Samsom, who comes from Groningen, former site of Europe’s largest gas field, worked for the Dutch Greenpeace subsidiary in the late 1990s before entering politics.

He is best known in Brussels as the right-hand of Commission Vice-President Timmermans during negotiations on the Green Deal, and the “Fit for 55 climate” package. When his boss left town in 2023, he stayed on until early 2024 to conclude the term.

His new job was announced by state-owned Gasunie on 26 June, after his appointment by the Dutch finance minister.

“We are extremely pleased that Diederik Samsom will be joining our Supervisory Board,” said Tim van der Hagen, vice-chair of the board.

Samsom’s “wide-ranging knowledge of both the domestic and the international energy sector” as well as his time in Dutch parliament and the European Commission equipped him to make a “significant contribution” to realising Gasunie’s “strategic ambitions,” van der Hagen added.

The new chair himself said “Gasunie contributes to energy security and achieving the climate goals in the Netherlands and Germany” which “motivated” him to join the board.

Gasunie is expected to play a major role in transporting hydrogen to Germany’s industrial heartland, and storing CO2 underground.

The Porthos Carbon Capture and Storage project co-founded by the utility is considered the first functional CO2 storage project in the EU, eyeing a total CO2 sequestration of 37 million tonnes.

L'articolo Green policies are the past, back to normality! – Frans Timmermans’ right-hand man, Diederik Samsom, will be the new chairmansh of the supervisory board of Gasunie, the Dutch gas giant. Samsom had been one of the main negotiators at the time of the green deal. Today the scale of priorities is different and one is forced to get one’s hands dirty… proviene da Bubble report.

Gas production costs no more than 5-10 €/MWh worldwide. A cap on the price of gas has been rejected by Germany, which wants to prevent any restriction on over-the-counter trading and derivatives. This trading is often the source of speculation. Suffice it to say that the EEX exchange in Leipzig, where many of the transactions, including those of the Dutch TTF, originate, is a flagship of German speculative finance, absorbing a lot of liquidity and generating wealth for the Dutsche Boerse, one of the world’s leading financial operators. Any cap on the price of gas would remove liquidity from these markets. This is why Germany and the Netherlands are reluctant to impose a real cap on the price of gas.

The cost of CO2 emission permits in Europe is 70 euros, while the Chinese pay only 10 euros. The prices our companies pay for electricity are much higher than in China and the United States, and this affects our competitiveness. Nuclear power is the leading source of electricity generation in Europe, accounting for 23 percent, mainly thanks to France’s 56 nuclear reactors. This is what Europe really needs to focus on if it really wants to reduce CO2 emissions and ensure economic growth.

L'articolo Bubblereport #19 – The Green Deal bullshit. At the Strasbourg plenary, Lady Ursula finally wakes up to the fact that ‘energy costs continue to affect our competitiveness’. But then she lies: ‘We expect gas prices to fall.’ From a low of 25 euros per megawatt hour, they have already risen to 32 euros per megawatt hour just in the last few days… proviene da Bubble report.