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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.
Interesting comment on POB .
JT
IGNORED
04/22/2024 at 7:52 am
Keep in mind all wars are resource wars. There is no other reason. Vietnam WW1, WW2 etc. it’s always about who has free access to your stuff. We are now in an unprecedented situation of no growth combined with depletion. And all of a suddenly everyone is going to get along. Please!!! It’s more likely you’ll be fighting locally for whatever is left.
I just read Tim Watkins book Breakdown and he’s spot on that the banking system can not survive peak energy. The next shock will be far worse than 2008 and will break the central bank systems. Green initiatives are quickly going away because they are and have been a waste of time and resources.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Breakdown-economic-impact-peak-oil/dp/B0CMTPKYC7/ref=sr_1_1?crid=26K1LR4CIB75&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.L2DXmbWpbpaSlNa1fYH_BQ.Q79g7_Kui6QHu_yZdzm-WhOFf8Jzva0zUhHpkaenwV4&dib_tag=se&keywords=breakdown+tim+watkins&qid=1713798623&s=books&sprefix=breakdown+tim+watkins%2Cstripbooks%2C77&sr=1-1
It’s an uncomfortable read but unavoidable reality.
I am afraid that Tim Watkins is correct. “Green initiatives are quickly going away because they are and have been a waste of time and resources.”
But they did keep Advanced Economies operating a little while longer. They provided an excuse for more debt and more college courses, hopefully leading to alternatives to fossil fuels. They kept politicians in office. They gave at least some people hope for a better, green existence.
“Indeed, despite the rate of oil production falling after 1973, the volume continued to grow right up to November 2018. But in 2005, conventional crude had peaked, setting in chain the events leading to the 2008 crash… which inadvertently created the conditions for the brief expansion of the US fracking industry.”
I think the most important oil production is sweet middle distillates (diesel & jet-fuel kerosene) — I suppose SMD oil peaked long before 2018.
I think there is a very good chance that we will have that next 2008 ( 1929)shock this fall.
These big financial shocks happen in the fall (most stressful time of year for banks).
We will have added trillion of dollars more debt by the fall to the US gov’s already huge debt.
The election puts a whole lot of investments in doubt.
Japan and the UK are extremely fragile and contagion of the financial risk is likely.
We are past peak net energy from fossil fuels.
And the enemies of the Biden regime know this.
The Nasdaq is the most bullish index in the world.
On Friday it was at the same level as in November 2021.
Yes, it rises as always, to remain in the same place two and a half years later.
In short, he who does not console himself is because he does not want to.
The Willi . E . Coyote moment . Floating on air .
Yes dobbs , it is nett energy surplus that matters . Gross income is not important , it is the nett carry home that is important . Missing the woods for the trees . An excerpt from a long post at POB on this subject .
” Civilization runs on excess energy, we don’t get energy from civilization. Civilization takes energy from the natural world. Most of our energy comes from fossil fuels, they are clearly damaging the climate, but we also have the problem of scarcity of these energy sources, particularly oil coming soon.
All renewables, nuclear and hydro energy comes from builds with fossil fuels. We can’t, nor are we trying to, make any of them from anything other than fossil fuels.
Without the energy inputs, civilization collapses. Once energy availability starts falling, mostly from oil production reductions, it will cascade throughout our civilization, breaking complex systems all over the place. We saw a minor example of this in 2008 when oil price went to $147/bbl, which broke many important aspects of our civilization temporarily. We were able to recover because fossil fuel use grew again after a small hiatus. In 2008 oil production didn’t fall, it just didn’t rise.
Now imagine 2008 again, but instead of oil price falling, it stays high because production is falling, then price rises again, with further falls in production. Many parts of the economy cease functioning because businesses go bust. They put off employees because of financial reasons, yet these reasons are caused by lack of cheap oil. The problems will cascade around the world as everyone is in the same boat, less energy available. Perhaps you should read J. Tainter Collapse of Complex Societies. ”
Be Well .
unfotunateley you are uncomfortably spot on but i am with Gail on the green deal being a necessary distraction and extension of fossil fuels for those who choose to ride out ‘mad max world’ solar and batteries with evs will extend life for the prepared they will probably living in gated communities that have their own private army . I remember reading on some forum for peak oil that renewables would give us another 20 years to allow the elites more time to work on nuclear fusion so time is running out ‘mad max world’ is coming i will try to find the 20 years plan and post it on OFW.
Mike S always looks at issues from a different angle .
” Nothing personal against people working in the tight oil sector; I have many smart friends working in it. CEO’s and royalty owners have had enough, however. They can eat fisheads. But this article will give you some idea of how stupid the sector is about managing this valuable American resource.
Its running out of foregin import customers and export facilities are being whacked.
I supsect this has something to do with crude quality, and waning demand, and costs to export. But the sector has no plans whatsover to cut back on the drill baby, drill bullshit. In fact when Trump is re-elected that is exactly what he will promote. So because we can only absorb so much of the stuff in US refineries, and now the rest of the world doesn’t seem to want anymore of the crap, it will stack up and oil prices will go down. I don’t think the American consumer will benefit much, we can’t use anymore LTO, but what the hell. Overproduction always drives the price down.
