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There are many myths about energy and the economy. In this post I explore the situation surrounding some of these myths. My analysis strongly suggests that the transition to a new Green Economy is not progressing as well as hoped. Green energy planners have missed the point that our physics-based economy favors low-cost producers. In fact, the US and EU may not be far from an economic downturn because subsidized green approaches are not truly low-cost.
[1] The Chinese people have long believed that the safest place to store savings is in empty condominium apartments, but this approach is no longer working.
The focus on ownership of condominium homes is beginning to unwind, with huge repercussions for the Chinese economy. In March, new home prices in China declined by 2.2%, compared to a year earlier. Property sales fell by 20.5% in the first quarter of 2024 compared to the same period a year ago, and new construction starts measured by floor area fell by 27.8%. Overall property investment in China fell by 9.5% in the first quarter of 2024. No one is expecting a fast rebound. The Chinese seem to be shifting their workforce from construction to manufacturing, but this creates different issues for the world economy, which I describe in Section [6].
[2] We have been told that Electric Vehicles (EVs) are the way of the future, but the rate of growth is slowing.
In the US, the rate of growth was only 3.3% in the first quarter of 2024, compared to 47% one year ago. Tesla has made headlines, saying that it is laying off 10% of its staff. It also recently reported that it is delaying deliveries of its cybertruck. A big issue is the high prices of EVs; another is the lack of charging infrastructure. If EV sales are to truly expand, they will need both lower prices and much better charging infrastructure.
[3] Many people have assumed that home solar panel sales would rise forever, but now US home solar panel sales are shrinking.
A forecast made by the trade group Solar Energy Industries Association and consulting firm Wood Mackenzie indicates that US solar panel installations by homeowners are expected to fall by 13% in 2024. There are many issues involved: higher interest rates, less generous subsidies to homeowners, not enough grid capacity for new generation, and too much overproduction of electricity by solar panels in the spring and fall, when heating and air conditioning demand is low. The overproduction issue is particularly acute in California.
For each individual 24-hour day, the timing of solar energy production does not match up well with when it is needed. With sufficient batteries, solar electricity produced in the morning can help run air conditioners in the evening. But storage from summer to winter is still not feasible, and batteries for short-term storage are expensive.
[4] It is a myth that wind and solar truly add to electricity supplies for the US and the countries in the EU. Instead, their pricing seems to lead to tighter electricity supplies.
Strangely enough, in the US and the EU, when wind and solar are added to the electric grid, electricity supplies seem to get tighter. For example, one article says, Most of US electric grid faces risk of resource shortfall through 2027, NERC [regulatory group] says.
Charts of electricity supply per capita show an unusual trend when wind and solar are added. Figure 1 shows that, in the US, once wind and solar are added, total electricity generation per capita falls, rather than rises!
The EU, using a somewhat shorter history period, shows a similar pattern of declining total electricity generation per capita, even when wind and solar are added (Figure 2).
I believe that the strange pricing systems used for wind and solar in the US and EU are driving out other electricity suppliers, especially nuclear. With this system, intermittent electricity enjoys the subsidy of going first at the regular wholesale market rate. Other providers find themselves with very low or negative wholesale rates in the spring and fall of the year and on weekends and holidays. As a result, their overall return falls too low. Nuclear is particularly affected because it requires a huge, fixed investment, and it cannot be ramped up and down easily.
Besides the foregoing issues affecting the supply of electricity generated, there are also factors affecting the demand for electricity. Electricity generation using wind and solar tends to be high priced when all costs are included. The US and EU are already high-cost areas for businesses to operate. High electricity rates further add to the impetus to move manufacturing and other industry to lower-cost countries if businesses desire to be competitive in the world market.
On a world basis, in 2022, wind and solar added about 13% to total world electricity generation (Figure 3).
Figure 3. Electricity generation per capita for the World based on data of the 2023 Statistical Review of World Energy, prepared by the Energy Institute. Amounts are through 2022.
Based on Figure 3, with the addition of wind and solar, the upward slope of the world per capita electricity generation has been able to remain pretty much constant from 1985 to 2022, at about 1.6% per year. But the US and the EU, as high-cost producers of goods and services, haven’t been able to participate in this per capita growth of electricity.
Instead, China has been a major beneficiary of the shift of manufacturing overseas from the US and EU. It has been able to rapidly increase its electricity supply per capita, even with wind and solar. It has also been adding both nuclear and coal-fired electricity generation capacity.
Thus, this analysis produces the result a person would expect if the physics of the world economy favors efficient (low-cost) producers.
[5] It is a myth that the US and EU can greatly ramp up the use of EVs or greatly increase the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) without relying on fossil fuels.
Both EV production and AI are heavy users of electricity supply. We have seen that the US and the EU no longer have growing per-capita electricity supplies. Ramping up electricity generation would require a long lead time (10 years or more), a major increase in fossil fuel consumption, and an increase in electricity transmission lines.
The State of Georgia, in the United States, is already running into this issue, with planned data centers (related to AI) and EV manufacturing plants. The state plans to add new gas-fired electricity generation. It will also import more electricity from Mississippi Power, where the retirement of a coal-fired plant is being delayed to provide the necessary additional electricity. Eventually, more solar panels are planned, as well.
[6] It is a myth that the world economy can continue as usual, whatever happens to energy supply and growing debt. China’s homebuilding problems could, in theory, lead to debt bubbles crashing around the world.
The world economy depends upon a growing bubble of debt. It also depends on an ever-increasing supply of goods and services. In fact, the two are closely interrelated. As long as a growing supply of low-priced energy of the types used by built infrastructure is available, the economy tends to sail along.
China, with problems in its property business, is an example of what can go wrong when energy supplies (coal in China) become expensive, as supply becomes increasingly constrained. Figure 5 shows that China’s per-capita coal supply became constrained in about 2013. China’s per capita coal extraction had been rising, but then it dipped. This made it more difficult for builders to construct the homes planned for would-be homeowners. This is part of what got home builders in China into financial difficulty.
Finally, in 2022, China was able to get coal production up. But the way this was done was through very high coal prices (Figure 6). (The prices shown are for Australian coal, but Chinese coal prices seem to be similar.)
Building concrete homes at such high coal prices would have resulted in new homes that were far too expensive for most Chinese citizens to afford. If builders were not already in difficulty from low supply, adding high coal prices, as well, would be a second blow. Furthermore, all the workers formerly engaged in home building needed new places to earn a living; the current approach seems to be to move many of these workers to manufacturing, so that the popping of the home building bubble will have less of an impact on the overall economy of China.
There is now concern that China is ramping up its manufacturing, particularly for exports, at a time when China’s jobs in the property sector are disappearing. The problem, however, is that ramping up exports of manufactured goods creates a new bubble. This huge added supply of manufactured goods can only be sold at low prices. This new low-priced competition seems likely to lead to manufacturers, around the world, obtaining too-low prices for their manufactured products.
If other economies around the world are forced to compete with even lower-cost goods from China, it could have an adverse impact on manufacturing around the world. With low prices, manufacturers are likely to lay off workers, or give them excessively low wages. If wages and prices are inadequate, debt bubbles in other parts of the world are likely to collapse. This will happen because many borrowers will become unable to repay their debt. This is the reason that we have been hearing a great deal recently about raising tariffs on Chinese exports.
[7] The world’s biggest myth is that the world economy can continue to grow forever.
I have pointed out previously that based on physics considerations, economies cannot be expected to be permanent structures. Economies and humans are both self-organizing systems that grow. Humans get their energy from food. Economies are powered by the types of energy products that our built infrastructure uses. Neither can grow forever. Neither can get along without energy products of the right types, in the right quantities.
We become so accustomed to the narratives we hear that we tend to assume that what we are told must be right. These narratives could be based on wishful thinking, or on inadequate models, or on a sour grapes view that says, “We don’t want fossil fuels anyhow.” We know that humans need food, and that economies will continue to require fossil fuels. We can’t make wind turbines or solar panels without fossil fuels. What do we plan to do for energy without fossil fuels?
In a finite world, economies cannot continue forever. We don’t know precisely what will go wrong or when it will go wrong, but we can get a hint from the recent failures of myths that our economy may change dramatically in the not-too-distant future.
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What if we use solar panels to generate more bitcoin?
Oh, never mind.
BTW, short article, and it sounds like a user guide for a toaster. Running out of steam, dear Gail? Me too.
It becomes more and more difficult to define who we are in de-growth. Maybe we are just animals abusing other animals.
Brain quantity is no guarantee for succes.
Brain quantity does not matter. Qualities do matter.
=
Sometimes sort of simple, short articles is what Zerohedge is looking for.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/worlds-economic-myths-are-hitting-their-limits
The true power of Zerohedge is (was) the comment section.
Love you Gail.
Ah, now we are talking, finally a way to make money with solar panels.
Dennis L.
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A new study finds that humans evolved through ongoing inter-homo competition, unparallelled among mammals, as highly flexible ‘generalists’ who used technology (eg. stone tools, fire) in the competition for land and resources.
That is probably ultimately why we are so good at war and oriented to it? It is uniquely how we evolved. (Moreover, it took us 100s of thousands of years to fight our way out of Africa through Neanderthal territory and that likely had a selective effect for heightened military prowess.)
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/04/240417131021.htm
Interspecies competition led to even more forms of ancient human — defying evolutionary trends in vertebrates
Competition between species played a major role in the rise and fall of hominins — and produced a “bizarre” evolutionary pattern for the Homo lineage — according to a new University of Cambridge study that revises the start and end dates for many of our early ancestors.
Conventionally, climate is held responsible for the emergence and extinction of hominin species. In most vertebrates, however, interspecies competition is known to play an important role.
Now, research shows for the first time that competition was fundamental to “speciation” — the rate at which new species emerge — across five million years of hominin evolution.
The study, published today in Nature Ecology & Evolution, also suggests that the species formation pattern of our own lineage was unlike almost anything else.
“We have been ignoring the way competition between species has shaped our own evolutionary tree,” said lead author Dr Laura van Holstein, a University of Cambridge biological anthropologist from Clare College. “The effect of climate on hominin species is only part of the story.”
In other vertebrates, species form to fill ecological “niches” says van Holstein. Take Darwin’s finches: some evolved large beaks for nut-cracking, while others evolved small beaks for feeding on certain insects. When each resource niche gets filled, competition kicks in, so no new finches emerge and extinctions take over.
Van Holstein used Bayesian modelling and phylogenetic analyses to show that, like other vertebrates, most hominin species formed when competition for resources or space were low.
“The pattern we see across many early hominins is similar to all other mammals. Speciation rates increase and then flatline, at which point extinction rates start to increase. This suggests that interspecies competition was a major evolutionary factor.”
However, when van Holstein analysed our own group, Homo, the findings were “bizarre.”
