Since the late 1990s, globalization has seemed to be the great hope for the future. Now this great hope seems to be dimming. Globalization sets up conflict in the area of jobs. Countries around the world compete for development and jobs. If there is not enough cheap-to-produce energy to go around, huge wage disparity is likely to result.
We know from physics and history that economies need to grow, or they collapse. The wage disparity that high-wage countries have been experiencing in recent years is evidence that the world economy is already reaching energy limits. There are no longer enough jobs that pay well to go around. Any drop in energy supply is likely to worsen the job situation.
Most observers miss this problem, because they expect high oil prices to signal energy limits. This time, the signal is low wages for a significant group of workers, rather than high oil prices. This situation is possible in a networked economy, but it is not what most people look for.
Unhappy citizens can be expected to react to the wage disparity problem by electing leaders who favor limits to globalization. This can only play out in terms of reduced globalization.
History and physics suggest that economies without adequate energy supply can be expected to collapse. We have several recent examples of partial collapses, including the Great Depression of the 1930s and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Such collapses, or even more extensive collapses, might occur again if we cannot find energy alternatives that can be quickly scaled up to replace oil and coal in the very near term. These replacements need to be cheap-to-produce, non-polluting, and available in huge quantities.
The story that the economy doesn’t really need a growing supply of very cheap-to-produce energy is simply a myth. Let’s look at some of the pieces of this story.
[1] The world economy needs to grow or it collapses. Once all of the nations of the world are included in the world economy, one obvious source of growth (incorporating nations that are not yet industrialized into the world economy) disappears.
The reason why the world economy needs to grow is because the economy is a self-organized system that operates under the laws of physics. In many ways it is like a two-wheeled bicycle. A bicycle needs to roll quickly enough, or it will fall over. An economy must grow quickly enough, or debt cannot be repaid with interest.
Also, government promises may be a problem with slow growth. Pensions for the elderly are typically paid out of tax revenue collected in that same year. It is easy for a mismatch to take place if the number of younger workers is shrinking or if their wages are lagging behind.
Figure 1. Author’s view of analogies of speeding upright bicycle to speeding economy.
I explain a little more about my bicycle analogy in Will the World Economy Continue to “Roll Along” in 2018?
Economies throughout the ages have collapsed. In some cases, entire civilizations have disappeared. In the past 100 years, partial collapses have included the Great Depression of the 1930s, the collapse of the central government of the Soviet Union in 1991, and the Great Recession of 2008-2009. Economic collapses are analogous to bicycles falling over.
[2] A growing supply of energy products is extraordinarily important for keeping the world economy operating.
We can see in Figure 1 that the energy of the person operating a bicycle is very important in allowing the operation of the bicycle to continue. In the world’s economy, the situation is similar, except that we are facing a problem of a world population that is continually growing. In a sense, the economic situation is more like a rapidly growing army of bicycles with riders. Each member of the economy needs goods and services such as food, homes, clothing, and transportation. The members of the economy can collapse individually (for example, growing suicide rate) or in much larger groups (collapsing government of a country).
Figure 2. World population according to the United Nations 2017 historical estimates and Medium forecast of population growth after 2017.
In an economy, we have a choice regarding how much energy to use. If more energy is used, workers can have many tools (such as trucks and computers) to leverage their productivity. If all goods are made with few energy inputs other than human labor, most workers find themselves working in subsistence agriculture. The total amount of goods and services produced in such an economy tends to be very small.
If supplemental energy is used, many more jobs that pay well can be added, and many more goods and services can be created. Workers will be rich enough that they can pay taxes to support representative government that supports many services. The whole economy will look more like that of a rich nation, rather than the economy of Somalia or Haiti.
Individual nations can grow their economies by using available energy supply to create jobs that pay well. Globalization sets up competition for available jobs.
If a given country has a lot of high paying jobs, this is likely to be reflected in high per capita energy consumption for that country. There are two reasons for this phenomenon: (1) it takes energy for an employer to create jobs, and (2) workers can use their wealth to buy goods and services. This wealth buys more goods and services made with energy products.
[3] One measure of how well the world economy is doing is world energy consumption per capita. On this basis, the world economy is already reaching limits.
Figure 3. World energy per capita and world oil price in 2016 US$. Energy amounts from BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017. Population estimates from UN 2017 Population data and Medium Estimates.
It is clear from Figure 3 that energy consumption tends to move in the same direction as oil price. If “demand” (which is related to wages) is high, both oil price and the amount of energy products sold will tend to be high. If demand is low, both oil price and the amount of energy products sold will tend to be low.
Since 2014, energy consumption has remained quite high, but oil prices have fallen very low. Today’s oil prices (even at $70 per barrel) are too low for oil producers to make adequate investment in the development of new fields and make other needed expenditures. If this situation does not change, the only direction that production of oil can go is down, rather than up. Prices may temporarily spike, prior to the time production falls.
Looking at energy consumption per capita on Figure 3 (above), we notice that this amount has been fairly flat since 2011. Normally, in a growing world economy, a person would expect energy consumption per capita to rise, as it has most of the time since 1820 (Figure 4).
Figure 4. World Energy Consumption by Source, based on Vaclav Smil estimates from Energy Transitions: History, Requirements and Prospects (Appendix) together with BP Statistical Data for 1965 and subsequent, divided by population estimates by Angus Maddison.
The fact that energy consumption per capita has been nearly flat since 2011 is worrying. It is a sign that the world economy may not be growing very rapidly, regardless of what government organizations are reporting to the World Bank. Some subsidized growth should not really be considered economic growth. For example, some Chinese cities have been buying off the country’s housing glut with borrowed money. A better accounting would likely show lower GDP growth for China and the world.
Looking more closely at Figure 3, we note that energy per capita hit a high point in 2013, just before world oil prices began sliding downward. Since then, world energy consumption per capita has been trending downward. This is part of the reason for gluts in supply. Producers had been planning as if normal growth in energy consumption would continue. In fact, something is seriously wrong with demand, so world energy consumption has not been rising as fast as in the past.
The point that is easy to miss is that (a) growing wage disparity plus oil gluts and (b) high oil prices are, in a sense, different ways of reflecting a similar problem, that of an inadequate supply of truly inexpensive-to-produce oil. High-cost-to-produce oil is not acceptable to the economy, because it doesn’t produce enough jobs that pay well, for each barrel produced. If oil prices today truly represented what oil producers (such as Saudi Arabia) need to maintain their production, including adequate tax revenue and funds to develop additional production, oil prices would be well over $100 per barrel.
We are dealing with a situation where no oil price works. Either prices are too high for a large number of consumers or they are too low for a large number of producers. When prices are low, relative to the cost of production, we tend to get wage disparity and gluts.
[4] The reason why energy demand is not growing is related to increased wage disparity. This is a problem for globalization, because globalization acts to increase wage disparity.
In the last section, I mentioned that demand is closely connected to wages. It is really wage disparity that becomes a problem. Goods and services become less affordable for the people most affected by wage disparity: the lower-paid workers. These people cut back on their purchases of goods such as homes and cars. Because there are so many lower-paid workers in the world, demand for energy products, such as oil and coal, fails to grow as rapidly as it otherwise would. This tends to depress prices for these commodities. It doesn’t necessarily reduce production immediately, however, because of the long-term nature of investments and because of the dependence of oil exporters on the revenue from oil.
Figure 5 shows that China and India’s energy consumption per capita has been rising, leaving less for everyone else.
Figure 5. Energy consumption per capita comparison, based on energy data from BP Statistical Review of World Energy 2017, and UN 2017 Population Estimates.
A major way that an economy (through the laws of physics) deals with “not enough goods and services to go around” is increased wage disparity. To some extent, this occurs because newly globalized countries can produce manufactured products more cheaply. Reasons for their advantage are varied, but include lower wages and less concern about pollution.
As a result, some jobs that previously would have been added in developed countries are replaced by jobs in newly globalized countries. It is probably not a coincidence that US labor force participation rates started falling about the time that China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001.
Figure 6. US Labor Force Participation Rate, as prepared by Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
Lower wages for unskilled workers may also occur as the result of immigration, and the resulting greater competition for less skilled jobs. This has been a particular concern in the UK.
[5] Adding China, India, and other countries through globalization temporarily gives a boost to world energy production. This boost disappears as the energy resources of the newly added countries deplete.
Both China and India are primarily coal producers. They rapidly ramped up production since joining the World Trade Organization (in 1995 for India; in 2001 for China). Now China’s coal production is shrinking, falling 11% from 2013 to 2016. Both China and India are major importers of fossil fuels (difference between black line and their own production).
Figure 7. China’s total energy consumption compared to its energy production by type, based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017.
Figure 8. India’s total energy consumption compared to its energy production by type, based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017.
China and India’s big surge in coal production has had a major impact on world coal production. The fact that both countries have needed substantial imports has also added to the growth in coal production in the “Other” category in Figure 9.
Figure 9 also shows that with China’s coal production down since 2013, total world coal production is falling.
Figure 9. World coal production by part of the world, based on BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017.
Figure 10 shows that world GDP and world energy supply tend to rise and fall together. In fact, energy growth tends to precede GDP growth, strongly suggesting that energy growth is a cause of GDP growth.
Figure 10. World three-year average GDP growth compared to world three-year average energy consumption growth. GDP data is from the World Bank, based on 2010 US$ weights of GDP by country; energy consumption is from BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017.
If a growth in energy consumption is indeed a primary cause of world economic growth, the drop in world coal production shown in Figure 9 is worrying. Coal makes up a large share of world energy supply (28.1% according to Figure 12). If its supply shrinks, it seems likely to cause a decline in world GDP.
Figure 11 shows energy consumption growth on a basis comparable to the energy consumption growth shown on Figure 10, except for different groupings: for the world in total, the world excluding China, and for the combination of the US, EU, and Japan. We can see from Figure 11 that the addition of China and Japan has greatly propped up growth in world energy consumption since 2001, when China joined the World Trade Organization.
Figure 11. Three-year average growth in energy consumption, for the world total; the world less China and India; and for the sum of the United States, the European Union, and Japan. Energy data from BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017.
The amount of the “benefit” was greatest in the 2003-2007 period. If we look at Exhibit 10, we see that world economic growth was around 4% per year during that period. This was a recent record high. Now the benefit is rapidly disappearing, reducing the possibility that the world energy consumption can grow as rapidly as in the past.
