscow and Kiev to put an end to the conflict between Ukraine and Russia in a peaceful way, he said. Ankara has always “believed in the power of dialogue and diplomacy,” Erdogan said, pointing to Turkey’s mediating efforts in both the Istanbul grain deal between Moscow and Kiev, and the recent prisoner exchange between the two sides. He added that individual efforts of world leaders are not enough.
“The UN could not end the war, could not stop the bloodshed and it could not find a solution to the energy and food crisis,” he said, calling on other world leaders to join Turkey in its diplomatic efforts. Erdogan noted that he would call Putin and Zelensky and continue his “telephone diplomacy.” There must be a “joint effort of all world leaders,” and “everyone” should be talking to Russian President Vladimir Putin, as well as Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, to “open the door” for diplomacy, he said. Any “negative approaches” to the two leaders will “not bring the result we expect,” but will only bring more death and destruction, Erdogan warned. Since the start of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, the US and its allies in Europe and elsewhere have supported Kiev through financial and military aid. Moscow has repeatedly warned that arms deliveries to Kiev will only prolong the conflict. French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz are among the few Western leaders who have remained in contact with Putin since the start of the operation, though their efforts so far have not brought about any diplomatic breakthroughs. Turkey has maintained contact with both Moscow and Kiev throughout the hostilities. It condemned the use of force by Russia, but refused to take part in the international sanctions on Moscow. Ankara was also involved in the UN-brokered deal to allow the export of grain from Ukrainian ports, which was agreed on between Russia and Ukraine in July. Earlier this week, Erdogan told US news program PBS NewsHour that Moscow seeks to end the conflict as soon as possible. He also said that Russia cannot be allowed to keep the territories it has gained since February. A user on the gaming website GTAForums has posted nearly 100 clips of test footage from the upcoming Grand Theft Auto 6, marking one of the largest leaks in video game industry history. The leak was confirmed by GTA’s developer, Rockstar Games. The user who released the footage over the weekend goes by the handle ‘teapotuberhacker’ and claims to have also been behind last week’s Uber hack, which took down several of the service’s internal systems. In his post on GTAForums, the hacker shared a link to a 3GB file containing 90 clips of GTA 6 test footage and claimed they are considering leaking more data “soon.” Rockstar Games wrote in a Twitter post that the company “suffered a network intrusion in which an unauthorized third party illegally accessed and downloaded confidential information from our systems including early development footage for the next Grand Theft Auto.”
The developer expressed disappointment that details about the game were revealed, but stressed it would not disrupt the development process, which will “continue as planned.” The released test footage appears to match early reports about the game. It includes the series’ first playable female character and is set in the Miami-esque Vice City which featured in previous titles. Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier, who was one of the first to confirm the leaks were genuine, described it as “one of the biggest leaks in video game history and a nightmare for Rockstar Games.” The videos have already garnered millions of views after spreading on social media, showing very early in-game footage full of unfinished textures and models, placeholder text, and debug code playing out in real-time. Some of the more complete videos show full scenes from the game, including one where playable characters rob a diner and hold up patrons at gunpoint. The hacker said the leak had gone “unexpectedly viral” and updated his forum post to include details on how Rockstar or Take2 employees can reach him, as he is “looking to negotiate a deal”, apparently regarding other potential disclosures. While the game is believed to have been in development since 2014, it’s unclear how old the footage is. Some video game outlets suggest that most of the clips can’t be older than two years as they appear to be running on the latest graphics cards from Nvidia. Grand Theft Auto 6 is reportedly at least two years away from an official release. Siemens Gamesa’s first recyclable blades are spinning on a wind turbine at the Kaskasi offshore wind farm in Germany. For many years it was possible to recycle these blades. The only solution was to use these blades in landfills. For Siemens it’s the first commercial installation of recyclable wind turbine technology. The S panish-German wind engineering giant calls its recyclable blade technology RecyclableBlade. Wind turbine blades are made of a number of materials embedded in resin. Siemens Gamesa explains: Separating the resin, fiberglass, and wood, among others, is achieved through using a mild acid solution. The materials can then go into the circular economy, creating new products like suitcases or flat-screen casings without the need to call on more raw resources. The Recyclable Blade technology was developed in Aalborg, Denmark, and the blades were manufactured in Hull in the UK (pictured above). The nacelles were produced and installed in Cuxhaven, Germany. Siemens Gamesa has a plan to make all of its wind turbine blades fully recyclable by 2030 and all of its wind turbines fully recyclable by 2040. Marc Becker, CEO of the Siemens Gamesa Offshore Business Unit, said: We’ve brought the Siemens Gamesa RecyclableBlade technology to market in only 10 months: from launch in September 2021 to installation at RWE’s Kaskasi project in July 2022. This is impressive and underlines the pace at which we all need to move to provide enough generating capacity to combat the global climate emergency. The 342 megawatt (MW) Kaskasi offshore wind farm is owned by German energy company RWE. It’s 35 km (21.7 miles) north of the island of Helgoland in the German North Sea. Siemens Gamesa doesn’t specify how many of the offshore wind farm’s 38 SG 8.0-167 DD wind turbines will feature the RecyclableBlade; it just says that “a number of turbines” will be recyclable. Those turbines that do feature them will have “handcrafted Siemens Gamesa B81 RecyclableBlades, each with a length of 81 meters [266 feet].”