For the Homo lineage that led to modern humans, evolutionary patterns suggest that competition between species actually resulted in the appearance of even more new species — a complete reversal of the trend seen in almost all other vertebrates.
“The more species of Homo there were, the higher the rate of speciation. So when those niches got filled, something drove even more species to emerge. This is almost unparalleled in evolutionary science.”
The closest comparison she could find was in beetle species that live on islands, where contained ecosystems can produce unusual evolutionary trends.
“The patterns of evolution we see across species of Homo that led directly to modern humans is closer to those of island-dwelling beetles than other primates, or even any other mammal.”
Recent decades have seen the discovery of several new hominin species, from Australopithecus sediba to Homo floresiensis. Van Holstein created a new database of “occurrences” in the hominin fossil record: each time an example of a species was found and dated, around 385 in total.
…. While early species of hominins, such as Paranthropus, probably evolved physiologically to expand their niche — adapting teeth to exploit new types of food, for example — the driver of the very different pattern in our own genus Homo may well have been technology.
“Adoption of stone tools or fire, or intensive hunting techniques, are extremely flexible behaviours. A species that can harness them can quickly carve out new niches, and doesn’t have to survive vast tracts of time while evolving new body plans,” said van Holstein
She argues that an ability to use technology to generalise, and rapidly go beyond ecological niches that force other species to compete for habitat and resources, may be behind the exponential increase in the number of Homo species detected by the latest study.
But it also led to Homo sapiens — the ultimate generalisers. And competition with an extremely flexible generalist in almost every ecological niche may be what contributed to the extinction of all other Homo species.
Added van Holstein: “These results show that, although it has been conventionally ignored, competition played an important role in human evolution overall. Perhaps most interestingly, in our own genus it played a role unlike that across any other vertebrate lineage known so far.”
It sounds like animals tend to evolve to fit in where there is a niche to fit in. Humans are no different. In fact, competition for scarce resources may play more of a role for them.
Von Holstein never met a chimpanzee with a nuke, apparantly.
“as highly flexible ‘generalists’ who used technology (eg. stone tools, fire) in the competition for land and resources.”
Is it possible as civilizations evolve there are too many specialists who cannot see outside their own niches?
To get into an Ivy League school most entrants are highly intelligent but perhaps too narrowly focused.
I wonder if most of them can hang a picture, the have no experience making anything.
Dennis L.
The survivors will be slim and not very tall people, like Kalahari Bushmen/women/trans or Amazon tribespeople. There will be no schools or pictures to hang.
As Dr. Laura van Holstein demonstrates, if you wanna get ahead, get a skull.
https://twitter.com/lolvanhol/status/1438900632128311300
Another strike against EV’s:
“How Big Tech Is Consuming America’s Electricity And Water”
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/how-big-tech-consuming-americas-electricity-and-water
Ah, move the computers to space, plenty of electricity, cooling should not be a problem, send information only to earth.
Now, where was that cubic mile of Pt?
Dennis L.
By the end of the year it’s going to be clear to everyone in Europe that despite the tale of living happily ever after, EV’s do actually need an awful lot of electricity (5 households worth for one car on the slowest charger) and it just isnt there.
Two and two make five, they’ve been telling us in effect. As we press down on the accelerator pedal, there’s something just visible in the distance. It looks like a huge brick wall.
‘Someone’ is optimistic?
“There is huge idle capacity in the grid at night. This is when electricity is cheapest too, if you’re on time-of-use pricing. And this is when most people plug in their EVs at home, at their condo and apartment garages, and I now see EV chargers in hotel parking lots. To take advantage of the idle capacity in the grid at night is a massive trend, and utilities love it, and only anti-EV morons haven’t figured it out yet. You can see this in San Francisco, where the electrical grid isn’t all that great either, but EV penetration is already huge, with zero problems for the grid. EV are everywhere here.”?
https://wolfstreet.com/2023/09/12/tesla-price-cuts-followed-by-other-automakers-plus-surging-incentives-hammer-down-average-transaction-prices-after-toxic-spike/
We’ll see how turns out when we have full market penetration of ev vehicles…
Maybe technology will be such solar collectors on the roofs of evs will charge them during sunlight.
Remember, without fossil fuels these ev s won’t come off the assembly line nor will have roads to drive on..
How will they be recycled? Don’t want to spoil anything for ya..
It seems the ruling class in US and EU want to destroy their nation and culture. Why? Do they think they will be better off after the destruction? How?
This is libelous. They just want to keep control one way or another. Lack of energy is destroying their nation and culture. Like you would do any better in their place smarty pants.
We had to make it look like the economy was growing. The only way we could do that is to sell more laundry detergent, McDonalds, Starbucks and what not every year by increasing the population.
Since the native population refuses to do so due to not being able to afford houses, we had to go to Plan B.
Perhaps it is time for these cultures to die. Civilizations are born, grow up, mature, get old and die. It is just time for these cultures to die as well
It’s hard to watch the decline of most significant cultures in such a rapid and simultaneous fashion. Usually there is some culture in ascendency, but I don’t see one. Twerking and genital mutilation doesn’t really count as a replacement culture or civilization.
Twerking and genital mutilation doesn’t really count as a replacement culture or civilization.
Young people in all countries seem to be messed up. All they do is stare at their phones watching those silly Tiktok videos. Doesnt matter where you go they are all like that.
Not saying it bothers me personally, I’m a citizen of the world and have no problems with people from other countries. My best friend is a Muslim though drinks alcohol and eats bacon (we’ve Britishised him). It is what it is.
Maybe because the ruling class are not really members of the cultures they are undermining?
Even I who am not a member of the ruling class do not feel I am a member of the local “culture”. I feel some affinity for elements of the culture of Mountain View,CA, that is silicon valley.
I and the ruling class enjoy the fine products of the existing order, fine food, fine cars, fine clothes, fine ….. They and I will not be able to find these items after a catastrophic reset. Even with ten thousand acres and twenty thousand slaves the ruling class will live more coarsely.
FUBAR .
https://www.artberman.com/blog/europes-metacrisis-just-got-worse/
Meanwhile the Yen has gone down to 155 . A good read on ” the self organizing economy ” and the Yen carry trade we have discussed here .
https://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2024/03/the-plumbing-of-financial-system-we.html
One of the things the author says is
Someone figured out how to take advantage of differences between countries in the Yen carry trade. It is not necessarily easy to understand all of the implications.
https://www.artberman.com/blog/almost-everything-is-about-oil-in-the-middle-east/
I don’t think of Art Berman as a political writer, but he probably has some good points about the alliances and the wars indirectly being all about oil.
This is covered in a rather long but highly recommended book: “Oil, Power, and War”, 2018, by Matthieu Auzanneau
Well don’t look now but the USD just hit a new low against gold!
It now takes over $2400 USDs to buy an ounce of gold.
It is currently hard to understand exactly why the value of the USD has recently been falling versus gold.
Yes, inflation is part of the big picture but we have been experiencing the effects of inflation every year for decades.
So, it can not be solely the effects of inflation suddenly pushing the value of the USD to new lows against gold.
However, there is another kicker to confuse people, the value of the USD is going up against the rest of the world’s currencies!
So, how can the USD be getting stronger against the rest of the world’s currencies while at the same time making new lows against gold?
And while US interest rates are higher than much of the west too.
In the world of fiat currencies, the USD is considered to be the cleanest dirty shirt among other world fiat currencies.
Also many other countries use the USD in the form of US Treasury Bonds to back their currencies.
So if the value of the USD is going up against other world currencies, then there must be a demand for USD from the rest of the world.
In other words, there must be a slight shortage of USDs available to buy.
What could cause an increased demand for USD?
Other countries selling USD to support their falling currencies?
Has anybody notice what has been happening in the US Treasury bond market in the last few years?
More and more US Treasury bonds are being issued to fund the US government deficits.
So, who is buying all the new US Treasury bonds?
New US regulations are forcing many US entities to buy only US Treasury bonds.
Certainly China and Russia are not buying US Treasury bonds!
Well, the number of foreign buyers of US Treasure bonds has been steadily falling.
In response, the US Fed has been steadily monetizing more and more US Treasury bond purchases.
In layman’s terms, the Fed has been creating more and more USD out of thin air to buy all the excess US Treasury bonds, nobody else wants to buy!
Now if you are a large holder of US Treasury bonds, how are you feeling with rising inflation?
How about the fact the the US and Europe seized Russian central bank’s reserves held in USD and Euros?
If you are a foreign holder of US Treasury bonds, and a possible future potential recipient of having the USD weaponized against you, you are probably pretty nervous!
You probably want to get out of USD and Euros too.
So, maybe you are quietly trying to sell some of your US Treasury bonds?
When you sell a US Treasury bond, you usually expect to receive USD in cash in return.
(Maybe you are then using your USD to buy some gold too?)
So, could selling US Treasury bonds be the big new source of demand for USD?
We probably won’t know for years, if this is the real reason.
But something is happening!
P.S. There are other reasons for the demand for USD, like investing in the US but these are usually on-going and don’t represent a new big sudden shift in the USD market.
This is copy/paste . I have forgotten from where .
I think of the US as being the “best horse in the glue factory.”
We in the US are dealing with inflation, which is a big part of the rise of the price of oil. But other countries are doing even worse than we are. Their currencies are falling relative to the dollar. So that gives them more inflation in the cost of imported goods. And the rising dollar makes imported goods cheaper for the US.
I doubt that this situation can hold together for very long. But higher interest rates were intended to raise the US$ relative to other currencies.
Original article … has very useful comments and links. There’s the suggestion that the gold price will be fixed one day in China, not in London or New York. Worth listening to what Silver Wolf and Eric Yeung each have to say.
https://www.oilystuff.com/forumstuff/forum-stuff/gold-set-a-near-record-vs-oil-at-28-times-as-gold-breaches-2-400
I would worry more about silver . Gold is a monetary /fiscal metal but silver is monetary plus industrial . Use Google translate .
https://futurocienciaficcionymatrix.blogspot.com/2024/04/informe-de-la-plata-escasez-permanente.html
After sanctions, seizure of funds and assets and genocide who is going to accept a gold based promissory note from the agreement incapable? Gold, just as the rest of the western civilizational structure, has not had a stress test in any time period that resembles the current moment. The degree of societal collapse required to create an environment for gold to move freely enough to continue the current levels of corruption from child traffic, drug traffic to arm’s traffic and colonialism would be colossal. Almost impossible to believe and i will go out on a limb, this time it is different.
The total absence of discovery in the global financial and trade markets is a stumbling block not easily removed. The open discovery of this moment of weakness, moral, ethical, spiritual and military has changed five hundred years of history from one side of the ledger to the other. A move to gold is the end of Total Spectrum Dominance. Value and price discovery will decimate the current order. This is happening and everyone is grasping at straws.