If we want world energy consumption per capita to rise again, we need a new large rapidly growing source of cheap energy to replace the benefit we received from China and India’s rapidly growing coal extraction. We don’t have any candidates for a suitable replacement. Intermittent renewables (wind and solar) are not candidates at all. According to the IEA, they comprised only 1% of world energy supply in 2015, despite huge investment. They are part of the gray “Other” slice in Figure 11.
Figure 12. Figure prepared by IEA showing Total Primary Energy Supply by type from this IEA document
Academic studies regarding wind and solar have tended to focus on what they “might” do, without considering the cost of grid integration. They have also overlooked the fact that any energy solution, to be a true energy solution, needs to be a huge energy solution. It has been more pleasant to give people the impression that they can somehow operate a huge number of electric cars on a small amount of subsidized intermittent electricity.
[6] On a world basis, energy consumption per capita seems to need to be rising to maintain a healthy economy.
When energy consumption is growing on a per capita basis, the situation is similar to one in which the average worker has more and more “tools” (such as trucks) available at his/her disposal, and sufficient fuel to operate these tools. It is easy to imagine how such a pattern of growing energy consumption per capita might lead to greater productivity and therefore economic growth.
If we look at historical periods when energy consumption has been approximately flat, we see a world economy with major problems.
Figure 13. World per Capita Energy Consumption with two circles relating to flat consumption. World Energy Consumption by Source, based on Vaclav Smil estimates from Energy Transitions: History, Requirements and Prospects (Appendix) together with BP Statistical Data for 1965 and subsequent, divided by population estimates by Angus Maddison.
The flat period of 1920-1940 seems to have been caused by limits reached on coal production, particularly in the United Kingdom, but also elsewhere. World War I , the Great Depression of the 1930s, and World War II all took place around this time period. Charles Hall and Kent Klitgaard in Energy and the Wealth of Nations argue that resource shortages are frequently the underlying cause for wars, including World Wars I and II.
The Great Depression seems to have been a partial economic collapse, indirectly related to great wage disparity at that time. Farmers, in particular, had a difficult time earning adequate wages.
The major event that took place in the 1990 to 2000 period was the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The central government collapsed, leaving the individual republics to operate independently. The Soviet Union also had strong trade relationships with a number of “satellite” countries, including Cuba, North Korea, and several Eastern European countries. In the next section, we will see that this collapse had a serious long-term impact on both the republics making up the Soviet Union and the satellite countries operating more independently.
[7] The example of the Soviet Union shows that collapses can and do happen in the real world. The effects can be long lasting, and can affect trade partners as well as republics making up the original organization.
In Figure 14, the flat period of the 1980-2000 period seems to be related to intentional efforts of the United States, Europe, and other developed countries to conserve oil, after the oil price spikes of the 1970s. For example, smaller, more fuel conserving vehicles were produced, and oil-based electricity generation was converted to other types of generation. Unfortunately, there was still a “backfire” effect related to the intentional cutback in oil consumption. Oil prices fell very low, for an extended period.
The Soviet Union was an oil exporter. The government of the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, indirectly because with these low oil prices, the government could not support adequate new investment in oil and gas extraction. Businesses closed; people lost their jobs. None of the countries shown on the Figures 14 and 15 have as high energy consumption per capita in 2016 as they did back when the Soviet Union collapsed.
Figure 14. Per capita energy consumption for the Soviet Union and three of its satellite countries. Energy data from BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017. Population data from UN 2017 Population data and Middle Estimates.
The three satellite countries shown on Figure 14 (Bulgaria, Hungary, and Poland) seem to be almost as much affected as the republics that had been part of the Soviet Union (Figure 15). This suggests that loss of established trading patterns was very important in this collapse.
Figure 15. Per capita energy consumption for the three largest (by population) republics that made up the Soviet Union. Energy data from BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017. Population data from UN 2017 Population data and Middle Estimates.
Russia’s per capita energy consumption dropped 29% between peak and trough. It had significant fossil fuel resources, so when prices rose again, it was again able to invest in new oil fields.
Ukraine was a major industrial center. It was significantly impacted by the loss of oil and gas imports. It has never recovered.
The country that seemed to fare best was Uzbekistan. It had little industry before the collapse, so was less dependent on energy imports than most. Of all of the countries shown on Figures 14 and 15, Uzbekistan is the only one that did not lose population.
[8] Today, there seem to be many countries that are not far from collapse. Some of these countries are energy exporters; some are energy importers.
Many of us have read about the problems that Venezuela has been having recently. Ironically, Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world. Its problem is that at today’s prices, it cannot afford to develop those reserves. The Wikipedia article linked above is labeled 2014-2018 Venezuelan protests. Oil prices dropped to a level much lower than they had been in 2014. It should not be surprising that civil unrest and protests came at the same time.
Figure 16. Monthly average spot Brent oil prices, through December 2017, based on EIA data.
Other oil producers are struggling as well. Saudi Arabia has recently changed leaders, and it is in the process of trying to sell part of its oil company, Saudi Aramco, to investors. The new leader, Mohamed bin Salman, has been trying to get money from wealthy individuals within the country, using an approach that looks to outsiders like a shake-down. These things seem like very strange behaviors, suggesting that the country is experiencing serious financial difficulties. This is not surprising, given the low price of oil since 2014.
On the oil-importer side, Greece seems to frequently need support from the EU. The lower oil prices since 2014 have somewhat helped the country, but the basic shape of the energy consumption per capita chart makes it look like it is struggling to avoid collapse.
Figure 17. Greece energy per capita. Energy data from BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2017; population estimates from UN 2017 Population data and Medium projections.
There are many other countries struggling with falling energy consumption per capita. Figure 18 shows a chart with four such countries.
Figure 18. Energy consumption per capita for Japan, UK, Italy, and Spain. Energy consumption from BP Statistical Review of World Energy; population from UN 2017 Population data and Medium Estimates.
In a sense, even though oil prices have been lower since 2014, prices haven’t been low enough to fix the economic problems these countries have been having.
China is in a different kind of situation that could also lead to its collapse. It built its economy on coal production and rapidly growing debt. Now its coal production is down, and it is difficult for imports and substitution of other fuels to completely compensate. If slowing growth in fuel consumption slows economic growth, debt will become much harder to repay. Major debt defaults could theoretically lead to collapse. If China were to collapse, it would seriously affect the rest of the world because of its extensive trading relationships.
[9] Leaders of countries with increasing wage disparity and unhappy electorates can be expected to make decisions that will move away from globalization.
Unhappy workers are likely to elect at least some leaders who recognize that globalization is at least a small part of their problems. This is what has happened in the US, with the election of President Trump.
The hope, of course, is that even though the rest of the world is becoming poorer and poorer (essentially because of inadequate growth of cheap-to-produce energy supplies), somehow a particular economy can “wall itself off” from this problem. President Donald Trump is trying to remake trading arrangements, based on this view. The UK Brexit vote was in a sense similar. These are the kinds of actions that can be expected to scale back globalization.
Conclusion
Having enough cheap energy for the world’s population has been a problem for a very long time. When there is enough cheap-to-produce energy to go around, the obvious choice is to co-operate. Thus the trend toward globalization makes sense. When there is not enough cheap-to-produce energy to go around, the obvious choice is to try reduce the effects of globalization and immigration. This is the major reason why globalization can’t last.
We now have problems with both coal and oil. With the decline in China’s coal supplies, we are reaching the point where there are no longer enough cheap energy supplies to go around. At first glance, it looks like there is enough, or perhaps even a superabundance. The problem is that no price works. Producers around the world need higher oil prices, to be compensated for their total cost, including the cost of extraction, developing new fields, and the tax levels governments of exporting countries need. Consumers around the world are already having trouble trying to afford $70 per barrel oil. This is what leads to gluts.
We have been told that adding wind and solar to the electric grid can solve our problems, but this solution is simply absurd. If the world is to go forward as before, it somehow needs a new very large, very cheap supply of energy, to offset our problems with both coal and oil. This new energy supply should not be polluting, either.
At this point, it is hard to see any solution to the energy problems that we are facing. The best we can try to do is “kick the can” down the road a little farther. Perhaps “globalization light” is the way to go.
We live in interesting times!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpQH0g9onf8
I am a megalomaniac… I want to be called King. If you refuse to call me King then you are violating the law.
Man – woman. Choose. There is nothing else.
Doesn’t Peterson’s refusal to acknowledge certain tribal groups bother you at all?
The fact that Peterson and his allies and his enemies have any degree of relevance at all in current mass culture tells you how utterly fracked we are.
Agree – debating legislation about calling a tranny freak a zee or a zat…. seriously…. ridiculous.
there are trannies and then there are posers… weirdos who are riding the affirmative action train…making the bare minimum effort to be a man or woman…and demanding respect…for doing absolutely nothing. I can’t even say that the majority of them are highly skilled workers or artists with considerable talent. Nope, a lot of them are Communists who think it’s the job of society to take care of them. Did I mention that a significant percentage of them identify as “mentally ill”?
I don’t think affirmative action will get anyone very far. Certainly not far enough to depend on. I can believe that being able to sign up for health for benefits with someone else is worthwhile for someone who is in a field where the employer is not likely to provide them. This is much likely to be a motiving factor in the USA. I suppose in other countries, there could be different circumstances.
I think that there are an awfully lot of frustrated and confused people in society today. They tried college, and it didn’t work out for them. Perhaps they dropped out, and now all they have to show for their efforts is lots of debt, and very mediocre job opportunities. Or perhaps they have worked in a field for years without a college degree, and moved up in the ranks. Then they get laid off, and find it impossible to find a similar job today, without a degree.
At one time, there was an obvious route to the “top.” (Conform to expectations, go to school, and somehow things will work out.) Now that doesn’t work. People try different approaches to get some happiness out of life. If they can’t afford a wage and children, perhaps they can find a partner of the same sex, and the two of them can get along without children.
The thing is…
If you look like a man with a woman’s hairdo… whether our not you have something swinging down below….
http://images.medicaldaily.com/sites/medicaldaily.com/files/styles/headline/public/2014/01/29/transgender.jpg
… referring to yourself as zeee or zaat or whatever the f789 these walking freak shows want to be called…
Ain’t gonna result in you being accepted as normal. Snowflakes might buy that… but to 99.9999999% of all other people — you are just a f789ing major w.eir do.
There are TWO genders. Male – Female. No others.
If you are caught in between then you have a problem that requires psychiatric help. Not a new pronoun.
