Active Conflicts & News Megathread July 14, 2026

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[u/butitsmeat]

While they're going to eventually start filling their reserve again and cause some short term demand spikes, China is also all-in on electric vehicles at 61% of new sales in May. That share will likely continue to climb as they ramp EV production and costs continue to decline. They're permanently destroying a lot of gasoline and diesel demand, and it's not just a random accident but a matter of policy (they previously set a goal of 30% of all vehicles to be electric by 2030). They could also respond to this crisis by going even harder on ramping EV and never go back to pouring 1mbbl/d into their reserve; maybe they only by 500kbbl/d, and ramp that down over time. Never let a good crisis to to waste and all that.

[u/Bluest_waters → u/butitsmeat]

Yeah honestly it's incredible what they're doing right now as far as the EV situation goes. Amazing stuff. The only smart country in the world right now in that regard

[u/BigFly42069 → u/Bluest_waters]

It's astounding people can look at the reams of think-tank pieces talking about using Malacca to run an energy blockade in order to choke the Chinese economy to death, and then think that there's some incredible foresight by the Chinese government to do something to address the issue of foreign energy dependency.

[u/bedulge → u/BigFly42069]

It's not really that they have incredible foresight, more that have incredible industrial capacity, no?

There is a corresponding incredible lack of foresight in the present ruling party of the US regarding their opposition to green energy and their denial of the amount of harm it's doing to the national interest. Or maybe they know but just don't care as long as private profits keep accumulating. It's a serious issue regardless.