The future is not in the rear view mirror.
Copy/paste from comments at OSB .
Original article … has very useful comments and links. There’s the suggestion that the gold price will be fixed one day in China, not in London or New York.
Perhaps. There isn’t much time left for big restructuring or international markets. One by one European countries are heading for power rationing and blackouts.
In the UK there was another recent announcement about how disabled persons will now basically be classified as unemployed and my impression is they are going to start throwing them off state benefits to starve or perhaps get euthanasia. if it’s legalised. I wish I could say I wasn’t serious.
”Alister Hamilton is a researcher at the University of Edinburgh and the founder of Zero Emissions Scotland. He and his colleagues self-funded research into oil depletion around the world and the results are shocking: We will lose access to oil around the world in the 2030s.
They calculated this by establishing the Energy Return On Investment (EROI) and found that whilst there will still be oil deposits around the world, we would use more energy accessing the oil supply than we would ever get from burning it. This is because we’re having to mine further into the earth’s crust to access lower-grade oil. According to their calculations, the oil in the North Sea will be inaccessible—in a dead state—by 2031, and the oil in Norway by 2032. Around the world, oil reserves see the same trend through the 2030s. ”
Very interesting . Hamilton has done the research using data from UK , Norway and Alaska . He talks about exergy ( external energy) in the form of NG usage and electrification now used in oil production . His work is a refinement of the work done by Hill Group . He also talks about temperature differential on the earth surface and the oil basin etc . I have read about this in 2021-22 in a paper by Brendt , Werhner .
Link to the video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r79rxfOFJJY&ab_channel=Planet%3ACritical
Link to the Berndt paper
https://www.peakoil.ch/media/files/the_end_of_oil_covered_230920.pdf
Really stunning report.
I think a good idea would be for all Americans and western world. To cut their food and fuel consumption in half. And someone needs to create a program to calculate this and track it.
This also could have huge gains for people such as ending obesity, and all the great things that come, feel better, sleep better, look better, etc. And it doesn’t have to be sold as “reduce your lifestyle to save the planet and your fellow man. Because most people don’t give a s*** about their fellow man. So, they just flat out see anything “Green” as a huge net loss. This would be a way to show them a personal gain. I know many women would see this as a dream come true even. No, need for weight loss drugs and nonsense.
Not only would lower carbon emissions it would likely free up much more farmland which could be used to bio-fuels and such. And considering most people in the western world eat way more than we need anyway, I don’t think the challenge would be that difficult.
And we would all have to do it together.
We can cut our fuel consumption by stopping building roads. Stop fixing pipelines, including water pipelines. Stop repairing electricity transmission lines. Of course, without these things the economy is really bad off. Without oil, we don’t have any of these things.
My point was we don’t need to be overweight/obese. We don’t need to drive huge SUV’s and consume on average 3 gallons of gasoline a day. And we would likely be much better off personally and socially if we didn’t.
We DO need to keep the lights on the trucks running etc. And if the dam burst, we aren’t going to be able to be overweight or drive anything anyways.
We DO need to keep the lights on the trucks running etc.
It would just be delaying the inevitable. Sooner or later the lights go out, the food trucks stop running, the toilet won’t flush and the screaming and gunshots start.
Laughing quietly,
Amish have a bit of a problem with building codes, it is the plumbing or lack thereof; that drives the building inspectors nutz.
Dennis L.
The Hill report for those interested .
https://www.feasta.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Systemic-Change-Rev-7.pdf
Thanks! This is a fairly long presentation from 2016. I recognized a couple of images I made in the presentation.
One aspect of the oil problem that this presentation focuses on the economics of the oil industry, and how the oil industry looked like it was going broke. I haven’t had good data on that kind of thing, so I haven’t focused on those things.
I suppose all of the subsidies of “green” things have helped bail out the oil industry. But I am doubtful with respect to this line of reasoning. It doesn’t match up with what the industry is reporting. https://www.api.org/oil-and-natural-gas/energy-primers/earnings-in-perspective
If everyone cut their food consumption in half, they would all be dead.
bummer
Dennis L.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/ai-bubble-stumbles-first-asml-now-tsmc-warns-downgrades-2024-global-chip-outlook
Very nice article, Gail!
The Middle East developments create a pressure on the Arab states, especially Saudis, to sell their oil to BRICS states. When US-Fracking declines NATO won’t have any Diesel.
The CO2 agenda allows states to force up investments during recession, when investments and credits are low. I think, that’s the main purpose.
During the lockdows, companies received payments without any work (Blackrock’s “Going direct”), keeping the economy going with less energy. We should expect a new pandemic in the moment supply crunches are near.
I suppose, the Chinese price competition aims to develop markets in India, Brasils and Africa, which could work, if these markets receive cheap oil.
If there are not any magic machines deployed soon, I don’t see many options for the West.
“CO2 agenda allows states to force up investments during recession”
I think of the CO2 agenda as giving an excuse for ramping up debt, and creating a new (subsidized) industry that gives the world economy hope–whether or not that hope is really feasible. And, you are right, it can do these things during recession as well.
A huge solar farm that has been approved in Ohio could be the paradigm for similar ones moving forward.
The Oak Run Solar Project on 6,000 acres in Madison County will be able to serve the grid with enough electricity to power 170,000 homes.
The most impressive part about the billion-dollar effort is how developers are designing the massive system to include agriculture — a concept called agrivoltaics. It’s part of the work to maximize sun-catching, as well as to gain support from Madison’s robust farming community, according to Electrek and the project’s website.
“A solar project provides a healthy, productive economic development opportunity for local land to harvest a stable cash crop — the sun,” the developers wrote on the website.
As part of the plan, a thousand sheep will graze on the Oak Run property. There will be 2,000 acres of crops a year after the system powers up. The goal is for about 70% of the project area, around 4,000 acres, to include agriculture, according to Electrek’s story.
It’s the largest project of its kind in the United States, estimated to generate $7.2 million in tax revenue each year. The system’s life span is estimated at 35 years, all per the developer, Savion. Savion is a subsidiary of Shell.
https://www.thecooldown.com/green-business/oak-run-solar-project-agrivoltaics-ohio/
What could possibly go wrong, I wonder?
Someone emailed me a link to this video: How the Resource Curse Will End Russia Economically
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zCXNm1vk6o
Basically, the sale of these resources benefits only a small share of the population, creating huge wealth disparity. This disparity is a disaster for innovation. Innovation works much better when incomes are much more equal. The economy can grow better if it is much more diverse, with much more widespread sharing of the wealth.
That would have been certainly true 25 years ago. But the place is rapidly changing and as seen from the inside Putin is positively social democratic. In fact there is a wave of small entrepreneurs coming online.
This guy’s a grade A moron, I watched a couple of his videos. Power comes out of the barrel of a gun and we can’t make many of those any more but Russia and China can, to put it simply.
Maybe the new Space Force branch of the US Military was established to take the place of hardware in the field.
SPACE NOW DEFINES OUR DAILY LIVES AND THE MODERN WAY OF WAR.
Seems one way to streamline operations…bring the hostile nations back to the stone age ..
What Space Force would that be? I know there’s one on paper.
It’s a work in progress…
I’m not going to dig down that rabbit hole too far. Visited their website and a few articles.
Seeking recruits and appears it will tie in all branches together to coordinate functions under their command regarding computer space warfare.
Surgical strikes of communication/financial systems may be just as crippling to a nation as artillery bombing. Reading bits alreZdy being hatched by the Russian and Chinese
What a show..
The US is far too weak today for any such fantasies, it’s out of the question. Only one country today has its own space station and that is China.
“computer space warfare”
Then you are going to want the best up and coming programmers the world can produce. Which country consistently produces the best of the best?
https://cphof.org/contest/icpc
Looks like it’s the same country that has the best rocket scientist and oodles of those adorable resources, to make all the artillery they choose as well.
That Deagel forecast, given recent events, is looking more and more like a good bet, although cashing out could be problematic.
Fritz,
Perhaps, and likely the US Powers recognize that fact and are establishing a blitz program to counterbalance their threat.
Sometimes advertisement is the best deterrent against an enemy.
I would not short change the US ability in that department either.
I would not short change the US ability in that department either.
It’s 2024.
In 2023 China produced 1,000,000,000 tons of steel of which 870,000,000 tons was virgin steel suitable for arms manufacturing.
The US produced 80,000,000 tons of which maybe 10 to 20 percent was virgin steel. Let’s go way high and say half of it was so that gives the US 40,000,000 tons.
That means China produces 22 times more of it per year.
That’s why the US is moving to warfare software….
Same as the UK. Problem is you don’t have a big brother looking out for you like we do.
Mike, look into Russia’s EW capabilities and it will soon become clear that the west’s deficit in the relevant tech is, like hypersonics, measured in decades and we won’t be catching up, as we scamper around, ever more desperate just to keep the lights on.
We turned our brightest scientists into pharma shills and our best mathematicians in to complex conjurers for financial fraud. We don’t possess the mindset to face these challenges anymore. We’re not reality based anymore.
Spot on Fritz,
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TpCb3xjh-Kk&t=8s&pp=ygUaTWljaGFlbCBiYXVtIHRoZSBiaWcgc2hvcnQ%3D
We live in an era of Fraud … Govt, Banking, Society.” Things have only become exponentially worse since 2009.
“I thought we were better than this, I really did. And the fact that we’re not doesn’t make me feel all right and superior. It makes me feel sad.”
Pingback: World’s economic myths hitting limits | Worldtruth
Here’s one for Dennis L. Start in at the 3:34 mark, to avoid the sponsored advertising and also Hecklefish mischievously trying to “out” the presenter, who has a rather high-pitched voice.
Martian Mysteries | The Phobos Incident, Monoliths, and Ancient Ruins
In fact, I think we should send Dennis L. to Mars to investigate. We’ll send Norrman too, to keep an eye on the wayward intellectual. They’ll have to provide their own oxygen, though. Dennis is a practical sort of guy, and I’m sure he’ll manage it. Meanwhile, I’ll start a YouTube channel to record his adventures, with the catchphrase: “Bloody ‘ell – it’s Dennis L!”
“Before the eighteenth century mankind entertained no false hopes.”
– John Maynard Keyes
True. They weren’t expecting the Spanish Inquisition or even the return of the Messiah.
(Byoblu + Bloomberg)
Dubai floodings of these days seems to be a clear consequence of ‘cloud seeding’ made previous days.
Every mainstream source now talks about these kind of activities made all over the world since many years.
Just with the purpose to take a note about that when one talks about the climate.
“Torrential rains, winds up to 80 kilometers per hour, and stranded airports. In 24 hours, the amount of rain expected in a year and a half fell in Dubai.