Did I mention I was considering starting up a traveling circus? Well… technically not a circus… more of a Traveling Freak Show. I am recruiting tranny-freaks, two headed children, women with hairy breasts…. if you know anyone who is .. out of the ordinary…. and needs a job…. please send them my way.
Wow FE, he’s hot!…uuuummm I mean she.
the Left is behaving the same way the Christian Right did when the 1% was throwing money at them. The 1% that supported the Christian Right came from “old ” industries that are not as wealthy as they used to be. The 1% that exists now is throwing a lot of non-profit money at those on the left. LGBT activism has replaced Christian missionaries in some respects…they’ve turned sexual orientation and identity into an ideology…
You mean transgenders are tribal groups? I didn’t catch that part of the discussion
No, I was referring to the same tribal group that protects its own interests that his heroes Jung, Solzhenitsyn, and Nietzsche all discussed at length but that he turns a blind eye to and indeed is very cozy with.
Can you provide a link to where he discusses this. And if he didn’t discuss it then what’s the point?
https://youtu.be/1GSUG_B-new?t=37m12s
Hmmm… I am not seeing the response… can you try that again
This one really needles him on the issue at hand:
https://pewtube.com/user/CustomerService/rdw36SM?autoplay=on
How is one to respond to a question – ‘are the J ew s likely to exact revenge on countries with a history of expelling them’ (particularly given he had not read the book)
It’s a stuuupid question to begin with given Z ion ists run the world.
And they refer to everyone else as cattle (goyim)…
There’s their revenge.
And if Peterson understands that — there is no way in hell is ever going to say that publicly.
For obvious reasons.
Acknowledging them may mean acknowledging that we screwed them over on their territory. I can’t see us handing back arable land back to native american tribes.
Male, female and non sexual (neuter). Only those that give a f&*k will survive. Sorry that should be have a….
I just made a bet with myself and won…
I bet that if I googled is kkkk cccc killing bees…. there would be a pile of stories claiming that is so…
I win.
Try it.
Type in just about anything along with the phrase XXX xxx or K C… and you’ll find it is the culprit….
It also makes a nice excuse for not addressing the actual pollutants causing these events—you linked above an article relating the coral reef bleaching to river runoff. Similarly bees are being killed off by pesticide use in industrial agriculture.
Blame everything that we can do nothing about without collapsing BAU… on XXX XXXXX…..
Then tell them … if we transition to ‘renewable’ energy …
We will save the world.
That resonates (with stewpid people)
I don’t get why you keep bringing it up. We are talking about finite world resource issues not your conspiracy issues.
These issues are beyond the comprehension of someone with an IQ below room temperature….
Boring
Infrastructure decay. Germany’s army equipment is broken and they can not afford to fix it. Maybe some electric tanks and recharging stations every 50 miles.
https://www.rt.com/news/417641-what-is-wrong-german-army/
it now appears that there was no planned collapse this collapse is spontaneous
could the drop be related to Groundhog Day? did he/she see its shadow?
nice summary talk by Nate.
looks like the endgame has begun amazing a drop of 666 points monday could be the big one looks like we have run out of luck
Didn’t you say june 1st day before yesterday?
i did say june the 1st but now i am starting to see that was just wishful thinking i was wrong,see how easy it is for the human mind to construct a fantasy for oneself sort of like a security blanket
great… I have confidence in you, adonis!
“… monday could be the big one looks like we have run out of luck”
oh no, did you “construct a fantasy” again?
I would bet everything I own that The Collapse will not be Monday, 2/5/2018…
wanna bet?
666 doesn’t sound like an auspicious number. We also had a blood moon lunar eclipse last week https://www.space.com/39557-next-blood-moon-eclipses-2018-2019.html following our solar eclipse in late 2017. I am sure that people with an interest in what they believe are signs could come up with more. I am afraid I don’t really follow this, but it may be as good or better than what our economists say regarding predicting the future.
it is a strange coincidence the dow plummetts 666 points we are facing an extinction level event and the bible makes reference to this number in the book of revelations a book about ‘end times’ http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/02/investing/stock-market-today-dow/index.html
Signalling Devil ‘it’s time – I am with you’
HRC and Bill are selling us out for Senate seats in Hell.
http://www.thelibertybeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/clinton1.png
If HRC is somehow a threat to humanity you’ve got a scoop.
actually the number of the beast is 616, as found in the oldest scrolls. Though if you need to speak to him now try 555 614 325, ask for Lucy.
Plunge Protection Team:
We need to adjust the markets so hold off on stepping in…
What number shall we allow boss?
Let’s go with the number of the beast…. given it is The Beast that we are holding on a very thick leash with our market manipulations ….
Let’s mock The Beast … let’s show him that we still have the strength to hold him back
Nate Hagens in Southern Barbaria.
Not even a downvote. Yet.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2DpfsqjQbP0&ebc=ANyPxKoG-TfhRwKa6_wQsDK0QtgrUVmGzMk55YXYeYrNYQqv5EOvWztR_wGpVJfif_AqFTJOM7iTbG-4X8Nx4O6puziNQZtSjA
Thanks, I liked this. There it is again, ‘oil is magic’ so simple, but almost no one gets it.
Excellent!
another thing i want to say is
if Globalization did not came in 90s then india would have gone bankrupt
so sorry to all anti globalization people but truth is my country save by Globalization
Nice perspective, thanks
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Indian_economic_crisis
One thing I have noticed is that India has been an energy importer for a very long time. It seems to always to have more imports than exports, perhaps related to its energy imports.
1+ Billion people… Need energy!
“if Globalization did not came in 90s then india would have gone bankrupt
so sorry to all anti globalization people but truth is my country save by Globalization”
OK, but has globalisation really helped countries like yours in the long term? You have population overshoot, and the middle classes (or equivalent) probably having unrealistic expectations about standard of living. Not to mention burning up what resources you do have at an increased rate. I’ve said before that India is a very bad candidate for collapse with its combination of population + low resources.
I’ve read that large parts of India don’t enjoy industrial lifestyles (electricity etc). Western folk today look upon those sort of people with condescending pity. But they will fare best in a collapse scenario while the rest of the world tries desperately to retain their precious industrial luxuries while trying to find good reasons for doing so.
I am not sure anyone will do well. People in India get considerable benefit from fertilizers (and perhaps pesticides??) increasing their yields. Also irrigation. Modern irrigation, fertilizers, and pesticides would not be available without our current system. Neither would transport to market. India is dependent on its financial system as well. I think it is as susceptible to collapse as anyone.
Perhaps hunter gatherers might fare better, because of their better skills. The problem is that too many people will become hunter-gatherers at the same time. This will cause problems as well.
I don’t see many turning into hunter gatherers…
I am anticipating Murderer Pillagers
Hunting people? Gathering heads?
” The problem is that too many people will become hunter-gatherers at the same time. This will cause problems as well.”
Maybe not. Its probably the way things should be. The gene pool will benefit from competition that starts with a larger number of individuals.
“I am not sure anyone will do well. People in India get considerable benefit from fertilizers (and perhaps pesticides??) increasing their yields. Also irrigation. Modern irrigation, fertilizers, and pesticides would not be available without our current system. Neither would transport to market. India is dependent on its financial system as well. I think it is as susceptible to collapse as anyone.”
This is a non sequitur because 100% of agricultural land isn’t unproductive without those inputs. Small communities, if they have access to naturally fertile land and the ability to irrigate, can and will survive; more so if they are accustomed to living without most/all industrial amenities.
“Small communities, if they have access to naturally fertile land and the ability to irrigate, can and will survive” I am doubtful that there are many of those communities left. Which each day, encroach on more of their territory in our desperation for more and enthrall them in our chains of dependency.
https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=llV2WrirBeGCjwTo5oGwCA&q=how+many+people+live+in+india&oq=how+many+people+live+in+india&gs_l=psy-ab.3..0j0i20i264k1l2.761.8456.0.8783.36.18.3.12.12.0.353.3090.0j10j2j3.15.0….0…1c.1.64.psy-ab..6.30.3393.0..35i39k1j0i131k1j0i10k1.0.L0-aFH-2jiU
1.324 billion people in India! & 1.379 in China! India has nearly caught up to China?!
I don’t see how they feed so many people with a water table dropping like theirs. That’s crazy stuff.
Ok, for some reason that post requires moderation, so I’ll try again. Population of India is now 1.324 billion & China is 1.379.
of course, it’s reasonable to interpret these numbers as estimates and not facts…
basically, they’re tied at one and a third billion…
meanwhile, one of them has some logical population controls…
the other country is insane.
UN’s 2017 Medium Projections have India’s population passing China’s in 2024. But they have different figures for 2018.
They show at India at 1.354 billion and China at 1.415 billion in mid-2018, which is quite a bit farther apart than you show them.
China has a water problem as well, especially in north China. But I noticed that they were watering the landscaping of Petroleum University in Beijing, when I was there.
“… truth is my country save by Globalization”
this is like an 80 year old person who says “Thank you, doctor, for saving my life!”
“saving my life” actually means “helping me to live a little longer”…
meanwhile, India has a neighbor China which has had a one child policy for decades…
has India learned anything from the Chinese?
there will be other (smaller) countries that feel Creeping Collapse this year and next…
but India likely will be the first large nation to suffer Creeping Collapse.
great article gail
this is a highlight:
“[5] Adding China, India, and other countries through globalization temporarily gives a boost to world energy production.”
and adding more FF to the work of 2 billion people gives a good boost to world GDP…
this may be the last stage of growing GDP…
any GDP plateau likely will not last more than a decade.
Gail, there was something that I pictured when I saw your bicycle analogy again in point #1 of this new article:
the air in the tires… like the intervention and/or manipulation by CBs…
too little CB action results in a flat tire…
too much air pressure and the tire could pop…
like the bubbles that the CBs now have created.
That could be. Wrong manipulation gives the system a flat tire. Selling off securities does not seem like a good idea.
What if the tires all have small holes that make pumping them with air less effective ?
The guy at Ponzi world thinks this may be it:
http://ponziworld.blogspot.in/2018/02/ignition.html?m=1
He indicates that even with the sell off, stock prices are still way too high. His technical charting is a little difficult to understand, unless a person follows this kind of thing.
oh no, this is it!
cascading losses next week!
then The Collapse!
then no food left within a few days…
and finally…
worst of all…
OFW goes away!
Let’s not forget that less than two years ago …. a far worse storm was brewing in China….
