Ryan Bridge: Looks like the LNG deal's dead in the water, for now

Energy is everything, but you can't have your cake and eat it too.

The LNG terminal is on ice 'till after the election. Shane Jones told Ryan Bridge Today as much last week.

The Taranaki project hasn't been green lit by Cabinet and there's no way it will be pre-election. There's also no way a contract of that sort would be signed by what is basically a caretaker government.

The Methanex closure buys time, but how much, we don't know.

The thing they said we need, the terminal, is now at the whims of the election and coalition talks.

Businesses and factories don't close just because of costs, they close because of uncertainty. Investment dries up. You need reassurance you've got inputs to produce outputs.

How many more closures will we see before we have options, and back-up options, signed, sealed, and delivered?

In Australia, they're just waking up to the fact data centres run 24/7 and therefore, when the sun don't shine and wind don't blow during a cold winter's evening, these beasts need a power source.

There's an energy conference there this week and business leaders are telling Albanese they need coal and gas back-ups to operate his $200 billion promised pipeline of data centres.

The problem with politicians is that we vote for them. To appeal to use, they do and say things that aren't necessarily in our long-term interests.

Case in point, Trump's looking at a diesel export ban to lower prices in the US to try and lower gas prices ahead of the midterms.

The only upshot, if we can call it that, of this year's squeeze on oil and 2022's electricity crunch is that voters are alive to the fact we actually need a plan to keep the country running, preferably one that actually gets delivered.

Ryan Bridge is a New Zealand broadcaster who has worked on many current affairs television and radio shows. He currently hosts Newstalk ZB's Early Edition - where this article was sourced.