However, the impressive cloudburst that hit the Emirati city is not the work of Mother Nature. […]
In search of a plausible explanation for the phenomenon in the past few hours, in fact, international newspapers have heard the opinions of experts. And with no longer any fear of being labeled as crazy conspiracists, these have brought forward the theory of cloud seeding.
The most authoritative voice in this case is that of Ahmed Habib, a specialist meteorologist with the NCM, the UAE task force responsible for “cloud seeding” missions.
“In the two days before the flood, April 14-15, seeding planes flew seven missions,” Habib said limpidly.
On the day of the flood, however, there was no operation, reassured Omar Al Yazeedi, deputy director general of the NCM, instead.
“We take the safety of our personnel, our pilots and our aircraft very seriously. The NCM does not conduct cloud seeding operations during extreme weather events.”
As if the cloudburst was not caused by previous seeding activities…
The fact remains that the UAE has been using such a cloud seeding technique since the 1990s and that they are not alone. According to the Spanish state meteorological agency…”
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
https://www.byoblu.com/2024/04/18/nubifragio-dubai-altro-che-cambiamento-climatico-adesso-anche-i-media-generalisti-parlano-di-geoingegneria/
https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/dubai-grinds-to-standstill-as-cloud-seeding-worsens-flooding-1.2059771
Do you REALLY think that the Arabs have cloud-seeding techniques that are as powerful as all that? When have they EVER caused such a downpour before? You have too much faith in technology.
Not an opinion on cloud seeding, but I’ve witnessed downpours and flooding like that in the region. Also, most of these countries road systems, have no drainage installed when built, so flood very easily(not sure about Dubai).
Wake up to reality my friend.
Better to understand how the world goes if one wants to discuss what’s going on…
https://english.alarabiya.net/News/gulf/2024/01/18/UAE-to-carry-out-hundreds-of-cloud-seeding-missions-in-2024-to-tackle-water-scarcity
I’m already awake. I know these things go on. But I question whether they are as POWERFUL as you think they are.
They were pretty capable 70 years ago.
In 1952 the UK RAF tried cloud seeding above the small town of Lynmouth, Devon. It went disastrously wrong and 35 civilians died in the resulting flash flooding.
By the end of the 20th century, the truth came out. No compensation was offered to surviving relatives, but nor did the authorities really try to deny what had happened.
I tend to agree with you, probably a nothingburger. But the hypothesis that cloud seeding is uncontrollable, and most often a dud, but under the right circumstances, can generate a major storm, is interesting. A little bit like the fusion device that israel used to level the Beirut port.
Please say a little more about the fusion device…
Thanks
Well in Beirut the crater was clearly due to a point-like explosion, whereas the official explanation was the explosion of an extended warehouse. Likewise the shockwave was coherent from pics I have seen, also indicating a point like explosion. The problem is, there were no neutrons detected as a fission device would produce.
In 2007 a similar accident happened in Sandia Lab in the US. It appears to have involved lithium rods arranged in a cylinder in a hydrogen (heavy hydrogen most probably). The device worked by sending a high transient through the rods, somehow igniting the neutron less reaction 6Li+2H-> 2 4He (the scheme was invented in Russia). totally uncontrollable but portable (less than cubic meter) and deniable at least to the public. whatever your theory about that event, it needs to explain a circular crater and coherent shockwave.
Do you have a link to a video?
Pics of the explosion and the aftermath are everywhere. The sandia lab accident i know through professional channels.
It is now wonder that GB left the EU: its energy implosion and the level of complexity surpassed the threshold that was acceptable.
EU is a construct that requires a certain level of generalization. It was not the EU rising complexity that caused GB to leave the EU, as proclaimed by the political forces that promoted the Brexit, but the rising complexity within GB suprassing that of the EU.
the EU was a construct of collective prosperity—without that prosperity we will start fighting each other again
I wrote about that years ago
https://medium.com/me/stats/post/7a401c225171
I agree with you. Without collective prosperity, the EU cannot succeed. Member countries start fighting with each other when there is not enough to go around.
The EU no longer matters, like NATO; both of them are now impotent talking shops. Like a Roman emperor of the 5th century, they command armies and great wealth that exist only on paper.
The latest EU move has been to block imports of cheap Chinese EV’s on the false ground that China is not competing fairly. The real reason of course is that if we added millions more EV’s to the current number in the EU, the lights would go out and the bridges and roads would collapse even faster.
Germany is now talking about banning driving at weekends to ‘save the planet’. The Netherlands may start rationing electricity. The UK wants to bring in ‘surge pricing’ to expose consumers directly to the wild fluctuations of the electricity wholesale market.
It is necessary to have an excuse such as “to save the planet” to reduce driving. Staying at home to prevent the spread of covid was another similar excuse.
Whatever the excuse I’m glad we aren’t going to import those cars, for sure. Imagine the effect on the grid.
“In 2019, she was placed in office with the support of the EU’s self-described pro-European parties: the conservative European People’s Party, the Socialists and the liberal Renew group. That landed her only a narrow majority: 383 votes, slightly above the minimum of 374. With the far right surging across Europe, von der Leyen could struggle to repeat that win.”
https://www.politico.eu/article/second-term-not-guaranteed-eu-commission-president-ursula-von-der-leyen/
Make no mistake. The Iran problem started with peak oil under the Shah
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GLDTaX9a4AE4ndn?format=jpg&name=900×900
Just to see the issue from an Alien’s point of view,
in Iran they see a ‘US problem’ with peak oil, in US, under Nixon 😀
The US peak was in 1970. That allowed OPEC to impose an embargo in 1973.There were several other, later peaks in th region which shaped geopolitics: In Yemen, Syria, Sudan, Egypt, Libya. The result you see every day on TV.
So you understand my point, that we talk about an Iran problem, they talk about an US problem.
We should see things also from the other’s perspective, we have already 2 active wars, it is better not to have a third one..
They could close Hormuz strait, not nice.
There is no Iran problem. Iran complies with international law unlike the US, Israel and the UK.
There are a lot of countries with peak oil problems, usually quite a few years ago. The general population doesn’t recognize this problem.
There are really two different oil problems:
1. The financial hit, when a country loses its exports and/or needs to increase its imports.
2. The overall world economic need for specific oil products, pretty much on a per capita basis. We need enough diesel for the world’s growing population, for example.
Israeli missiles have reportedly hit the Iranian city of Isfahan
19 Apr 2024
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/israeli-missiles-have-reportedly-hit-the-iranian-city-of-isfahan/rr3xopdgp
The WSJ article on this topic says
“Strike targeted area around Iranian city with nuclear facilities”
I would imagine this was the reason the city was selected.
This is a link to the zero hedge article on the subject:
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/eye-eye-tooth-tooth-only-hamas-wants-bigger-war-iran-israel-signal-strikes-done
“Eye For An Eye, A Tooth For A Tooth”: Only Hamas Wants Bigger War As Iran, Israel Signal Strikes ‘Done’
This is a war only in the media .: Nothing much physical damage was done to Israel and Israel has retaliated by doing nothing back! International leaders are currently assessing the situation and caution restraint. Colonel Outis of the Pentagon reports “nobody knows anything about anyone; it’s a fluid situation”. Tensions remain high over concerns that nothing might happen. There is also worry that populations around the world are disengaged and completely indifference . Talking about indifference — look at the oil markets , just shrugging . Imagine if this was an event in the 1980’s .
Another theory that this just WWF .
”Although the Israelis have not yet taken responsibility for anything, the U.S quickly stated that it was Israeli through multiple outlets. I will put forward a wild theory here:
Israel didn’t even know this was happening, the U.S used their many proxies in the area to send out a couple small drones and have Iranian air defense engage them. Then within seconds jumped and said it was Israel, in an attempt to stop the Israelis from actually committing a mistake by striking something they shouldn’t have. ”
Sounds crazy , but then —-
This would be a rare smart move by the US. But then, surely there are still some smart mid-rank guys.
Funny how in mass communication societies elephants can become as invisible as the soul of a chattering monkey, to the point where few can detect their pachydermic presence in pharma labs, universities, rooms or even in the sky above us.
Tell me about viroliegy, zience and crymate change.
How blind can fear and indoctrination make us? Answer: completely.
The issue of geoengineering is an issue of global suicide. Ultimately it is a matter of priorities: wealth and power for a few zillionaires now or planetary death later. So far as I can see, the egotistic materialism of the globemaster nihilists who own and control the planet is the ineluctable fate of our Goldilocks satellite.
It’s a very long video but skipping through it I understand the thesis is that gl0bal worming has been covered up by the use of aircraft and so on seeding clouds and rain and ice and snow though chemical means?
Obviously that couldn’t work because of entropy, the same as sucking the CO2 back out of the sky with giant machines couldn’t work. So it’s nothing to worry about because it isn’t possible and therefore isn’t happening. QED.
1. like other psy ops (war on drugs, on terrorism, etc.) the “war on globalworming” is not meant to solve the supposed problem, but to use it for political gains.
2. That there’s nothing worrying about dumping tons of barium, alum and sulfur oxide into the atmosphere is just wishful thinking on your part.
3. It’s not happening? Instead of relying on logic, try looking at the trails in the sky and believing your own eyes.
1. like other psy ops (war on drugs, on terrorism, etc.) the “war on globalworming” is not meant to solve the supposed problem, but to use it for political gains.
Sure, it’s not a ‘problem’ that can be solved. Agreed.
2. That there’s nothing worrying about dumping tons of barium, alum and sulfur oxide into the atmosphere is just wishful thinking on your part.
I just don’t think this is happening and my point was it would do absolutely nothing because entropy tells us we would only create even more CO2 doing it. Yes there is some limited ‘cloud seeding’ in a very few places but they use silver based particles I believe.
3. It’s not happening? Instead of relying on logic, try looking at the trails in the sky and believing your own eyes.
Those are condensation trails. It’s water.
C15H32 + O2 = CO2 + H2O
Get real, geongeneering and cloud seeding are real military technologiers and have been used for decades.
Condensation trails don’t stay in the air for hours nor expand like the trails I’ve seen in the sky, which btw are perfectly documented in photos and videos all over the world and are even admitted by many comercial and military pilots. It’s not theory, but fact.
But maybe they’re not spraying in your neck of the woods. Or maybe you’re just short-sighted.
Get real, geongeneering and cloud seeding are real military technologiers and have been used for decades.
I did say cloud seeding is real.
Sulfur oxide does not exist. Sulfur dioxide (SO2) and sulfur trioxide (SO3) exist, both of which are gases not solids.
There’s plenty of both gases going into the atmosphere plus plenty of particles causing global dimming from all the coal we burn globally. No need for any additional stuff.
Yes I see lots of trails but as I said they are condensation trails which are just water. I don’t know what else to say about that.