The CBs crushed it by:
1. Threatening short sellers with jail time
2. Making billions upon billions of dollars available to proxies to bid the market back up.
The Central Banks have unlimited fire power in terms of how much money they can print — they dwarf the fire power of all entities combined — who dare to fight them.
So I am doubtful that the end is signaled by collapsing stock markets.
I expect that when the end does come — the markets will be at record highs….
I would expect that on Monday — or soon after — calm will return — and the markets will again start to slowly drift upwards….
yes!
and people thought you were an InstaDoomer!
ha!
yes, I am confused.
He is just very local in his collapse view. If he personally havent collapsed = BAU. When HE has collapsed = collapse. The change between these two states will be instant.
That could happen just between drinks for FE
Sure, on an individual level collapse will be a heart attack or being invited to the boss, or missus, for a quick chat.
Load following nuclear. Kind of.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-31/french-energy-giant-seeks-survival-by-rewriting-nuclear-rules
Flexible nuclear can work. I’m just surprised that people who do not know this get promoted beyond their competence. The reason this doesn’t happen is because nuclear is expensive and contracts promote operation near full load.
BTW this :
https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/254692-new-molten-salt-thorium-reactor-first-time-decades
“A team from the Nuclear Research and Consultancy Group (NRG) the Netherlands has built the first molten salt reactor powered by thorium in decades.”
“When bombarded by neutrons, thorium becomes radioactive uranium-233, which is shorter-lived and less dangerous than the uranium-235 used in conventional reactors. The molten salt design being developed at NRG is known as the Salt Irradiation Experiment (SALIENT). This radioactive slurry could potentially reach very high temperatures, which translates to a lot of energy generation. However, the molten salt isn’t just the fuel; it’s the coolant as well. There are still several problems that need solving before NRG’s thorium reactor designs will be scaled up to industrial levels. While the waste is safer, scientists still need to figure out how much of it there will be and what can be done with it. The environment inside a molten salt reactor is also extremely corrosive. So, some creative materials might be needed. If it works, we could generate more power without pumping more carbon into the atmosphere — a win for everyone.”
Changing output twice per day, and needing up to 30 minutes, is not very flexible. If you are trying to balance intermittentables you need 30+ min battery, and STILL capacity of the intermittents can’t be much more than 80% of minimum demand.
Just out of curiosity, you’ve never worked in nor designed a coal-fired power station, have you?
Of course not, but how does that relate to balancing wind and solar with nuclear?
Rapid response to grid load changes is usually via gas fuelled generation in one form or another, In the old days, oil fired generation was quick enough to catch loss of major contributors to the grid supply. Coal, however, is a lot slower, with chain-grate stokers taking up to an hour to accept full load. Hence nuclear generation is, generally speaking, in much the same bracket as coal-fired generation. That said, the steam cycle part of the whatever generation configuration you have in mind doesn’t appreciate the rapid changes in temperature and pressure that come with load following. And a few minutes searching would have found things like this:
https://www.quora.com/Is-nuclear-power-a-viable-alternative-to-natural-gas-peaking-power-plants
So yes, nuclear generation can load follow, if we decide we want that.
I’m sorry I can’t still understand why we are arguing coal. Article says France could manage on only nuclear, solar and battery. He sounds desperate for money.
If a hypothetical grid has max demand of 80GW and minimum of 50GW, would you think the grid (if they didn’t have interconnectors) could do with less than 80GW nuclear? Could they use MUCH more than 80GW solar? Nuclear, solar and battery only.
Check out what some kids did at my local grocery store.They went on the intercom and said a missile was headed for the united states!
Prank missile announcement made over Standale Meijer intercom
http://woodtv.com/2018/02/03/prank-missile-announcement-made-over-walker-meijer-intercom/
My news said customers were running for the exits! LOL
The news said an alarm went off over the intercom with a recording that said “North Korea had just fired missiles at the US and one was headed for Chicago”! And customers were running for the exits!
https://imgur.com/a/3qT2i
Dow’s 666-point plunge looks bad, but the economy’s fundamentals are still strong
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-markets-slump-20180202-story.html
I’m putting my CB and Don Draper shoes on …. and I am thinking what we are seeing here is:
Not the beginning of the end.
Rather…. a forced correction in the market….
Because a market cannot just keep on going straight up … at some point the PE ration just gets so absurd that it just becomes ridiculous .. and that is not good for CONfidence….
So you smash it down …. then start the slow steady build again
Harley-Davidson plant employees shocked, frustrated by news of upcoming closure and layoffs
http://fox4kc.com/2018/01/30/harley-davidson-plant-employees-shocked-frustrated-by-news-of-upcoming-closure-and-layoffs/
I would open a bottle of the best Champagne if HD went bankrupt.
Why the f789 are as sholes allowed to ride around on these piles of shi it making such a racket?
If I were to strip the muffler off my car and drive round and round like an id i ot forcing people to look at me — as if I were awesome because of all the noise I was making — I guarantee — a cop would be called and I would be quickly shut down.
If I was World Emperor (when…) I will create a special force…. these will consist of fellow HD haters — they will be given unmarked black semi trucks…. no plates no nothing…. and they will be tasked with roaming the highways looking for HD riders…. bike gangs, old men trying to look cool… anyone riding one of these jalopies…..
And their mandate will be to run into them head on ….. run over them… or run them off the road….
I will bring an end to the chaos.
When Arnold Schwarzenegger was Gov. of CA, he helped pass the Harley Davidson law which allowed any and all vehicles to have the right to make as much noise as a Harley. Since then the after market muffler business skyrocketed and cars and trucks statewide now make huge amounts of noise, I experienced on a recent business trip to sell a race horse. Sure glad I’m back on the ol’ range here in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
I especially like when the fat slob riding that dresser with the thousand watt stereo playing guns n roses full blast so he and his fat slob wife can hear it over his stupid drag pipes looks at you like he’s gonna whip your ass for thinking hes a fat slob poser because the xxxl leather HD vest he paid $500 for give him super human biker powers.
A person needs to grab onto some of the benefits of energy and use them any way he can. Someplace, I read someone explain that a big tattoo proves to others that at least at one time, the person had enough fund to afford the tattoo. A motorcycle equipped with a loud stereo, an engine that produces a lot of noise through its tail pipes, and clothing that goes with this outfit help the person impress both other men, and women who feel that this group is suitable for them.
When it comes to marriages, I have heard the observation, “Every pot has a lid.” Women coming from a similar segment of society are likely to find these outward displays of wealth attractive.
They call it HD because when you go into one of their dealerships, you can’t walk out with anything for less than $100.
Gotta say FE I am right there with you. f..ing can’t stand HD noise machines. Can’t understand why they aren’t breaking noise level laws.
With an eye on Russia, U.S. to increase nuclear capabilities
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-nuclear-russia-military/with-an-eye-on-russia-u-s-to-increase-nuclear-capabilities-idUSKBN1FM2J0
Amazon patents wristband that tracks warehouse workers’ movements
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/jan/31/amazon-warehouse-wristband-tracking
They have human workers?
There was a time when civil liberties groups would have vigorously opposed such technology being used, and the courts would have supported the employees right to movement without tracking. It’s got that taste of G. Orwell’s 1984 that is sickening, but that’s what happens when people decide anything goes and nothing matters.
In many ways … Atlas Shrugged/1984 are playing out in tandem….
When I wrote about slavery being our normal state, I must have unconsciously been up these trends. This helps me to see the issue more realistically. Or maybe slavery is just the normal state of economics.
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Groundhog day warning shot. Start divesting.
it’s too late to close the barn door after the horse ran away…
probably too late for “investors” in Buttcoin etc…
stocks? down what? 4%?
yes, investors have been warned.
There are two versions of globalization in the West.
One has been the neoliberal model…last used in its full glory by the George W. Bush administration.
The second…. I think is being worked on now. This was referred to by conspiracy theorists in the 1990s as the NWO…a global economic system with enforceable rules.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwgvSdWn2UA
It’s what Fast Eddy would call Kumbaya since a goal for it is that economic development should proceed if it creates no losers, including other life forms other than humans.
The second form of globalization assumes the problem with globalization before was that it was not regulated enough–and that regulation of trade flows cannot be entrusted to regional governments.
Local sovereignty in developed countries has been demonized lately by labeling it as nationalism or fascism.
https://imgur.com/a/Pfk4c
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No idea if what happens this week in bonds, stocks, etc will be out of the control of CBs. The complexity is ridiculous high and the law of diminished returns states that it will get harder and harder to get the gears moving.
Just read that Capita of UK just got into trouble (at Wolfstreet) just a couple of weeks after Carillion. Things will spin faster and faster out of control.
the easier part might be the CBs work of keeping their markets high, since this is just the somewhat illusionary secondary economy of finance…
the harder part is keeping up the real primary economy of actual work and resources…
in the long run, this will prove to be impossible.
“The complexity is ridiculous high and the law of diminished returns states that it will get harder and harder to get the gears moving.”
True enough. The more the situation is forced via fancy CB fiscal footwork, the worse it will be when the cards finally fold. None of us know when but balancing that many spinning plates at the top of sticks will go wrong in some manner we can’t anticipate, like in 08 when Lehmann folded, starting a cavalcade of losses. A market correction at this point is a dangerous event. It’s a bad sign when a big drop like that occurs on a Friday, usually the most upbeat day of the week. I don’t thing this correction is over so Monday should be either a wild roller coaster ride of ups and downs, or some more panic like today.
There are probably thousands of companies that are bigger than Lehman … that are effectively insolvent right now (did we see a figure of 10% of all listed corporations some weeks ago on FW that are alive only because the CBs are supporting them?)
Incredible.
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“We know from physics and history that economies need to grow, or they collapse.”
Wow. Talk about building straw men.
You just made a massive assertion, backed by no evidence, from two fields in which you have no claim whatsoever to any sort of expertise.
If you want to be taken seriously as a scholar, you might want to put some thought into the assumptions underpinning the rest of your writing.
This is a much bigger story than what I describe in this article. I have written about it in previous articles and I need to talk about it again.
Basically, population is constantly rising, because humans learned to control fire a very long time ago. The earliest use seems to have been over 1 million years ago. Now we have larger brains and smaller teeth, jaws, and digestive systems, thanks to our bodies being adapted to the use of supplemental energy. We have no choice but to use supplement energy to cook part of our food. We also need supplemental energy for many other uses: to irrigate part of farmland, so it will be more productive; to heat homes, so humans can live in wider areas; to provide education, so we can add more “complexity” to the system (specialized knowledge, bigger governments, bigger companies, more wage disparity), so we can add more technology, as we run up against limits.
