The US could instead build a reactor to reprocess "spent nuclear fuel" and use it again for about the same price.

Yes, Russia is the biggest exporter of nuclear fuel.

Great post. I appreciate hearing about things like this, even if it's a little late. Also, a lot of things are only 'current' news because they're purposely kept in the news cycle. If this one has slipped off the radar but it's still happening, then it remains current news even if the press isn't interested in picking it up.

The company TerraPower, founded by Bill Gates, plans to enrich uranium one day in a decommissioned coal mine in the US state of Wyoming. A centrifuge factory is also planned in Ohio. “But years will pass and more state subsidies are needed,” […]

Almost like the free market is incompatible with tackling climate change and taking 'moral' positions. It's as if the war in Ukraine is a great excuse for the US state to underwrite the projects of US billionaires.

Europe, on the other hand, has taken action: most countries voluntarily forego a lot of cheap Russian oil and even completely on Russian natural gas,

I'm not sure if I'd call it voluntary. The ruling class might have volunteered to sacrifice their populations at the alter of US hegemony. But I wouldn't believe that this was voluntary until I saw a very specific referendum at the very least. Fairly sure if you'd have asked the working class, they'd have said no to both war and energy price increases.

Not to mention that Germany not using Nord Stream 2 can hardly be called voluntary. They were threatened not to do it, they did it, and it was blown up.

so that Russia receives as little foreign currency as possible.

While Europe has increased imports of US LNG, Russian exports to Europe and the income therefrom hasn't dropped as much as might be expected. It's just filtered through third states, who (a) add a markup and (b) pay Russia in currencies other than the dollar.

In doing so, the countries of Europe accept high prices and inflation with all its consequences.

I'd want to hear from a significant section of the European public before I accepted this claim. It seems to me that waves of strike action over the cost of energy, etc, materially contradict it.

The problem is that hypocrisy doesn't come into it. The ruling class has no interest in moral consistency. Only of maximizing profits even if it means telling us one thing while they do another.

One broader motif of narratives like this is to prime the citizens of liberal democracies for three ideas: (i) greening the economy is going to be expensive; (ii) it's natural for the state to pay for and hand over control of domestic energy security to billionaire leeches; and (iii) standards of living have to drop if you want to live at all. That's not explicit in the story, but it's the message that will seep in to consciousness without people realising.

I love U 235