This country sucks, and could learn from Norway

[Tellos Athenaios]

They were in the situation we are in now a few years ago, and squandered it all. We try our best not to make their mistakes, and Krazilec is correct that our oil-fund was inspired by their mistakes.

We call it "the dutch disease" here.

If by "a few years ago" you mean the 1960's/70's? As opposed to the 90's/00's which more or less created the current situation?

Got any Protocols of the Elders to explain how those bankers work?

Anyhoo, a country relying on natural resources is bound to stay poor. Countries without them are bound to be wealthy. It's not a coincidence that Europe's first truly wealthy states came in areas without natural resources or agriculture(Holland and the Italian city-states). Ditto for the East. Asia's wealthiest country, Japan, is also the country with the fewest resources.

Two extremely poor choices. The Italian city states were funded by wealth from agriculture surplus and being conveniently located on a nexus of trade routes, and the Dutch were funded by much the same (dairy + trade routes).

Gas doesnt need that much treatment before consumption, and I think we do it ourselves. There are various industrial applications for natural gas (i.e. used for fertilizer, conversion into methanol, etc) and we might import some of that stuff, but that's not quite the same thing.

Our pipelines also serve as a distribution node for foreign gas towards other European countries, maybe that's what Frags meant.

Either that or a capacity thing. Could be the gas supply is maintained at a nearly continuous capacity which is somewhat lower than our peak demand -- so during peaks we buy Russian through Germany. The alternative is what Britain does which is to make it a survival of the fittest granny thing. Though that might also have something to do with a penchant for choosing poor housing and a stubborn reluctance to invest in their own comfort.