An increase in supplemental energy supply has been needed for a long time, essentially because with rising population, we have a problem with falling energy per capita, even if it is “solar energy per capita.” We have gradually added trained dogs to help with hunting, animals used to help transport goods and to grind grain, charcoal to be able to obtain higher temperatures than can be obtained from wood itself, burned peat moss, and eventually fossil fuels. With the use of fossil fuels, we were able to greatly ramp up living standards, in addition to allowing a huge population increase.
In a sense, all of human history is the struggle to maintain adequate energy per capita. When new, less populated lands could be found, this helped. So did the use of new technology (made possible by complexity). The disadvantage of adding complexity is that some of the energy available has to go into growing “overhead”: the educational system, funds to pay instructors, funds to support those writing text books, a tax system to transfer funds to the educational system, etc.
There have been many people who have looked into this issue. One reference that is often quoted is The Collapse of Complex Societies. Another is Secular Cycles. Ugo Bardi has put together a curve which he calls the Seneca Curve, to describe the shape civilizations follow:
This curve is based on writings in the 1st century C.E. by Lucius Anneaus Seneca saying “It would be of some consolation for the feebleness of our selves and our works if all things should perish as slowly as they come into being; but as it is, increases are of sluggish growth, but the way to ruin is rapid.”
In my bicycle analogy, there are different speeds a bicycle can go. It can go uphill, when energy supplies are very abundant. It can coast along, when it has had past energy abundance, and needs to hold on for a while longer. Eventually, the bicycle begins to wobble (major recession) or collapse.
The physics reason has to do with the fact that the economy is a dissipative structure. It tends to grow and eventually collapse. Ecosystems are examples are dissipative structures. So are plants, animals and humans. So are hurricanes and star systems. Dissipative structures form in energetically “open” systems. Over time, new similar dissipative structures tend to form. In fact, in a finite world, this is the way things seem to need to work. Nothing can stay the same (even climate). New dissipative structures can be “better adapted” to their changing surroundings, such as the solar irradiation that the earth is receiving.
http://preparingyourfamily.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/DeflationarySpiral-320×2311.jpg
Are you new here? Hope you could tell us what kind of scholars you admire?
I don’t know what the term “history” refers to. The San in South Africa still have a branch of their culture living as it had since the dawn of modern human (200 years). Is that part of history?
Sorry, that was supposed to be 200,000 years ago.
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Dow Jones Index fell 666 points today.
Biggest fall in 2 years. Bond yields are also rising strongly. Investa’s getting nervous? How significant is this? Time will tell…
Source
“Dow Jones Index fell 666 points today.”
Which is our collective id telling us that reality is the antichrist. As Steve Ludlum is fond of declaiming – everything has to be perfect forever!
wake me when it is down 6666
Definitely something to watch come Monday, AM, ding, ding, ding, opening bell. Up, down, sideways, or off the charts plummeting. A weekend is a long time to ponder this one.
Nobel Prize-winning Economist Robert Shiller, The stock market today is similar to the market in 1928
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/robert-shiller-stock-market-today-similar-stock-market-1928-204253341.html
‘
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/plunge-protection-team.asp
It will only be allowed to fall so far….
But the Dip!
LOL!
It’s because Trumps memo is a sham and he’s getting impeached. The US market fears their newly given tax breaks will be rescinded. It was an almost instant reaction to the Nunes memo being released.
correlation is not causation.
Dow suffers 500-point drop amid rate-hike fears
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/markets/2018/02/02/dow-suffers-brief-300-point-drop-amid-rate-hike-fears-after-strong-jobs-report/300350002/?csp=chromepush
https://imgur.com/a/SJMEu
I’m just waiting for someone to explain why Mr XXX XXX … Leo … would spend many millions of dollars… on a project… that his good buddy Al says is going to be underwater quite possibly before the first guest arrives…
I think that is a reasonable question … no?
Because he is a great actor but an intellectual pygmy who simply hasn’t put two and two together? Or perhaps he is naive/arrogant enough to imagine that sea-level rise and associated phenomena will soon be arrested via the intervention of agencies such as his eco-foundation? Or perhaps he is a fatalist who understands that if coastal Belize is swamped then we are already stuck on a fast-track to total buggeration?
If you are looking to the confused and hypocritical psyche of Leo Di Caprio for hard evidence of a c c conspiracy then I dare say you are barking up the wrong tree.
Leonardo Dicaprio sells beach house for $17.35m… making a staggering $11.35m profit
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2531705/Leonardo-Dicaprio-sells-beach-house-17-35m-making-staggering-11-35m-profit.html#ixzz561ZjneZ4
Leo would seem to be a rather savvy investor… so rule out the pygmy thing….
I’m sticking with the theory that he is playing front man for the ho ax…. he knows it is a ho ax…. because that is the only theory that makes sense.
Just like Al Gore knows it’s a ho ax…. as demonstrated by his sea level property purchase for $9m.
Eddy, let’s come down from Planet Paranoia just for a second.
Does making a good profit on a Malibu property he bought in 2002 really single Leo out as an especially savvy investor given the inflation we’ve seen in high-end property markets across the world since the GFC?
Let’s look at the breakdown of the recent beneficiaries of Leo’s eco-foundation:
C l ima te Program – $3,573,562
Wildlife and Landscape Conservation Program – $6,360,000
Marine Life & Oceans Program – $3,756,000
Innovation, Media & Technology Program (IMT) – $4,077,568
California Program – $1,436,750
So, are we to believe that Leo is so fiendishly Machiavellian that he is feigning an interest in the health of the environment as a whole (and funding a wide range of eco-preservation activities) solely in order to slip the evil c c h oax past an unsuspecting public? Are those marches he goes on, head bowed, looking all serious, and the impassioned speeches he gives and the Prius he drives all part of this intricate and devilish plot as well?
Is Leonardo Dicaprio an evil genius whose entire extra-curricular life is an elaborate charade designed to deceive the public about c c? Or is he just another confused green activist and LA-airhead who lacks systemic insight and is blind to their own hypocrisy and complicity? Can we please apply a bit of Occam’s razor here?
·
Where did the foundation money come from?
It’s time again for The World Champion…. someone shine the Fast Eddy signal in the sky…. here he comes out of the Fast Eddy Cave…. to expose another Fat LIE…
Fast Eddy the FW super hero swings open his laptop …. he’s typing in g.. o….o…g…l…e… google… GOOGLE… he’s typing in Google!!!
And now … ah … he’s typing in Leo Dicaprio Foundation …. drum rolll…..
Ah ha!!! Here is is! https://www.leonardodicaprio.org/
Oh my go..d!!! What do we have here?????
$80.1M
GRANTS AWARDED
I wonder if Leo gets a piece of those grants …. and uses the cash to buy islands inches above ocean level… then builds CONCRETE ec.o resorts…. after all Leo has been implicated in so..rdid goings on before… hasn’t he!
[Kinda like how the Clintons tap into their foundation money to pay for The Be.ast’s wedding…. maybe they even use it as a dowry to find someone to take that nasty ‘thing’ off their hands… the ‘thing’ that is a product of the deal they did with the d..evil in exchange for power… ]
Now THAT would qualify Leo as a savvy businessman!!!
Scrolling down the page… and I am seeing:
Before The Flood
Watch Leonardo’s documentary on kkkklimate ccccchange and learn how you can make a difference.
Hmmmm… I am assuming Before The Flood is a call to action to do something before the glaciers melt and the oceans rise….
It takes on a new sense of urgency since his island has only an inch or two of time left. And given Al Go.re is calling for a 7m rise within the next decade….
Maybe Leo should stop flying around in private jets and building CONCRETE eco hotels because otherwise nobody is going to listen to him because he is not leading by example…. he may even damage the brand by acting like a .hyp..ocrite….
He would be far more appropriate as the spokesman for The Cult of Hedon…. I have a name for a new foundation http://www.leolivinglarge.com — donate now and follow Leo as he ba..ngs models, cruises the world on private jets and super yachts… builds concrete hotels (remove the word eco) … pillages resources like an emperor… burns coal just for the fun of it…. anyone contributing 1M or more gets a night with Leo (males and females accepted … Leo is on for anything)
The moral of this story is —- when you take on The World Champion — be prepared for a beating….
I hope it doesn’t hurt too much…. here… take a couple of these
http://assets.menshealth.co.uk/main/thumbs/36446/painkillers.jpg
Hang that one from the rafters wouldja Gail…. that’s a Hall of Fame post… if I don’t say so myself.
VICTORY. It makes life worth living
Pazuzu has found a new host….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrPO8Cm5ieQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg6pWv1B9L4
Someone call the Exorcist!!! (Trump???)
because it is not true and leo knows it
http://laoblogger.com/images/first-prize-clipart-1.jpg
i don’t think anyone knows but it is weird that the Great Barrier Reef is experiencing more and more bleaching events due to rising water temps and that dangerous jellyfish are moving further south on the east coast of Australia.
Yes… I have seen those headlines… in the MSM…
But unlike you I don’t allow the MSM to tell me what to think…
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/plastic-pollution-coral-reefs-disease-damage-seas-oceans-cornell-university-a8178156.html
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/01/25/580227045/plastic-pollution-is-killing-coral-reefs-4-year-study-finds
Did corral reefs die before we burned fossil fuels?
In a World First, Indian Marine Scientists Restore Thousands of Years Old Dead Coral Reef
https://www.thebetterindia.com/52607/world-first-indian-marine-scientists-restore-ancient-dead-coral-reef/
actually FE I have close friends that I went uni with who are marine biologists actively studying the reef and are concerned that the reef will be dead within 20 years, So hey i guess I should just ignore that and listen to the king of paranoia who rants against MSM on things he doesn’t believe in while using them as references for things he does believe in. Oh god I have just realised there are two FEs. Now we are truly FEed.
There is zero evidence that burning fossil fuels is killing reefs.
There is plenty of evidence that plastic is though.
And as for Leo and his island — someone suggested that perhaps he is building his concrete eco resort because he sees that we are not going to change direction and stop burning fossil fuels and transition to renewable energy ….
So he wants to enjoy the final years ….
There is a flaw in that theory …. if that were the case then why would he be building an entire resort for many millions of dollars …. why not just build a single dwelling … with a landing strip so he could fly in on his private jet.