Condensation trails dissolve after a couple of seconds, they don’t stay in the air for hours nor expand.
I don’t know what else to say about it either except watch The Dimming. then comment.
Condensation trails dissolve after a couple of seconds, they don’t stay in the air for hours nor expand.
Look this is high school level stuff. Why not just watch some proper science videos which will explain it for you?
Of all the things in the world to worry about you’ve picked a completely imaginary non issue.
Every day I see trails that behave as expected, dissolving after a few seconds, AND OTHERS that don’t behave as expected and remain visible for hours. That in the same day and in the same sky and place.
The badly behaved trails invariably appear on clear days (never when it’s cloudy) and in criss-cross patterns (which invalidates the hypothesis that they are made by commercial planes, since the air routes are well defined).
If you prefer to believe your high school science over your eyes, that’s up to you, but you’re no less dumb for it.
End of conversation.
If you prefer to believe your high school science over your eyes, that’s up to you, but you’re no less dumb for it.
I could throw plenty of insults your way but doing that only degrades the person throwing them. Not my style really except with Fast Eddy who doesn’t count.
Countries with the highest and lowest household debt 2023
https://www.comparethemarket.com.au/home-loans/features/countries-with-the-highest-and-lowest-household-debt-2023/
It is clear that the cold latitudes and the high altitudes or the too hot areas of the world are a problem.for the survival of the human species.
The countries that use the most fossil fuels are the coldest areas (and perhaps the oil exporting areas). The countries that use the most debt are similar. It takes more substantial buildings to shelter people in cold areas from the weather outside. Vehicles tend to be more substantial, also. People use debt for homes and vehicles, among other things.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3e_Fhr6T3PE&t=1077s
MARC GIRARDOT
New Interview with John Campbell.
Discussing “The Needle’s Secret: Unraveling the Mystery of Vaccine Harm, and the Bolus Theory Revolution”
oh please. Campbell made millions pushing the jab. Chase the laser pointer down the “bolus” rabbit hole if you want. These people are both criminals.
Did he? What was the source of money?
Marc keeps pushing this hypothesis. No idea why. In traditional vaccines the adjuvants contain toxins (e.g. aluminium). In the new mRNA/LNP platform it is known that the lipids (both ionic and cationic) are toxic.
Children have also been harmed by the oral polio vaccine. How does Marc explain that?
The lipid nano particles for sure are not the most dangerous ingredients.
Since the 90s it was known that the mRNA technology allows no control to where and how long the mRNA is expressed – which means uncontrollable auto immune reactions, leading to inflammation and cardio vascular problems.
Kevin McKernan, co-responsible for the Human Genome Project, said recently, he cannot imagine the vaxx NOT to lead to cancer: tumorsuppressor p53 down, RNA/DNA jumps into the genes thanks to SV40, lymphocytes down, frameshifting leading to protein junk.
By the way the RKI files prove the German government has known in advance that covid was not so dangerous and that the vaxx has some risks.
On Australia’s east coast, renewables contributed 38.8% to power supplies over the last 12 months:
Solar rooftop 11.3%
Solar utility 7.3%
Wind 13.1%
Hydro 7.1%
Coal incl. brown coal had a share of 56.3%
https://opennem.org.au/energy/nem/?range=1y&interval=1w&view=discrete-time
The biggest regular problem is the period after sunset when hydro comes in. But a lot of gas is needed in peaking plants e.g in Queensland (20%) and South Australia (up to 70% depending on how much wind is available)
As aging coal fired power plants have to be closed down, the problems will increase, especially because:
28/3/24
Peak gas in Victoria, Australia
https://crudeoilpeak.info/peak-gas-in-victoria-australia
Australia is exporting itself gas poor, plans LNG import terminals http://crudeoilpeak.info/australia-is-exporting-itself-gas-poor-plans-lng-import-terminals
Using a phrase of Art Berman: Drain Australia first
>> On Australia’s east coast, renewables contributed 38.8% to power supplies over the last 12 months:
I’m not clear on whether you mean to say that renewables are a big help or not, but in case you are, I suggest figuring out for yourself what percentage of overall energy consumption electricity constitutes.
What I am saying is that there are limits to renewables taking a much higher share in power generation. Gas peaking plants and storage are essential. In relation to transport fuels I have been warning on my crudeoilpeak website and twitter account over many years that the current situation is unsustainable. EVs can be powered from rooftop solar + batteries or the grid, reducing availability of electricity
I worked out that if we were to manufacture enough lithium batteries to store the world’s total energy consumption for 2023 and placed them end to end, we would have enough batteries to reach from Earth to well beyond Mars.
I wonder where all of the lithium would come from. We would need to keep replacing these lithium batteries in the future, too.
Starship will launch about May 15. The cost is down to four dollars per kilo to orbit. Low enough to make solar power satellites profitable.
Still need to control the number of humans.
Also, at that rate AIs can be put in orbit with full time local power and no human competition.
Do you make solar powered satellites with mud bricks? Also how long are their lifespans?
These things don’t last too long.
Lifespan, good question.
Another common myth is that we can solve a physics problem politically, or that politicians have magical powers. To many right wingers I know think that if Trump gets into office, he can magically make more oil. They think he is like Moses in Exodus 17 when he gets water to flow from a rock.
He can’t make more oil, but he can change the size of the straw and access to ANWR and NPRA. That could improve quality of life for a while, albeit with a steeper drop when it comes. And less aggressive foreign policy would lessen the motivation of other countries to drop the dollar.
We haven’t hit the final resource limits just yet. Rather, the West is running into late-stage consequences of financialization, parasitism, and systemic incompetence.
What I find funny in a dark sort of way is that US elites are now trying to reindustrialize and re-shore obviously critical industries, but it’s too late to make those investments in a way that would reverse current geopolitical trends. Also, the culture, education, and demographics have been so corrupted that the human capital to improve the strategic situation no longer exists and would take a generation (optimistically) to rebuild. By that time we will have shipwrecked against resource limits.
UEP or bust. Or deus ex machina: The Secret Book of John (or another text; I forget) says that on several occasions God increased the size of the earth by two thirds to counteract overpopulation.
US Elites are just stupid. Even if they deindustrialize intentionally through green policy, lowering the IQ stock of the demographics and dumbing down the education would not give them autonomous global control. And shifting it to China won’t do anything, as they have perpetual corruption there and a large surplus population to feed. I personally feel the elites are incompetent. Perhaps they wanted a civil war to start a scientific dictatorship, albeit it’s too late now.
or a wobbly IC declining in an oscillating fashion along a multi decade degrowth curve, as the world economy will surely have worse years and bad but not so bad years.
yes the US could ramp up some conventional oil even as LTO declines, and Canada looks certain to increase production, and Venezuela looks like the next candidate to increase production for export and mostly for the benefit of the buyer (the USA).
https://davecoop.net/seneca has a graph of the EIA’s figures for annual world crude oil production, with 2023 being the highest since 2019.
Since the post-covid price spike in 2022 ( https://oil-price.net/ ), the figures show continued increases — were these partly due to US light-oil fracking, or releases from the US SPR?
We get whatever numbers the EIA chooses to provide to us. There seem to be some manual adjustments. Recent US oil is quite light oil from wells that have been fracked.
Your expected curve indicates that we will be completely out of crude oil by 2043. That is only 19 years from now. Quite a few of us could be alive then, under normal circumstances.
that speculative curve also shows oil quantity down only about 10% in 2030.
I could be alive then, hope to be, and hope to see bAU ongoing in that 10% down scenario.
The EIA and IEA are arms of the West just like IMF , World bank ,OECD etc . Their data is contaminated to one objective — keep the price of oil low . Overstating production is one of them .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-cohhcW1I7Y&ab_channel=KingdomExplorationLLC
Uncovering the truth. How shale oil reports by the EIA are overblown.
“Since the post-covid price spike in 2022 ( https://oil-price.net/ ), the figures show continued increases — were these partly due to US light-oil fracking, or releases from the US SPR?”
I think it’s mostly due to US fracked LTO, but a good portion is increased Canadian production, which is heavy oil.
the imminent decrease, which might be underway now and will certainly accelerate slightly in 2025 and beyond, will be driven by US fracked oil also.
this will cause severe problems in the 2030s.
“New Malthusians are wrong: a rich world needs less energy than once feared.
An untruth has led us to believe net zero is near impossible.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/04/18/rich-world-needs-less-energy-net-zero/
So says Ambrose Evans-Pritchard. Technology and green methods will save us all. Who will refute his individual points?
Let’s start with, “The more wind and solar energy we add, the less total electricity we will have.”
Then there is the issue that electricity (especially intermittent electricity) gives us practically nothing. We can’t grow food with it, or transport food to market. We cannot repair roads (either asphalt of concrete) with electricity. We cannot repair electricity lines with intermittent electricity. We cannot make transformers with only electricity.
The main thing we can do with intermittent electricity (if we have enough batteries) is run our air conditioners with it. It can store electricity from morning (when it is cool out) to evening (when our homes are too hot). It can also help us cook our evening meals. But expect to freeze in the dark in winter with wind and solar electricity.
Well parried, Gail.
The best renewable which comes with storage is timber for producing heat when it is dark and cold. But as well all know the growth rate vs population and use is not sustainable. Only really useful to those living on acreage.
There is always the question of whether people “living on acreage” can expect to continue living on acreage.
We can’t expect governments to protect us for the long term. The acreage, especially if it is forested, will be of interest to strong young men who are in a position to push others out.
David Mamet: “Old age and treachery will always beat youth and exuberance.”
Modern example: youth of Ukraine dying on battle fields while old men promote war.
Frankly, I don’t have a clue but I think if most people take human life it ruins them psychologically for the remainder of their life.
Call me crazy, looking at solar cells and H for storage. Alternative on survival sites, Beans, Bullets and Bandages or some such. What an awful way to live. Alternative, walking behind an ox.
Dennis L.
We will be lucky to find an ox, walking or not.
As a person living on an acreage and harvesting timber for Winter warmth, I doubt that strong young men will come to push me out.
Why? because there is nothing here for them.
These young men ( if any after the collapse) may come looking for a means of living. I.e. food, water, shelter, female company but there’s not much of any of that on an acreage
after the fuel powered devices are no more.
There will be a bit of food that the current occupier has recently grown or hunted which can be stolen.
Water, don’t need to come to an acreage for that ( it runs clean and clear in numerous rivers and streams all over Tasmania).
Shelter, well they could kick the current occupier out maybe, and then what?
The only option is a rural occupation growing plants or animals or harvesting timber.
Which bring us to timber which many writers on blogs seem to think can just be collected.
The average ‘young man’ couldn’t fell a tree
unless experienced. It is a skilled and dangerous job.
And what timber is he going to be after?
