China Daily reports that Wuhan has cut off the supply of natural gas to all industries and businesses to make sure that residential homes have enough to keep warm following this week’s snowstorm, which according to the article was the worst snowstorm in 40 years.
The government said the city is facing a shortage of about 1 million cu m of natural gas. The surge in demand is mainly due to increasingly popular gas-powered home water heaters. Homes in areas south of the Yangtze River have traditionally been unheated, but many now have air conditioners and home water heaters.
We have a gas-powered water heater in our apartment as well, and I’m very thankful that it’s still working. (The foreign students dorm at Wuda has apparently only had electicity intermittently these past few days).
Still, the economic impact of this must be huge. There’s certainly something to be said for the returns on basic infrastructure investment. At times I have my doubts, at least in terms of the scale of investment in roads and real estate (and railway lines) — sometimes it can seem like money is being spent on “roads to nowhere” simply as as a way to pump money into the economy and powerful pockets. But energy definitely seems to fall in the category of desperately needing further investment (even though infrastructure is just one aspect of addressing China’s energy problem) — demand for staying warm in the winter is just going to increase, not to speak of the industrial demand for natural gas, and the cost of having to cut off supplies of gas to industry on weeks like this must be huge.
Hmm. I suppose if an aggressor ever wanted me to capitulate, all they’d basically have to do is cut off my access to hot water.
Achilles heel NO!!!!