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/04/17/21/27AD946600000578-3044142-image-a-24_1429301974046.jpg
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/04/05/realestate/20150405COVER-slide-LZ8O/20150405COVER-slide-LZ8O-videoSixteenByNine1050-v2.jpg
The dead coral reef looked like a graveyard.
“It was pretty bleak,” says Hannah Nelson, a student at California State University, Northridge. “Live coral is extremely colorful. This dead coral was covered in algae and kind of monotone.”
Nelson and her colleagues at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute were in Panama’s Almirante Bay in 2013, where they were investigating the recent deaths of the Agaricia coral reefs.
The massive bleaching event, attributed to sedimentation and runoff from river dredging and other activities, left some reefs almost completely destroyed. In some areas, less than five percent of the coral survived.
https://www.hakaimagazine.com/news/there-life-dead-coral-reef/
Or we just blame it on XXX XXXX just like the MSM blames hurricanes, storms, heavy rain, hot weather, drought… etc etc etc on XXX XXXX
Anything bad that happens — the MSM trots out XXX XXXX…
You’d think people would catch on to the game after a while…
But nope… like duuumb parrots…. they just repeat the catch phrase…
And if someone dares to say – hang on ….
They get ANGRY.
This is pinnacle of f789ing stewpidity…. the grail…. the gold medal…. for such people live becomes meaningless…. they have accomplished everything there is to accomplish in the realm of stewpidity…. they have achieved complete stewpidness….
It’s not much of an accomplishment though…. they share the pedestal with nearly 7.8 billion other MORE ons
‘It’s going to zero – it has no intrinsic value’
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-02-02/bitcoin-drops-below-8-500-as-cryptocurrency-misery-continues
https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=0bF0WsiPOKy7jwS3nLmgDQ&q=dow&oq=dow&gs_l=psy-ab.12..35i39k1l2j0i131i20i264k1j0i131k1j0l3j0i131k1j0l2.618.1873.0.4216.4.3.0.0.0.0.620.964.0j2j5-1.3.0….0…1c.1.64.psy-ab..1.3.963.0..46j0i46k1j0i20i264k1.0.L8_ZicPBxrQ
Dow down 452 points!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just like that link to that article I posted a few days ago saying the big chunks the Dow/stock market were going up were much like what happened near the top of the Dot.Com stock market, followed by big chunks down with interspersed days of going up but only by small amounts. Now it’s going down this much on a FRIDAY?! That’s a major red flag warning it’s on the way back down.
25,581.64 Price decrease -605.07 (2.31%)
I also note, China stocks hurt by Beijing’s Financial Clampdown.
The article says
There other stock exchanges in China, that also fell:
China’s stock market is way down. So is Japan’s. I posted an excerpt about China elsewhere.
Between now and Monday, confidence will either, stabilize, blossom or fear will turn to panic.
Controlled.. partial demolitions….
PepsiCo, which has reserved 100 Tesla trucks, said it may eventually explore sharing facilities and costs with other companies. The food conglomerate has held multiple meetings with Tesla to discuss the recharging effort, said PepsiCo executive Mike O’Connell.
“We have a lot of in-house capability around energy and engineering … and certainly Tesla brings their expertize to the table on energy and charging,” said O’Connell, senior director of supply chain for Frito-Lay North America, PepsiCo’s snack-food unit.
Separately, in a high-tech twist on the traditional truck stop, Tesla is moving ahead with plans for its own stations to sell electricity to truckers who pull up for a charge, according to customers and transportation industry executives who have discussed the matter with the Silicon Valley automaker.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/02/how-teslas-first-truck-charging-stations-will-be-built.html
People ask…. how can it be that so many people believe in XXX XXXX … how can it be a ho ax….
Well just read the above …. we KNOW that the cost to power a semi with batteries is enormous … and we KNOW that the semi would be unable to haul much freight because the batteries are so heavy …. we KNOW that it would take a long time to recharge the batteries resulting in down time for the truck …. we KNOW this entire concept is ABSURD…
Yet….. it is happening….
And Germany has spent hundreds of billions if no trillions on solar and wind…. even though it is an exercise in futility that only results in sky high electricity costs….
Yet it is happening….
And these too … are also fake…. yet almost everyone believes they are real (too)
“People ask…. how can it be that so many people believe in XXX XXXX … how can it be a ho ax….”
How can so many people NOT believe that their heads are stuck inside their behinds? How can it be true?
[hysterical rant]
And FE too has his head stuck firmly inside his behind. Yet almost everyone believes otherwise (ok not really).
Do you want to experience immediate Cognitive Dissonance? Get ready … set….
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/04/05/realestate/20150405COVER-slide-LZ8O/20150405COVER-slide-LZ8O-videoSixteenByNine1050-v2.jpg
Can you actually feel it kicking in? Do you feel a sudden epiphany … and your mind is saying hang on … if XXX XXX is real then why is Leo….. then WHAM!!! the mouse trap slams shut on your brain …. and you go completely blank…..
And the image loses all context… the epiphany is like a forgotten dream….
Kinda like a dream where you are Emperor… and you are enjoying your harem…. then you wake up to take a pee… and you know you were onto something awesome… and you want it to continue…. but you cannot remember what it was… and the moment is lost forever..
Like that?
boring
Short Pepsi
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2018/02/caltech-and-grumman-partner-on-space-based-solar-power-initiative.html#more-141893
This one is for FE.
Fleets of gigawatt solar power satellites.
Thanks – I can add this to my fake list of things that attract investment and that people believe are real…
The more real money thrown at fake things the more real they seem.
The original strategy was outlined by this guy
http://www.azquotes.com/picture-quotes/quote-if-you-tell-a-big-enough-lie-and-tell-it-frequently-enough-it-will-be-believed-adolf-hitler-13-35-29.jpg
It must be real… Pepsi and Budweiser are on board… and everyone says so….
It’s kinda like how Celine Dion was at one point portrayed as ‘hot’ …. that demonstrates that the MSM can create reality out of what is fake…. a circle can be made a square … well not really … but it can convince the suuuupid humans that is a square….
They are easily manipulated
Doesn’t males worship celebrities to? Sports and geniuses, like Elon.
It’s not the same thing. With women the phenomenon is much more intense and widespread. This may be partially why there is a whole push for more female representation because the hope is that women will to rally around and support other women (or what other women like) out of a sense of sisterhood. Look at the widespread support among women for people like Beyonce, Oprah, etc.
Hillary Clinton was counting on that to win.
Moral of this story — don’t take 6 Xanax, 2 tabs of E, and a bottle of gin … before performing… unless you are a rock star
All we need to do is get it in place and scaled up nearly immediately, and very cheaply.
Not just energy, though of course nothing economic (broadly speaking) happens without oil, coal and natural gas as THE prime, only realistic sources of energy for an industrialized form of civilisation. And they HAVE to be plentiful, easy(ish) to exploit and a good return on energy input – such as the EROI of 100:1 from about 1900 to 1950 in US oil production … btw there ain’t no MAGA coming, what enabled the growth of the Empire – its “greatness” – is gone … not just energy.
Yesterday, on the X22 Report, I listened to an interview with a metals mining executive, with a focus on zinc production. Most people do not have a clue what zinc is, let alone how crucial it is to “life as we know it”, such as galvanizing steel to prevent corrosion. Many modern structures, such as bridges, would not last more than a few years without zinc protection. In any case the executive was saying that it’s increasingly hard to find economically viable ore deposits and that, at current rates of consumption, the World has only two weeks of stockpiled zinc.
Just extrapolate that to Peak Easy Everything (peed on the planet) being long gone, say 1971 as a not entirely arbitrary year, e.g. the conspiracy with the Saudis to monopolize both oil and the dollar. The attempt at global hegemon/monopoly has failed though. All that remains is to wait and find out if the Empire will end in a whimper or bang.
Thanks! People lose sight of the fact that our problem is not just an energy problem; it is a “resources of many different kinds” problem.
If people don’t pause to consider just how their light switch works, still less do they think about mining…. I know I never did.
“it is a “resources of many different kinds” problem.”
Also an “energy required to extract both energy and resources” problem.
True. One of those resources is water. Another is energy to grow food. Energy to extract energy turns out not to be as important as some people had thought. Too often, energy to run governments, including energy to build roads and to pay pensions to the elderly gets ignored. Models that overlook too much don’t work well.
It’s always about keeping the Model within its design limits. The troubles come because Adam Smith’s “informed Self Interest” doesnt seem to be working. We have known how to solve most of out problems for a ling time: http://donellameadows.org/archives/leverage-points-places-to-intervene-in-a-system/
Seems like an essay where the author pats him/herself on the back saying, I am so smart that I could design an system that worked perfectly. This article is academic and while pointing out flaws in systems, of limited utility. The whole issue with complexity is that we suffer unintended consequences. Mankind’s fundamental failing is being unable to sort out the true consequences beforehand.
Good point! Our “models” (mental or otherwise) do not consider all of the connections involved.
Hmmm … despite having a bunch of obvious problems, “we” cannot do anything about them because of unforseeable consequences? Or is it that politicans will sit on a problem until it becomes a crisis and then try to blame someone else?
And if the Model says that wage inflation should be 5% and it turns out to be 2% is the Model wrong? Or is it telling you to look at a change in investment from productive capacity and into share buybacks that do not increase demand for labour?
You should learn more when things go wrong. If things just carried on as before you will learn nothing.
You are right about dwindling resources. It also seems the scale of fraud, corruption, abuse and laziness has increased a lot since the 1950’s as well. So, one could add those to diminishing returns too. Thus, MAGA seems even less possible. The US as a country is finished. All that is left are crumbs that are going to the corrupt bottom feeders. Amazing how most don’t even realize what is happening.
I recall comments in the Thatcher era about beople driving around in their second mortgage. Similarly, around 2003 the FBI described the levels or mortgage fraud as “endemic”. Seeing your neighbour successfully getting ahead by foul means is destabilising.
https://www.google.com/amp/mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSL8N1PO2YZ
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
in combination with
http://www.vincentmetals.com/images/stories/pricehistory/zinc.gif
Won’t scare a cornucopian.
Like every other commodity, price varies with “demand.” Demand depends on wage disparity. Debt is also important. If a business or government takes out debt, they can hire more workers. If a consumer takes out debt, he acts to increase demand directly.