The tree needs to be dead for at least two years before it will burn and be the right species.
A homesteader looks only for dead trees that they can reduce in size.
It takes a lot of chainsaw work to reduce it to manageable sizes, even more with handsaws and axes, but it’s still heavy.
It’s bad enough pulling a small trailer back to the homestead many times to get enough for Winter.
So our ‘young men’ can, with a lot of hard work, some skills and knowledge can get enough timber to keep themselves warm over Winter.
Was that why they came, or have they got cranes, trucks a good supply of diesel etc so that they can make a living out of their acreage moving timber?
Female company? Forget it, they all went to the city to find a smarter young man to look after them.
(There are a lot of wallabies and possums if desperate for some sort of company).
Female company? Forget it, they all went to the city to find a smarter young man to look after them.
There won’t be any more cities. They’ll be abandoned once the cholera gets going and the lights go out.
“The tree needs to be dead for at least two years before it will burn and be the right species.
A homesteader looks only for dead trees that they can reduce in size.
It takes a lot of chainsaw work to reduce it to manageable sizes, even more with handsaws and axes, but it’s still heavy.”
Dad and I have 20 acres of hardwoods, mostly dying Ash, Ironwood and Maple with Hickory, Walnut and Apple for foraging and pectin for canning. Over the summer, I can harvest enough dead standing Ironwood (energy dense) and Elm and Ash (kindling) that I can cut with 12″ cordless or bow saw and carry back to camp in 6′ sections for sawing with corded or crosscut saw to fit into potbelly coal stove.
400 watt DIY solar set up may extend my youth as needed to run saws until batteries die. Trade and barter, charity and protective associations would allow for community aid to provide food and social security and teamsters to tackle plowing, barnraising and hard labor for senior citizens. Dad says my uncle hollered someone off the hill to warn them that their house was on fire. Bucket brigade formed to fight from miles around in another case. Background noise is low here, cooperation is a given.
Yearly foraging for wood within 100 yards of the cabin provides firewood for roughly a month of all-day fires during hunting season and early Spring vacations. Year round wood supply would require staging and multiple trips farther afield.
In this valley, within a mile there is a family owned Maple Syrup business and also a sizable beef operation run by a fellow with Belgian Draught horses. Human pop density is 12 with 80-100 whitetail per square mile. Location is approx 3 hours drive from major population centers in the northern tier of PA/NY. I think the best formula for post-peak survival may look something like our arrangement.
Young men want to mate and form a family, iz is still in our genes. They may be strong but being educated by tic toc, they wonder where nature’s USB connectors are on the mountains.
There is at least one generation of grandparents needed to tell them how to solve problems and to teach the babies. A lot of knowledge will have to come from books until it is tradition. Think of herbal medicine, gardening, lifestock, spinning, weaving, knitting, roof repair, forging, lenses for googles, preserving, tanning, timbering, natural pesticides.
Do you want to start teaching the grandkids Latin or how to how to make shoes?
You’re actually can, in theory, grow food with electricity using bacteria. https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2015025118
Better than Soylent green I suppose.
“Figure 1 shows that, in the US, once wind and solar are added, total electricity generation per capita falls, rather than rises!”
Malinvestment. Plain and simple. The world is getting very strange.
I need to send a link to my article to Prof. Charles Hall.
He and the other EROEI folks have been convinced that wind especially has a very high EROEI, and solar not terribly bad either. Thus, wind and solar should be good additions to the grid. It doesn’t work that way.
As important as eroei is it just goes to show how phenomal of a resource fungible on demand fossil fuels are. Oil derived diesel from high eroei wells is unbeatable in this regard. Can’t imagine we could ever construct as distributed and diverse of a transport, ag and mining system without it.
United States meddling with Europe is the cause of the fall of Western Civilization.
Although the people of USA spoke English, only a few actually belonged to Western Civilization, namely those who could be welcomed into the Anglo-American Establishment.
Its fatal flaw was it identified more with Asian countries, like China and India, than other European countries. So it was keen to destroy other European Countries and Japan , an Oceanian country, but it coddled USSR and the People’s Republic of China.
The cold war was not necessary. There might be some Russophils at here, but frankly speaking it was better to show Stalin the middle finger and deny Central Europe to it by ending Lend Lease at 1944 and breaking the Great Alliance on that year. I have a lot of things to say about how 1944 was botched, and again, I do not share Dennis L’s philosophies of valuing the mostly working class GI’s lives. Their mostly meaningless lives were not worth the price of giving a moral victory for USSR/Russia, as recently pointed out by Putin to Tucker Carlson.
The first Hydrogen Bomb should have been used at Shenyang (Mukden), at that time the industrial center of China, and Peking, and let Chiang Kaishek and what would be remaining of CCP leadership to sort the mess out.
These two measures would have kept the Third World largely very poor to this day, preventing the crisis describe in the body of this post.
The coal from China has helped the rest of the world economy in recent years. Without China ramping it up, we would be a lot worse off.
I think there is still hope for Gen IV nuclear. If it works and it is economic, the world economy still has a long way to grow. But if it doesn’t work and or we continue doing everything else but nuclear, then we are doomed.
It takes fossil fuels to extract uranium. In fact, there is a bottleneck right now. More uranium is demanded than we have the capability to mine. Then there is the issue of processing the uranium. Most of this is done in Russia. We need to “make nice” to Russia if we expect them to sell us the processed uranium.
We have been keeping nuclear reactors operating for 60 or even 80 years. Are we going to keep up uranium supply for that long? Then there is decommissioning. This takes fossil fuels, too.
Ultimately everything comes down to diesel. All excess energy needs to be converted to diesel synthesis and that is not energy efficient enough to run a modern civ. Shortly following that we run into every resource getting more energy intense to get.
My impression is that when we make liquids today, such as in “coal to liquids” or the gas to liquids plant in Qatar, we tend to make short-chain liquids, not viscous liquids like diesel.
Maybe it is possible to make diesel from other things, but it certainly isn’t easy or cheap. This is not something we can expect to do at scale.
Banks Unwilling To Finance $5 Trillion Global Nuclear Development
By Alex Kimani – Apr 14, 2024, 6:00 PM CDT
Nuclear energy is enjoying a renaissance in the U.S. and many Western countries thanks to the global energy crisis.
Bankers appear unwilling to finance the $5 trillion the IAEA estimates the global nuclear industry needs for development until 2050.
Over the past several years, billions of federal dollars have gone into the development and demonstration of next-generation small modular reactors (SMRs) and advanced fuel cycle reactors.
Nuclear plant
After decades of being treated as the black sheep of the energy universe, nuclear energy is enjoying a renaissance in the U.S. and many Western countries thanks to the global energy crisis. Back in December, at the COP28 summit, 22 countries including the US, Canada, the UK, and France pledged to triple nuclear power capacity by 2050 (from 2020 levels). Last month, 34 nations, including the United States, China, France, Britain, and Saudi Arabia, committed “to work to fully unlock the potential of nuclear energy by taking measures such as enabling conditions to support and competitively finance the lifetime extension of existing nuclear reactors, the construction of new nuclear power plants and the early deployment of advanced reactors.”
The world is begrudgingly beginning to accept that technological bottlenecks limit solar and wind energy as large-scale substitutes for fossil fuel energy. Further, we are unable to develop clean energy resources fast enough to meet the world’s climate goals while the war in Ukraine has laid bare Europe’s dependence on Russian energy.
But nuclear’s revival might be dead in the water with lenders balking at financing what they consider a high-risk sector. Last month, the International Atomic Energy Agency convened the first ever nuclear summit in Brussels. Unfortunately, bankers appeared unwilling to finance the $5 trillion the IAEA estimates the global nuclear industry needs for development until 2050.
“If the bankers are uniformly pessimistic, it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy,” former U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said after listening to a panel of international lenders.
Related: Chevron-Hess Tie Up Could Drag Until Next Year Courtesy of Exxon
“The project risks, as we have seen in reality, seem to be very high,” said European Investment Bank Vice President Thomas Ostros, adding that countries need to focus more on renewables and energy efficiency. Ines Rocha, a director at the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, and Fernando Cubillos, a banker at the Development Bank of Latin America, concurred, saying their lending priorities lean toward renewables and transmission grids. “Nuclear comes last,” Cubillos said.
“We need state involvement, I don’t see any other model. Probably we need quite heavy state involvement to make projects bankable,” Ostros said.
State Involvement
As Ostros has noted, at this juncture, the nuclear sector probably requires considerable government support if it’s to really take off. In the past, the U.S. government has been involved in nuclear energy mainly through safety and environmental regulations as well as R&D funding in enrichment of uranium projects like HALEU. However, lately, the federal government is becoming more heavily involved in the nuclear energy sector.
Over the past several years, billions of federal dollars have gone into the development and demonstration of next-generation small modular reactors (SMRs) and advanced fuel cycle reactors. U.S. EXIM has been providing financing for overseas nuclear projects for more than a half-century. EXIM has issued Letters of Interest for up to $3 billion for nuclear exports to Poland and Romania. Established in 1934, the Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank), operates as an independent agency of the U.S. Government under the authority of the Export-Import Bank Act of 1945. Similarly, USTDA has committed funding for the export of nuclear power technologies to Poland and Romania, Ukraine and Indonesia. Much of the funding is for technical activities, and includes a significant focus on the potential export of small modular reactors.
Last month, the U.S. federal government agreed to provide a $1.5 billion loan to restart a nuclear power plant in southwestern Michigan, abandoning earlier plans to decommission it. The Michigan plant will become the first ever nuclear plant in the U.S. to be revived after abandonment. Privately-owned Holtec International acquired the 800-megawatt Palisades plant in 2022 with plans to dismantle it. But now the plant will be able to contribute to Michigan’s power grid if it’s able to pass inspections and testing by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, known as the NRC.
Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer has welcomed the move.
“Nuclear power is our single largest source of carbon-free electricity, directly supporting 100,000 jobs across the country and hundreds of thousands more indirectly,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, a former Michigan governor, has said.
“The repowering of Palisades will restore safe, around-the-clock generation to hundreds of thousands of households, businesses and manufacturers,” Kris Singh, Holtec president and chief executive, has declared.
Meanwhile, California regulators have given the greenlight for the Diablo Canyon plant to operate through 2030 instead of 2025 as the state transitions toward renewable power sources. Pacific Gas & Electric, the plant’s owner, says it has received assistance from the federal government to repay a state loan.
By Alex Kimani for Oilprice.com
For most new zealand males their first real girlfriends are attractive ewes grazing in a nearby paddock. Some of these love interests are maintained over the lifetime of the sheep concerned.