Sweden's Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson has conceded defeat in Sweden's general election, after the opposition right bloc gained one extra seat in Wednesday's count of late and overseas votes.
“It’s a thin majority, but it is a majority, so tomorrow I will therefore request my dismissal as prime minister and responsibility for the process will pass to the Speaker and the Parliament,” Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson said in a press conference on Wednesday evening. “This is going to be a tough and complicated parliamentary term,” she said. “But the government which is going to run Sweden is going to have a good starting point.” She then ran through her party’s achievements in government and pointed to the fact that her party gained votes in the campaign. “We Social Democrats had a strong election campaign with a strong election result. The Social Democrats are not only Sweden’s biggest party, but the biggest party in Northern Europe,” she said. With only twenty districts left to count, the four parties supporting Ulf Kristersson for prime minister have 176 mandates to the 173 mandates held by the four parties backing Andersson. One mandate moved from the Social Democrats to the Moderates in the Wednesday count of late arriving advance votes, and overseas votes. Sweden’s speaker Andreas Norlén is expected to nominate Ulf Kristersson as the first person to go up for a vote in parliament to be Prime Minister. Kristersson needs at least 175 MPs to either vote for him or abstain to be appointed. Until then, Andersson will lead a caretaker government. In her speech, she said she would then stay on to lead her party in opposition. Moderate Party leader Ulf Kristersson said in video posted on Facebook that he was “now beginning work to set up a new, dynamic government”. “Sweden has an election result. The voters have spoken,” he said. “The Moderates and the other parties on my side had got the mandate for change that we asked for,” he wrote. “I will now start the work to set up a new, dynamic government.” The party’s group leader, Tobias Billström, was the first to announce victory, writing “We won!!!” in a tweet which he then immediately deleted. Ebba Busch, leader of the Christian Democrats, then published a victory tweet. “We have an election result and the Swedish people have voted for a change in government,” she wrote. World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus declared on Wednesday that the end of the Covid-19 pandemic is close at hand. While the virus is still spreading at the same level as last year, despite mass vaccination, deaths have fallen significantly. “We are not there yet. But the end is in sight,” Tedros said at a press briefing. Claiming that vaccination and other public health measures have reduced the threat posed by the virus, the WHO chief called on governments to push for 100% vaccination of vulnerable people and healthcare workers, and 70% vaccination of the general public. “A marathon runner does not stop when the finish line comes into view, she runs harder with all the energy that she has left,” he said. “Now is the worst time to stop running.” The impact of vaccines, masks, lockdowns, and other public health measures on the virus’ spread has been a controversial issue, with near-totally vaccinated countries like Singapore still experiencing waves of infection this summer that dwarfed similar spikes in 2021 and 2020. Some 3.1 million cases of Covid-19 were confirmed globally in the week ending September 5, compared to 3.9 million in the same week in 2021, and 1.9 million in the same week in 2020. Deaths have fallen, however, with 11,000 linked to the virus in the week ending September 5, the lowest weekly total since March 16, 2020. Tedros announced that the WHO would release six policy briefs for governments later on Wednesday, outlining the steps the organization thinks are necessary to avoid “more variants, more deaths, more destruction and more uncertainty.” Among these steps are the aforementioned vaccination push, the maintenance of infection control measures in hospitals, increased testing and sequencing, and the administration of appropriate treatment to patients.