Zinc had high prices in the 2007-2008 era. Then it dropped in 2009, when all other prices dropped. Recently, all commodities, including food, have been suffering from low prices. The (relatively) low prices on oil have been propping up the economies of the US, Europe, and Japan.
Your top image doesn’t seem to work.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Zinc_world_production.svg&lang=en
I somewhat understand what you write of oil prices and that the same applies.
But the usual technoiptimist only sees growing production and falling prices. And extrapolate for a thousand years.
Good point! For pretty much the whole time since the industrial revolution began, efficiency gains were able to make costs fall lower and lower. That is why we have had growing energy supplies, even as energy’s share of GDP keeps falling.
https://gailtheactuary.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/ayres-and-warr-electricity-prices-and-electricity-demand.png
https://gailtheactuary.files.wordpress.com/2017/05/36-un-world-gpd-value-added-shows-shrinking-energy-share.png
https://gailtheactuary.files.wordpress.com/2017/11/fouquet_average-price-of-energy-and-energy-services-in-the-uk-1700-2008.png
In fact, for GDP to grow, energy costs (really, the cost of energy services, when greater efficiency has been factored in) seem to need to keep falling, in order for GDP to rise. Now we are dealing with a situation where the economy is demanding that energy prices continue to fall (or at least not rise as much as they need to). This is squeezing energy producers of all kinds (farmers, oil and gas producers, coal producers, nuclear power plants). This seems to be a major way economies collapse: too low prices for producers. If there are major debt defaults, this tends to push commodity prices of all kinds down further.
This, or course, is not what people have imagined for the peak oil scenario. They pretty much got the story backward.
It seems to me that this dynamic goes along with Tainter’s complexity arguments. As the society increases in complexity, there is more and more overhead that needs to be “paid for” by the same energy production and there is a lower price that can be beared.
Don’t do that.
Goldman Says Oil to Surpass $80 With Market Likely Balanced
https://www.rigzone.com/news/wire/goldman_says_oil_to_surpass_80_with_market_likely_balanced-01-feb-2018-153366-article/
US democracy is at risk if Americans stay socially polarized, research firm says
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/30/us-democracy-at-risk-warns-economist-intelligence-unit.html
Democracy is a temporary situation, depending on very good energy supplies. Social polarization is a sign of inadequate per capita energy supplies. So this makes sense.
The reason American’s are so divided is income inequality.
https://imgur.com/a/snrst
Nice chart1
It’s just a game of Monopoly. At some point in time, too few have most/all of the money. They “win” and then the game has to start over.
https://assets.democracynow.org/assets/logo2-8566131fa2436fa4d6d18e6997cd58cda60253174a99078c681b6643aa38a558.png
DemocracyWhere?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JC7QEqxZCIs
That’s a link to a YouTube video with Max Keiser interviewing via a UK TV station regarding China’s recent move to exchange Yuan’s for oil, a threat to the petro dollar.
Aren’t they still going to use the price in US $ to set how many yuan need to be paid?
It surely won’t be bitcoin. In due time, it will be priced in gold. Because they ran out of other choices. Gold backed blockchain.
So for those that believe in a fast collapse, do you believe that a financial event is the most likely trigger or oil going into decline?
Aren’t both interlinked?
Definitely but a financial event could occur for other reasons such as a currency crises as T. Morgan talks about.
We’re in slow collapse now. Fast is when gasoline physically stops coming to gas stations and people begin rioting. Shortly after that, people begin starving because trucks will stop delivering food. Also people will lack the gas to get to their job or buy food.
I got a small taste in 2007 when gas prices rose to $5.50 a gallon and there were lines and shortages. People were absolutely freaking out. That’s what fast collapse will entail and it’ll be quick. After food and gas stop, most people will live a few weeks on their pantries and then it’s Fight Club.
In sum, actual inventory shortages in gas/diesel brought about by low oil prices will lead to fast collapse. This is why all other problems of an economic nature will be 100% papered over forever. And China, the US, Russia, and a few others have that figured out so don’t discount the real possibility of nuclear war before or as that is happening.
After food and gas stop, most people will live a few weeks on their pantries and then it’s Fight Club.
Agreed..Our collapse will be a catastrophe almost to scary to imagine!
There’s movies about it. I think one was titled blackout, going dark in America and is on YouTube free.
I think the economy will be fine until the oil goes into decline and we have permanent oil supply shortages. Then the global economy will collapse..
If a financial event hasn’t occurred at the time oil goes into decline, the temporal price spike caused by shortfalls will cause a recession that leads to a lot of debt defaults.
Here are some recent energy related articles on China. It seems China is suffering an extremely cold winter. Excess energy supplies are being imported as a result!
http://en.ce.cn/main/latest/201801/31/t20180131_27985333.shtml
China – Coal futures jump 10 percent as cold sweeps the country
Analysts believe the price rally was caused by a countrywide blizzard that blocked highways and boosted heating demand. Utilities warn of potential heating and electricity shortages.
____________
31 Jan 2018 – China’s four major power generation groups say they are facing pressure due to tight gas and coal supplies and have warned of potential heating and electricity shortages as blizzards continue to buffet some central and southern provinces.
The four top utilities asked the National Development and Reform Commission to increase coal supplies and regulate, reduce coal prices after snowstorms sweeping across central and southern provinces led to major losses for the thermal power sector.
Thermal coal futures have jumped over 10 percent this year as utilities deal with soaring power demand dues to the cold weather swept across swathes of the nation.
China’s thermal coal futures hit record highs on Monday.
—China is also scrambling to import more LNG due to the brutal winter.
China rushes to replenish gas supplies ahead of icy blast
January 26, 2018 by Robert
22 Jan 2018 – China is pulling in ships from all over the world to avoid a natural gas supply squeeze ahead of yet another “cold snap.”
With temperatures in Beijing set to drop as low as -15C (5F) this week, heating demand will soar and authorities want to avoid a repeat of December’s chaos, which saw serious supply shortages.
To ensure supplies, some 60 ships carrying more than 4 million tons of LNG are on their way to China. This is the third highest total behind December’s 5.1 million and November’s 4.36 million tons, according to shipping data in Thomson Reuters Eikon.
The shipments are coming from unusual origins: Equatorial Guinea and Angola, Peru, Trinidad, Tobago, and several from the United States.
Domestic producers are also churning out more gas.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-pollution-gas/china-rushes-to-replenish-gas-supplies-ahead-of-icy-blast-holiday-idUSKBN1FB0W3
—The same thing is happening to New England in the US.
Cold winters testing limits of US energy grid
“The arctic air that has frozen the northeastern U.S. over the first weeks of 2018 has prompted New Englanders to crank up the heat and New England’s utility companies to scramble for fuel,”
writes Jordan McGillis.
“This season’s above-average heating and electricity demand has tested grid reliability,” McGillis writes, “(but) ISO New England’s analysis reveals that in winters to come fuel insecurity will plague the region.”
Here are a few excerpts from the article:
Insecurity despite abundance
Though the resources are close at hand, a combination of laws and regulations has made New England dependent upon natural gas, yet unable to access all that it needs.
Pipeline paucity
On Jan. 23, ISO New England CEO Gordon van Welie testified before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee that, “when it gets cold the region does not have sufficient gas infrastructure to meet demand for both home heating and power generation.” …”New England (has) the most expensive spot natural gas prices in the world — including this January.
At the barricade preventing the transport of gas from the abundant reservoirs of Pennsylvania and West Virginia to New England is the state government of New York…. New York politicians have put the brakes on pipeline projects through their permitting power, blocking the Constitution and Northern Access pipelines outright.
The hostility to pipelines is so pervasive in the northeast that ISO New England takes that bleak view that “no new incremental gas infrastructure will be built to serve power generation.”
The Jones Act
With state governments blocking new pipeline construction to bring in affordable shale gas, New England buys liquefied natural gas (LNG) transported by sea….
But domestic shipping of LNG is made impossible by the obtuse Merchant Marine Act of 1920 — commonly called the Jones Act. The Jones Act mandates that only American-built, -owned, -crewed and -flagged vessels can participate in maritime shipping between domestic ports.
The Congressional Research Service has found that the Jones Act results in American vessels operating at twice the cost of comparable foreign ships.
The cold truth
“….despite unprecedented domestic energy production, New Englanders will soon find themselves out in the cold.
Jordan McGillis is a policy analyst at the Institute for Energy Research, a nonprofit focused on free-market energy and environmental research and policy.
See entire article:
http://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/371145-cold-winters-are-testing-the-limits-of-us-energy-grid
Thanks for the information and the links!
The Jones Act effectively guarantees that workers with higher wages will need to operate the vessels. There are no doubt other rules that are different as well–for example, whether the lowest quality, most polluting fuel can be used to power the boats. The Jones Act cuts off this kind of competition. In a sense, it gives us an idea of what happens when competition from low wage, higher polluting countries is cut off.
If you add salt into the swimming pool for 100 years….. you should never sink when you jump into the pool.
I don’t understand these freezing conditions around the world…. cold should be obsolete by now… if we were to follow the XXX XXX experts…
And Manhattan should be well on its way to being 7M under water like we were told in an Inconvenient Truth.
Or maybe the glaciers will not melt gradually — what will happen is — just as Al’s prediction (based on the advice of his experts) is that a month before the due date…. the melt will accelerate …and just like that 7M of water will flood over Manhattan…. (and Al’s ocean level $9m home… and Leos Concrete Eco Island)
Btw – Hong Kong is being fumigated by smog from China since December….. yet http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/2069381/cold-snap-hits-hong-kong-temperatures-plunge
Shouldn’t the smog be acting like insulation … making it warmer?
Isn’t it amusing that when the hurricanes hit the US some months ago — on this very site — we were told this was XXX XXXX in action.
Where are those people and their ‘logic’ — when there are record cold snaps around the world?
Yoo hoo…. Yoo hoooo … where are you?
Come out and play More Ons
FE, they are now cold WAVES.
Interesting question, but you need to define “fast collapse” first.
Good idea.
FEs definition of collapsed is grid goes down forever. I think that is good enough.
What is the definition of not collapsed at all?
And what time span between the states are fast/slow?
is that a world wide grid collapse over weeks. How is that likely?
Many instadoomers here think it is likely.
I aint an instadoomer, I think peripheral economies grids can go down and the central economy does fine.
But the German grid won’t go down for good and the french keep on going for years. Either the german will be brought online or both will go down or we will have war.