Jealously has always been an issue with rams of a certain age and finally one has snapped and killed their overlords in this case two elderly folk.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/thepanel/audio/2018934880/ram-suspected-of-killing-two-people-in-waitakere
Finally a ram has spoken out on these inter-species relationships and he has been executed for his stand on this issue.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350250520/couple-killed-ram-were-good-people-didnt-deserve-says-police-officer-nephew
Love should never cross species’ lines and it is high time the bestial new zealanders woke up to this fact.
Sheep rape is a crime!
Hard to be a man. When you reach a point where sometimes you are slapped when talking with a women, you have it down. Rejection with a smile and a “Perhaps a different time.”
Dennis L.
simple summary
an infinite number of people chasing a finite amount of energy.
Yes, this is the problem, Norman.
Pingback: World’s economic myths hitting limits | The Most Revolutionary Act
Another great post, Gail… You are The Best. You could have probably added many more myths to the list. All of the myths you listed are really based on the #7 myth. (Growth in the future will continue forever) But, as all your loyal readers know: The problem is a six letter word. Yes, the “F” word. FINITE! When you understand the implications that the F word has for civilization, your vision of the future changes. When you hear politicians, economists, and assorted experts, talking about the economy on tv or radio, what you hear sounds like bla, bla, bla. Their words show how ignorant they are of the fact that there is only so much “stuff” on this earth. You never ever hear them mention limited resources. Maybe a few are not ignorant, but are afraid to speak the truth. That’s sad.
And I think I’ve even noticed a gradual change in the tenor of the replys to your posts in the last few years. More and more readers seem to be understanding what FINITE really means. That driving a more fuel efficient car, putting solar panels on your roof, taking shorter showers, etc, doesn’t mean anything when you look twenty or thirty years in the future. Will it really matter if we run out of stuff on July 2031 or Aug 2032? Is there an answer? Yes. We should enjoy every day we have on this earth. Spend time with family and friends. Enjoy life. Be pleasant to others. Thanks Gail.
Yes, I try to enjoy every day I have. I go walking. I visit with neighbors, if they ever come out of their homes. I do a bunch of church-related work.
Trying to understand this issue is not easy. People put together models, but they don’t understand why their models are not complete enough to tell them anything useful.
The models in ‘Limits to Growth’ seem to have hit the nail on the head, and have lasted decades. Whatever happens, humans are screwed.
Recenty published swedish investigation on wind power. Summary: Average -39% profit margin for the years 2017-2022.
https://www.affarsvarlden.se/kronika/vindkraftens-skuldberg-borjan-pa-en-ny-finanskris
The debt taken for constructing wind power turbines will remain when they have to be decommissioned in 20-25 years from construction.
Despite this, just in my neighborhood of Sweden, there are plans for several sites for constucting new wind turbines, some as high as 300 m. The myth of wind power is at least as strong as the myth that made the easter islanders rise their giant statues.
Translation of some of this:
Wind power’s mountain of debt – the beginning of a new financial crisis?
Swedish wind power companies suffer big losses. Debts have only been paid through shareholder contributions totaling SEK 20 billion – mainly from abroad. The day money is not injected, half of wind power goes bankrupt. The installments take place more slowly than the lifetime of the facilities. When the wind turbines are worth zero kroner, a mountain of debt remains for several decades. Who pays the bill?
“In total, we have collected data from 3,000 wind turbines spread over 167 wind power plants, which means that we cover companies that were commissioned in the years 2010–2022. All figures have been taken from annual reports, the information is public and reported to the Swedish Companies Registration Office in accordance with Swedish law.”
How long does a wind turbine last and how quickly are the debts paid off in relation to this lifespan?
We have hardly seen any examples of companies that stated a longer lifespan than 25 years in their annual reports. International data rather point to a lifespan of around 20 years. For the sake of simplicity, we assume here that a facility lives for 25 years. That is, the entire economic value has disappeared after 25 years.
The average repayment period has been calculated for wind power companies built in the years 2015–2020. We then used this repayment rate and calculated how long it would take to pay off the entire debt. Our analysis shows that it would take 43 years for the companies launched in 2017 to become debt-free, for the companies launched in 2018 the figure is 29 years and for 2019 it will take 31 years before the debts are paid off. In the case of the companies commissioned in 2020, time will be negative or infinite for the simple reason that the mountain of debt has so far grown rather than reduced.
Given the current rate of installments, there will be a debt mountain of several billions left on the day the wind turbines are worth zero kroner. Who will bear this cost?
HALF OF THE WIND POWER HAS BEEN SAVED FROM BANKRUPTCY
The only way to pay off the debts when the losses are also growing is to make shareholder contributions that cover both losses and part of the debts. This is also what happens within Swedish wind power companies. As we wrote earlier in Affärsvärlden, half of the wind turbines have been subject to shareholder contributions during the period 2017–2022. Liabilities to the owner company are continuously converted into shareholder contributions. . .
LOSS MARGIN OF 39% 2017-2022
As we see in the graph, the entire modern Swedish wind power expansion is one big loss. We see that all years of commissioned wind power companies 2015–2020 make losses in the years 2017–2022.
With an average margin after financial items of minus 39.4% during these years, one may wonder how it would be possible to amortize one’s debts. If the losses are so great, should the debts rather grow?
——
I don’t know what the ratio of offshore wind is to onshore wind in Sweden. My impression is that offshore wind is much worse for lack of profitability than onshore wind.
In the US, my impression is that these big losses are hidden by all of the subsidies given to the industry. The subsidy of “going first” is the biggest subsidy. Once the subsidies go away, the owners simply abandon any wind turbine that needs repairs. The life expectancy depends on how long the subsidies are maintained. Wind turbines need repairs (or preventive maintenance) close to every year.
Around 20% of energy production in Sweden is from wind power. Unclear how much is offshore.
I assume you meant to say *electricity* and not energy.
A big difference even in Sweden.
My impression is that offshore wind is much worse for lack of profitability than onshore wind.
It’s like building an offshore gas well that only works some of the time and the gas cant be stored or used for other purposes than power.
It would appear that BitCoin Mining is over the top on electric consumption! https://www.cnet.com/home/energy-and-utilities/how-much-power-does-crypto-use-the-government-wants-to-know/. Would this affect your recent calculations?
My impression originally was that bit coin mining was mostly done where there was “stranded” natural gas or other fuels. In other words, there was no immediate need in the area for the natural gas, and the cost of transporting the natural gas (or the electricity made from natural gas) was too high for its sale to make sense. So the bitcoin operation was supposed to be a subsidy for the fossil fuel industry by buying some natural gas that could not otherwise be used. (perhaps other fuels as well–even nuclear when its electricity was not needed because of excess wind or solar).
I would think that bit coin data mining is helping keep electricity rates down because of this subsidy being provided. In the absence of this subsidy, natural gas providers would prefer to flare the natural gas (burn it so they didn’t have to send it anywhere). But regulators are getting tighter and tighter with respect to permitting this. Otherwise, they would need to build collection pipelines for even wells that produce even very little natural gas, or are very far away from where from where the gas/electricity is to be used.
Not only are EV sales in decline but car companies are beginning to abandon EV’s and switch to ICE vehicles. California has the largest EV base in the US 8.7% the want EV customers to charge their vehicles during non peak hours. EV doesn’t and won’t work because the US electric grid could not handle the load with tens of millions of EV’s needing to be charged.
And we’re seeing more instances of EVs catching fire and exploding. Who would want such a car? People will become increasingly wary of them.
Here’s Martin Armstrong’s take on EV’s
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/world-news/climate/republicans-v-the-department-of-energy-and-environmental-protection-agency/
I agree with you that our electric grid cannot withstand much more demand. We are already seeing alarms that insufficient supply is expected at certain peak times–typically, very hot or very cold days.
https://peakoil.ch/media/files/the_end_of_oil_covered_230920.pdf
Here is a link to a pdf of a book called “The last years of the oil age physics kills oil and cars” by a member of ASPO in germany. It has a lot of interesting information. On page 142 the estimated total automobile production we will ever produce is 4500 million vehicles (4.5 billion), we have already produced 3550 million vehicles (3.55 billion), so we have less than 1 billion autos left to produce. The debate between ICE and EV vehicles really doesn’t matter, we won’t be producing many of either for much longer.
It seems like James Kunstler, in The Long Emergency, suggested that all car production should stop 20 years before oil supply “runs out.” Some estimates suggest we are close to that point right now. Perhaps we shouldn’t be making any more private passenger auto vehicles, just use the ones we have. Think how much energy we would save!
‘Green energy’ fans believe we can keep using oil but just stop using gasoline and diesel.
I explained to them that oil production would immediately cease if the gasoline and diesel could not be sold and that even if by a miracle we continued producing oil the unwanted gasoline and diesel would have to be somehow disposed of and the only way to do that is to burn it.
They couldnt grasp it.
You’re being too polite. Instead of saying “oil production would immediately cease if the gasoline and diesel could not be sold”, try pointing out that they would cease the moment diesel stops being available. Making it personal to them is your only chance of them grasping it and on the plus side, they won’t bother you anymore if they do.
It’s like we’re at the village fête and the green campaigners have a stall selling sunshine, rainbows and fairy cakes and I’m selling cholera, rubble and rats.
Yesterday, I visited a supermarket in my regional town of Trencin, western Slovakia. I overheard a conversation of the two women, one of them was a workforce loading the shelves. The topic was the divorce. They talked about their friend, a woman who has just divorced. The woman loading the shelves said that she has gone through it and that she was more happy at her divorce than at her wedding. And that she calls the marriage a contract with the devil.
That is the energy implosion and the atomization of the society.
I agree with you about the energy implosion and the atomization of the society.
Young people are having a terrible time finding spouses. They don’t earn enough to afford a home for a family. For this reason, as much as any other, they don’t want to date or consider a marriage. There are an awfully lot of young people with health problems, too, including ADHD, autism, alcohol abuse or drug abuse. No wonder two women with relatively good incomes decide to get together and start a family. It is difficult to find a husband in today’s world.
And here is some interesting “retro” I think worth giving a listen to.
Analog computing may make a comeback when energy costs for digital data storage and AI processing become prohibitive? Water for chip manufacturing , limits of Moore’s law, physical laws etc.
why not? AI and analog computing are both fuzzy (approximate).
How about abacuses? They last a long time. Or slide rulers? Even books of log tables. These approaches have been used for a long time.
The US can’t make much of anything complex. I can’t imagine countries that can make these computers will want to export them to the US.
One point this fellow makes is that analog computers can be up to 1,000 times more energy efficient than digital computers. Later he talks about storing data at 1/10 the energy usage. Saving energy would be helpful.
We won’t be needing computers for much longer.
There must be a power shortage in Gail’s home town, because today she has given us only seven points. It always used to be 10 or sometimes 12.
I decided that shorter posts might be better for everyone. At least I would give it a try.