Researchers from the University of Adelaide have found bots have had a major online presence during the war between Russia and Ukraine. The researchers analysed 5,203,764 tweets, retweets, quote tweets and replies posted to Twitter between 23 February 2022, and 8 March 2022, containing the hashtags #(I)StandWithPutin, #(I)StandWithRussia, #(I)SupportRussia, #(I)StandWithUkraine, #(I)StandWithZelenskyy and #(I)SupportUkraine. “We found that between 60 and 80 per cent of tweets using the hashtags we studied came from bot accounts during the first two weeks of the war,” said co-lead researcher Joshua Watt, an MPhil candidate in Applied Mathematics and Statistics from the University of Adelaide’s School of Mathematical Sciences. “This drove more angst in the online discourse and even impacted discussions surrounding people’s decision to flee or stay in Ukraine. “We observed increases in words such as ‘shame’, ‘terrorist’, ‘threat’, and ‘panic’. “Pro-Russian human accounts were having the largest influence on discussions of the war – particularly on accounts which were pro-Ukraine. “To our knowledge, this is the first body of published work which addresses online influence operations in the context of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. “In the past, wars have been primarily fought physically, with armies, air force and navy operations being the primary forms of combat. “However, social media has created a new environment where public opinion can be manipulated at a very large scale. As a result, these environments can be used to manipulate discussion, as well as cause disruption and overall public distrust.” “In the past, wars have been primarily fought physically, with armies, air force and navy operations being the primary forms of combat. However, social media has created a new environment where public opinion can be manipulated at a very large scale." Fellow co-lead researcher, Bridget Smart, a Masters student in Applied Mathematics and Statistics, added: “Our research identifies that this is happening during the Russia-Ukraine war and provides a statistical framework which quantifies the extent to which this is happening. “This work extends and combines existing techniques to quantify how bots are influencing people in the online conversation around the Russia-Ukraine invasion.
“It opens up avenues for researchers to understand quantitatively how these malicious campaigns operate, and what makes them impactful. This research has identified that social media organisations may need to be better equipped for detecting and handling the use of bots on their networks. “It has identified that governments may need to have stricter policies on social media organisations, and that social media can be a vital tool during conflict.” The paper titled “#IStandWithPutin versus #IStandWithUkraine: The interaction of bots and humans in discussion of the Russia/Ukraine war” has been published in arXiv and will be presented at The International Conference on Social Informatics in Glasgow from 19-21 October. The biggest challenge the German industrial sector currently faces is posed by rising energy costs, The Economist reported on Sunday, citing the association of German industry BDI.“The substance of our industry is under threat,” BDI President Siegfried Russwurm said as quoted by the media, adding that the situation was looking “toxic” for many businesses.
According to the association, the electricity price for next year has already increased fifteen-fold, and the price of gas ten-fold. In July, the country’s industry, which has been forced to reduce production capacities, reportedly consumed 21% less gas than in the same month in 2021. Smaller companies are struggling more than bigger ones, according to a study by the consulting company FTI Andersch, as cited by the media. Some 25% of firms with fewer than 1,000 employees were forced to cancel or decline orders, or are planning to do so, compared with 11% of those with over 1,000 employees. Almost 10,000 bread manufacturers are reportedly struggling as never before in post-war Germany, as the cost of the electricity and gas needed to heat ovens and run kneading machines have increased enormously. The BDI survey of 600 medium-sized companies showed that nearly one in ten interrupted or reduced output because of high input costs, while more than nine in ten said that the soaring prices of energy and raw materials is a big or an existential challenge for them. One in five are reportedly considering relocating part or all of their production to another country. Bigger companies that use energy-intensive production capacities, such as chemicals or steel producers, may also relocate abroad, as they have to compete with rivals in other countries, where the cost of energy is lower. If energy prices remain high for a while, up to 3% of Germany’s energy-intensive businesses will relocate abroad, according to Holger Schmieding, the chief economist of private bank Berenberg. Ukraine’s eastern region has suffered a “total blackout” a day after a counterattack by Kyiv’s troops forced the Russian army to retreat from large tracts of the Kharkiv region, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accusing Moscow of deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure. Ukrainian officials said water facilities and a thermal power station in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-biggest city, were deliberately attacked, causing power outages and cuts in water supplies.
“No military facilities, the goal is to deprive people of light & heat,” Zelenskyy wrote on Twitter late on Sunday, describing the Russians as “terrorists”. As many as nine million people in the region, including in territory controlled by Russia, could be affected. “There is no electricity or water supply in several settlements. Emergency services are working to control fires at the sites that were hit,” Oleg Synegubov, the governor of the Kharkiv region, said in a statement on social media. Similar reports came in the evening from the regions of Sumy, Dnipropetrovsk, Poltava, Zaporizhzhia and Odesa. ‘Completely dark’ Al Jazeera’s Hoda Abdel Hamid reporting from Kharkiv said there are “power outages in five regions in the northeast and eastern part of the country. What we’re hearing from officials is that the Russians have hit critical infrastructure; they’re not telling us what or where, but this city is in pitch-black. “We were on the streets when [the power outage] happened and as we were driving back to our location, everything was completely dark; there was not one light on. It was quite an eerie scene.” |
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