This kinda looks like a disease …
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/04/05/realestate/20150405COVER-slide-LZ8O/20150405COVER-slide-LZ8O-videoSixteenByNine1050-v2.jpg
But it AIN’T!
It is proof that GGGG WWWW … is a LIE.
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/WdkNCQ6mpJo/maxresdefault.jpg
No it means that Leo was lying that he believes it
Possibly. After all, Leo is a professional actor, so presumably he’ll act in any role if the price is right.
Since you’re implying that you know his motivations, Niko, do you think Leo is lying for money, or for Hollywood street cred, or do you think he’s lying as a personal favor to Meryl Streep?
I should have thought that in these matters, he simply does what his advisors suggest.
A friend of mine handled investments for a very (very!) big Hollywood name: he had to deal with layer upon layer of advisors.
The one rule was that any investment should not lose money, and preferably yield a 10% return, minimum. ‘Make me more, and lose nothing’ was the fundamental.
It’s as simple as that at the top. Exactly what you or I would demand if we had piles of the stuff.
Actually, the Hollywood thing was civilised: at a lower level in the business he dealt with the Italian Mafia, and their message was: ‘We know who you are, can find out where you live, so you won’t lose anything -understand?!’ As crude as that, those very words.
Of course, this was all ‘legitimate’, but he could guess the origin of the money.
To be honest I have no idea what Leo is saying regarding CC or what the truth of his position is as it does not interest me. I was pointing out that the FE’s use of this evidence of Leo’s Island purchase only centimetres above sea level is not proof of global warming being a hoax rather that Leo might have other ideas about it than he made public. In no way does it have anything to do with scientific research into the effect of greenhou ses on the clim ate. But if that is FE’s fun to poke at Leo then who cares. There is nothing to take seriously there.
I don’t come here for CC debate as I believe that there is nothing that could be done about it if it is or is real. Resource depletion is our biggest and most immediate concern.
Niko — if you had an IQ of 80 or higher…. you would get it.
I suggest that in future…. if you don’t get the joke…. you just laugh heartily and say ‘ya that is a good one – it’s really funny’
no it is boring
Gail as usual a very informative article
I am a believer that like everything we are in a cyclic environment and we are now moving rapidly towards what I call “Localisation”.
It is interesting to see Brexit , Catalonia independence movement etc
I think this will gain significantly when Texas and California leave the US union which I expect to happen in not to distant future
The only thing I haven’t seen in your discussions is how renewable energy is actually depressing the price of power and hydrocarbons leading to a more rapid destruction of world economies
really looking forward to your next post
I talk a little about the pricing problem that renewables cause in this article: https://ourfiniteworld.com/2017/07/22/researchers-have-been-underestimating-the-cost-of-wind-and-solar/
There are several parts to the problem. For one, wind and solar are often given priority when they are available. This tends to reduce peak prices that backup providers (especially gas) had been depending upon, to support their operations during only a small share of the year.
Another problem is when wind and solar are producing a lot of intermittent electricity, but there is no need for it. This happens first on weekends, in the spring and the fall of the year, when there is little need for heating and when many businesses are not operating. As more wind and solar are added, it gradually spreads to other parts of the year. Under some pricing arrangements, the price of electricity for other providers turns negative during these periods. This tends to drive nuclear and coal power plants out of business. They cannot easily stop operations, and they need to pay their staff and bond payments for the full year. Negative electricity payments for systems that are built to operate nearly all of the time don’t work. (Other arrangements include (1) paying wind and solar producers to stop putting the unwanted electricity online or (2) paying another state to take the unwanted electricity. In Europe, sometime the unwanted electricity can be sold at very low prices to Norway, where they have some hydroelectric storage to where it can be stored.)
This whole dynamic is made worse by the fact the wind and solar are heavily subsidized. This happens by things such as the Production Tax Credit, various state programs, and renewable “mandates”. Also, costs associated with transmission that are necessitated primarily by wind and solar are not charged back to these providers. When costs are charged back to the system as they mostly are in Europe, (instead of being buried in general tax revenue, as they are in the US) it becomes apparent that wind and solar greatly increase electricity costs.
The net of all of this is that becomes clear that nuclear and coal electricity generation plants will go out of business if they do not have subsidies to compensate for the price distortions. The US does not have enough natural gas plus renewables to operate the system without wind and solar. This is the reason that Trump proposed the coal and nuclear subsidies in 2017.
In fact, the prices produced for natural gas generation are too low as well. Natural gas is another area where there are many companies operating “at the edge.” They have been trying to get prices up by exporting natural gas, but transport costs are terribly high, making this not a good option.
“The net of all of this is that becomes clear that nuclear and coal electricity generation plants will go out of business if they do not have subsidies to compensate for the price distortions.”
Don’t you think the renewable companies will be out of business before that point? If renewables cause too much disruption the public will simply forget their green ideals and demand a switch back to reliable power.
The whole electricity system is very vulnerable today. People think it is the oil system, but I think electricity is in as bad shape as oil.
We have many nuclear plants shutting down. This is an example of one that is shutting down a year ahead of schedule, because of low power prices. http://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article198022514.html
This is one list of planned closures. http://www.beyondnuclear.org/reactors-are-closing/
People don’t really understand what the problem is. It is hard to believe that electricity prices, in general, are way too low for producers. But this is the way it is. The problem is similar to oil and to food production. The system is failing for lack of sufficient “profit” for everyone. Putting things back, after they are gone, doesn’t work.
“It is hard to believe that electricity prices, in general, are way too low for producers.”
I don’t disagree with this, but I think this problem – at least in the short term – corrects itself. If products of essential things are overpriced and useless, the harmful effects become palpable to the general public very soon and they try to redress them in earnest.
They don’t if the cause of the low prices is low wages, and the low wages are because of low productivity.
This is what collapse looks like. Low wages and low prices.
Well I did say for the short term! The next time the economies of countries with costly renewable power enter recession, there will be a lot of public anger and confusion. However I think countries like Germany, due to their privileged position and relatively robust economies, are somewhat protected from the effects costly energy-cum-low wages (again, in the short term).
I believe solar and wind kills nuclear.
Solar and wind demands load following, which means hydro, gas or coal. Or battery.
This kills the business for nuclear that must run 11 months a year to be profitable.
This is good! Less nuclear plants and spent fuel ponds when we’re going down the seneca.
I think you nailed it there.
The problems these sorts of structures bring are: “accidentally” getting the subsidy wrong; and how to finance projects with lifetimes of 30 years or so that really need to be driven by market forces.
And some scientist just see a small part of the problem https://www.ucsusa.org/clean-energy/increase-renewable-energy/production-tax-credit#.WnVzMGKUmaM:
But most importantly, the PTC works. With it in place, wind power has dramatically increased, reducing our reliance on fossil fuels, driving innovation and economic development, lowering costs, and providing important environmental benefits — including carbon reductions
I like the reference to ““closed-loop” bioenergy (using dedicated energy crops)”
Anybody that believes that is not a scientist. The dedicated energy crops need massive FF inputs in the form of herbicides, fertilizers, pesticides, GM seeds, the creation of which would be impossible without our energy intensive industrial system…and….DIESEL.
Good point!
Consider the massive amounts of antibiotics and other medicines that are required to stop the massive herds of cows sheep pigs etc… from dying….
We better eat them quickly when BAU goes down — because they will soon be dead from disease/starvation
We live in an artificial world – we live in an artificial world
Gail thanks for the very informative comments
I am interested in how quick you see localisation (anti globalisation) taking place
I do think Catalonia will separate from Spain even though this doesn’t look logical to outsiders
I also see California & Texas getting sick of subsiding backward states just like Western Australians are getting sick of seeing our GST dollars given to introverted states of South Australia and Tasmania
I strongly believe people our now so limited in excess cash that they want to keep it in there back yard
The reason why your President was elected
the nations of europe fought with each other for centuries
then post ww2 everyone became prosperous and formed the eu
now that prosperity is fading away, and the eu is fracturing
the same thing can be applied to the united states
It is hard for me to see exactly how things will work out.
I heard Dmitry Orlov (from the Soviet Union) say in a 2014 video that he thought the current system would fail “At the speed of the internet,” because it did not have the interconnections the way the Soviet Union did when it fell. (I think this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4irXFllO-w ) The Soviet Union was not dependent on the price system, and on people having money to pay for goods and services. Instead, it had a system in place that allocated goods based on how much people needed. That system held together, even while the financial system failed. So food, apartments, and even transportation remained available to most people.
I do think it is possible that the system will stay together long enough for Europe, United States, and Australia to start coming apart. In the United States, I would expect that Texas would have a better time seceding than California. California imports electricity, oil, and natural gas from elsewhere. It would have a hard time if it couldn’t get those imports. In a way, it is like South Australia. It wants to pretend it can be very advanced thanks to wind and solar, except that that can’t really happen, because it is short of the resources it needs. It is also very short of water in the Southern part of the state. I could imagine other states wanting to get rid of it, because it is so dependent on the rest of the United States. Of course, we get a lot of food from California, so that wouldn’t really work either.
I agree that President Trump was elected because quite a few people didn’t think the previous direction was working.
I wish to make a minor correction to your opinion.
We the real people of the USA did NOT “elect” Trump!
He LOST by almost THREE MILLION OF OUR WORTHLESS “VOTES”!
Votes for third party candidates mean nothing, they are ignored.
Trump was SELECTED by the UNdemocratic electoral “collage” composed of corporate hacks, just as the “two” parties are owned & controlled by UNdemocratic corporations.
In the USA other parties have no chance to “win” in our RIGGED “elections” they are shut out by the mainstream media so no one hears their message or even knows they exist unit we get our “voter information” booklet.
Even then, too many of our “votes” are switched, voters are given fake ballots that will never be counted, they are disenfranchised by being sent to the wrong polling place, by being wrongly removed from the voter rolls, by not having enough corporate owned & controlled “voting” machines so after standing in LONG lines for hours, many minorities give up trying to vote, they get gerrymandered out of their district so the repugs “win” all the time, we do NOT have fair & open elections.
Trump is NOT a legitimate POTUS, he is a lying POS!
Trump is AWESOME!
He is hugely entertaining – a fantastic puppet of the el ders
Sorry you don’t agree.
“… we shall see all my life ive been wrong about predictions from other people i believed in …”
so why not rely on history instead?
the historical record shows that in IC the usual pattern is that one week is very similar to the next week and one month is very similar to the next month…
at some point in the future, this pattern will be broken… guaranteed…
but the timing is very much unpredictable.