In England circa 1973 to 1975, we used to get occasional power cuts. This was deliberate, due to strike-happy trades unions. One afternoon the power was cut off when my mother was baking a cake in the oven. Result: spoilt cake. It didn’t rise. In the evenings too, we would get occasional power cuts. Then out came the candles that my parents had bought in, in expectation of such events.
Nowadays, so much depends on a full-time power supply. We shop online, and we swipe our cards or use our mobiles (cell phones) at self-service checkouts. What happens when blackouts become more common, as they are bound to do in the future?
I do wonder about the direction of travel in modern life. Cashlessness, for instance. Admittedly, I usually go cashless when out shopping these days. I got used to it as a result of developments during the scamdemic lockdowns – it made life easier.
Now there is an astonishing related development.
=====================================
Royal Mint (UK) to stop making overseas coins after 700 years
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/saving/article-13301069/Royal-Mint-stop-making-overseas-coins-700-years.html
EXTRACT.
======
The Royal Mint will stop making coins for other countries this year, with 200 staff shifted from coinmaking to gold recycling.
The Mint makes coins for the UK and 28 other countries, at its site in Llantrisant, Wales. But from December 2024, the Royal Mint will stop making these overseas coins, and will instead solely focus on making coins for the UK.
The falling demand for coins overseas is behind the decision, which affects 200 staff. The Mint only made 56 issues of coins in 2022/23, compared to 339 in 2021/22 and 437 in 2020/21, according to latest annual results.
The Royal Mint’s currency arm loses money, and made losses of £13.1million in 2022/23, up from £4.5million the year before.
Instead, the Mint will move into recovering gold used in circuit boards, such as those found in mobile phones and laptops. The Mint is building a plant in Llantrisant that can recover 99 per cent of the gold used in electronic items.
The 200 affected staff will be offered jobs in the gold recycling plant, which in theory should mean no redundancies. They are also being shifted into jobs making jewellery and gold bullion.
A spokesman for The Royal Mint said: ‘The decline of cash use globally has been a catalyst for change at the Royal Mint, spurring innovation and a portfolio of new businesses.
‘The success of these growing businesses means we will stop taking new overseas currency orders and transfer employees into alternative roles. Our expertise in coin making has enabled our growth into areas such as precious metals investment and luxury jewellery. We have made a significant investment of over £17million into new businesses, including a world-first plant to recover precious metals from electronic waste opening this year.’
The reclaimed gold is used for the Royal Mint’s jewellery line, 886 – a reference to the year the Mint was founded. Royal Mint chief executive Anne Jessopp founded 866 in 2022 as a way of diversifying the ancient institution.
===========
END OF EXTRACT.
======
Two points here. How energy-efficient is to extract gold from these old appliances? The other point has to do with the growing gap between rich and poor. What type of customer can afford the bullion products that the Royal Mint is pushing?
Look at this:
https://www.royalmint.com/invest/bullion/bullion-coins/gold-coins/britannia-2024-1-oz-gold-one-hundred-bullion-coin-box/
Price: £200,209.39 per unit
I’m hoping Gail will buy me one for being a loyal reader and commenter. Howzabout it, Gail? I know you can easily afford it. 😉
That’s a astonishing decline in coin issues and a trend that cannot be ignored. This is indeed a historic milestone in the annuals of coin minting.
https://new.coinsweekly.com/news-en/foreign-coin-production-ends-at-the-royal-mint-the-end-of-an-era-or-another-step-closer-to-a-cashless-economy/#:~:text=The%20Royal%20Mint%20has%20announced,has%20operated%20for%20700%20years.
I recently tried to buy concert tickets (online, with a credit card) but had to give up because the only tickets they would sell were “mobile” tickets, meaning you have to have a smart phone which can display the ticket on their ticketing app or in a digital “wallet” (which I know nothing about and don’t care to have to learn).
I’m not about to buy a smart phone just to go to this concert.
It’s probably not giving up much to jettison old luddites like me from their audience, but you’d think they’d make an exception for Deep Purple and Yes!
The entire tour, is apparently mobile tickets only, and all venues cashless for merch and refreshments.
I have a smart phone, use it to call people, very quaint, and get texts for two level verification. Don’t have a clue on the rest and I do not want to go the scan route you mentioned.
Don’t like the idea of a “bug” in my wallet.
Dennis L.
I bought a smart phone most reluctantly. I keep it at home for those times when websites want extra verification but never take it outside. I’m sure that this is all WEF-driven, of course.
I see that there is talk of accepting your fingerprint via a smart phone as verification. Now that might just stop some scamming, as nobody can imitate your fingerprint.
I have had real problems with getting a phone to recognize my fingerprint. Scanning my face, and using face recognition, seems to work much better. I don’t know what the problem with my fingerprint is–perhaps it is somewhat variable from day to day.
Make sure to enroll as many prints as it will let you and use both hands just in case you hurt a finger. Its not that important really because it falls back on a PIN number right, if the print fails?
I see an epidemic of amputated fingers ahead!
I recently tried to buy concert tickets (online, with a credit card) but had to give up because the only tickets they would sell were “mobile” tickets, meaning you have to have a smart phone which can display the ticket on their ticketing app or in a digital “wallet” (which I know nothing about and don’t care to have to learn).
If you’re doing it online on your computer you should be able to just print out the document files for the tickets and take those with you, then they scan the QR code on them when you arrive. Digital tickets are just the same as that but you leave the document on your phone.
Although Dennis L. will show up to spread his gospel of optimism and cornucopianism, which are not really based in reality, sooner or later I have to say that the end of Western Civilization is now inevitable.
The piercing of the Israeli defenses by the Iranian missiles will have the same effect as Charles VIII’s destruction of the walls of the Italian fortresses, which ended the Middle Ages according to William Rees-Mogg’s the Great Reckoning.
“the end of Western Civilization is now inevitable.”
As it was all along kulm, although I think you’re at least a couple of decades late to the party. The future is with those that do and we unfortunately don’t and can’t.
The Iranian display was a wonderful show of repurposed, decades old stock, defeating the combined tech of the supposed 4 most advanced nations giving it all they have. To add to the humiliation, Iran and allies have forced the illegal encampments hand and so now know the exact capabilities of their defense systems. Then there’s the cost and it cost a lot. Most estimates are between 1.5-2.5b$ just to protect the mass murders of children for an hour or two. On the plus side, that’s two(or three) losses for the price of one, so something for the west to brag about.
Another abject failure from the self glorifying eejits, unless their plan was to make Iran the darling of 80%+ of the worlds population.
The mentally defective have said that they will attack Iran(again) and if they do, they will soon find out exactly how precarious their energy situation really is, just like Ukraine has and they had a far more robust energy network(mainly due to soviet tech, many decades old).
Take note of the words of the nato man in the below, because Iran will do similar if pushed and it will be far easier.
https://johnhelmer.net/how-the-electric-war-is-redrawing-the-ukraine-map-in-black/
kul,
Sun came up today, all is good.
Dennis L.
Thank you Gail! So nice to have a new posting. Glad you got to see your grandchild🤗.
You are welcome!
We think he is cute. He is starting to talk in a way that is understandable to grandparents.
And thanks to a reader here at OFW who turned me on to this blogger out of China:
Even assuming EV’s are viable to a certain degree when used in limited quantities that can still be powered by the grid, here’s something to think about, the graveyards of “EV cars to nowhere” filling up China’s dump sites ( maybe it just their outdated and prone to catch fire ones?) notwithstanding, China can, for now and for the near future a least, produce better EV’s at much less cost (25%) than legacy automobile manufacturers. Tariff time?
Both Democrats and Republicans can see the writing on the wall. Competition with affordable cars could put US carmakers out of business. Politicians want to win the votes of union members in Michigan and Ohio.
Is it wrong to do this? My point is that deflation in prices such as this could collapse the US debt bubble. I am not sure that we could find the electricity to operate all of the EVs either.
This is a good video. BYD can make EVs more cheaply and better than every other car maker. Part of their success is based on vertical integration. BYD will likely gain significantly in the share of autos sold in the near future.
Solar and wind: Privatizing the profits when the sun is shinning and the wind is blowing, socializing the losses when they are not.
And lots of hidden costs, in term of wider needed roads, longer transmission lines, fires started, and smoothing out the irregular output to match the needs of the electricity transmission system. We depend on imports of many kinds of goods from China and other parts of the world to do all of these things.
Thanks so very much for your superb work which I look forward to very much.
Here is a detailed review of the USA financial situation of interest.
The federal government accounting reviewed by Dave Stockman.
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2024/04/david-stockman/americas-fiscal-armageddon-and-how-to-avoid-it/
I looked through the long report. Stockman does lay out the problem, but he saves his supposed solution until Part 2.
I don’t think that Stockman understands that the physical goods and services won’t really be available.
Long time reader of your blog. Thank you very much for your generous time.
Wishing you health and hapiness.
Thanks very much! I was away visiting my daughter and family in the Boston area for a little while.
Where’s FE?
He seems to be OK. He is commenting elsewhere. Burnout? Over exposure? Needs to get some real work done?
Realization that vaxx deaths are so 2021? And it’s not like there is no material out there. Just in Italy, a soccer player died Sunday. a 20 something guy in an airplane also died yesterday. in Serie A, a player collapsed and the game was suspended. but we have gone through it for years now.
The sudden deaths phase is almost over now.
We have entered the phase of increased cancer rates, expecially on young people.
But this second point is easier to cover with plenty of mainstream articles about bad habits of the population, pollution in the western world, climate change and also lack of medical periodic controls by people who should go on private health hospital structures to do them of course (but after be up-to-date with last mRNA doses…).
my grandfather died in 1955
that seems suspicious too
Very suspicious! Someone probably traveled back in time and gave him the jab! /s
The person who makes general conclusions about statistics made on a single case, is suspicious
😀
More to the point, in 60 years of following italian soccer I recall only one case prior to vaccines (Renato Curi in the 1980s, it was so rare they named the Perugia stadium after him). Now we have had over a dozen cases in 3 years. It could be 5G, but the statistical discrepancy is amazing.
If you say a dozen cases in 3 years it means that from the place you are, you are unfortunately/luckily losing much much Italian data.
There are some websites reporting local news of flootball players of minor divisions who have died almost 1/2 every month in these 3 years…
OK, so 3 dozens? I don’t live there and do not get all the news. you have to count only those who were in danger of dying or died.
Anyway Drb 753, you hit the point, it was so rare in the past that they entitled a stadium to that person, but in these 3 years we have seen many events in sport players of various sports (also some not till the episode of death itself) that it should raise some questions in people with a fair scientific approach…
Probably got tired of those who chase pie in the sky and talk about the mythical cubic mile of platinum, which is about 200 times heavier than the largest object ever built by humans, the big dam in china.