Wood pellets and a 20% tax

[Ellsworth]

I'm going off memory so bear with me.

Europe added a 20% VAT tax onto wood pellets used for horse bedding.
They deemed horses a 'luxury item.'

So Feed and Farm stores started ordering extra pallets of wood stove pellets: no extra VAT tax.

Ukraine was a major supplier of wood pellets to the European market.
The war burned down manufacturing and supply.

On youtube you can now find a lot of vids about how to make DIY wood pellet presses/mills.
The accents are enjoyable, the mechanics are sometimes amazing.

I did a pretty deep dive into the topic and my primary take away is this:

'Europe is one EMP away from horses becoming a necessity.'

Edited to add:
There were a lot of other takeaways from the deep dive.
1) Pellets are a clean renewable source of fuel
2) US production has increased, and exports to Europe have increased
3) US pellet prices might increase due to production loss in Ukraine
4) Turkey is poised to become a major pellet producer which could ease European demand. I have yet to consider what happens with that, if they enter the middle east conflict
5) et cetera