Remember, these are the same astute businessmen with their finger on the pulse of the market that have driven the price of natural gas down to a negative number…with overproduction.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/as-shale-oil-gains-slow-deepwater-port-struggles-for-customers/ar-AA1nqQxJ
“Build it and customers will come” doesn’t necessarily work. I expect some lender is going to be out a lot of money, and the debt funding for this deep water port cannot be repaid.
We see once again that shale is tolerable so long as you can mix it with something else. No one has built refineries that can handle shale and no one will, because any shale peak is short lived and so why build something that will last 50 years for something lasting 10 years. Once conventional crude goes below a certain threshold necessary for mixing shale will lose all its value. Good thing it is declining so fast no one will be able to notice.
I think Mish’s latest article is very relevant. Our biggest issue today is housing costs.
https://mishtalk.com/economics/people-who-rent-will-decide-the-2024-presidential-election/
He points out that rent increases still tend to be high. Also, he shows the same chart of low home ownership rates among young people that he has shown before.
https://i0.wp.com/mishtalk.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Generational-Homeownership-Rates-1985-2022.png
Kids need to learn skill sets; upon reflection I see little to no value in a college education for most kids. Primary and secondary schools need to teach basics including cursive writing – it appears to aid learning and connects the brain to the knowledge. See Copilot for more information. Engineering maybe an exception, but CC can teach the 20% that gives 80% of the results.
Churches need to go back to basics, meet peoples’ needs and skip trying to social engineer the world. We need a connection to the universe and religion is a connection. As long as it helps a society, I suspect there is more in common among religions than different, J. Campbell researched that one.
Look at governments, cut the fat. Bring mom back into the home and stop burning her out trying to conquer the world, marriage works for kids, get rid of all the social workers, back to churches and simple rules. Confession is good for the soul, it reminds one weekly of the past weeks screw ups, rinse, repeat and hopefully improve.
Economics is not even part of the fabric of the universe, it is a social construct secondary to biology. Amish in my area are building nice homes, they have nice businesses, they take Sunday off; it is a day of rest. Strongly suspect they self finance and guarantee loans to each other. Don’t pay, shunned and no longer part of the group, into the jungle.
Dennis L.
I agree. We will have to wait and see whether we even have oil for this. World looks like it will change, soon.
Population tipping point could arrive by 2030
Study estimates global fertility will drop below replacement level years earlier than others predict
“Two point one: That’s how many children everyone able to give birth must have to keep the human population from beginning to fall. Demographers have long expected the world will dip below this magic number—known as the replacement level—in the coming decades. A new study published last month in The Lancet, however, puts the tipping point startlingly near: as soon as 2030.”
https://www.science.org/content/article/population-tipping-point-could-arrive-2030?utm_campaign=SciMag&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=ownedSocial
A big part of the problem has been a higher percentage of children living to maturity and beyond in less developed countries. I think that young people who have been able to grow up thanks to better hygiene and antibiotics (and ivermectin) are fueling the immigrant crisis.
Stress is part of life, heard an old Jewish proverb, whatever.
Father’s wish: “May God make my child’s life challenging enough to strengthen him, but not so difficult as to break him.”
Dennis L.
In the report, it says,
“A drop below replacement fertility does not mean global population will immediately fall. It will likely take about 30 additional years, or roughly how long it takes for a new generation to start to reproduce, for the global death rate to exceed the birth rate.”
So even if the number of babies falls below replacement level fairly soon, say 2030, it will be 2060 before total population falls.
“US House advances $95 billion Ukraine-Israel package toward Saturday vote”
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-house-advances-95-billion-ukraine-israel-package-toward-saturday-vote-2024-04-19/
I’d bet that is so much money that it helps BAU go on for a while. How is that financed? Additional credits? If weapons and services are mainly bought from the USA or partners, it would help the economy also.
Example for “there is no alternative” credit enlargement, justified by war as before by covid and next – wait and see – by climate protection. Additionally to tina-investments into solar and wind, that also might extend credit lines.
How long can that go well?
An excuse for more debt. And the debt will to some extent stimulate weapons production in the US. Will keep the US economy going for a bit longer, perhaps.
60% of the amount goes back to the MIC .
https://twitter.com/MoonofA/status/1782038731165245699/photo/1
Replenish already spent stocks?
Guess:
Money is to replace what has already been spent, as in spent munitions.
Dennis L.
(Times of Israel)
Tel Aviv University finds link between myocarditis and cancer.
Which is a way to understand the ‘turbo cancer’ problems we are experiencing now in western countries.
The explanation is between the lines and of course mRNA vaccine is not mentioned, but if one wants to understand, can understand.
“Tel Aviv University study finds link between heart attacks and cancer growth
Researchers shows factor-rich microscopic particles escape from the healing heart and travel through the bloodstream to reach existing tumors.
The study done on mice, led by medical student Tal Caller, found that microscopic bubbles called small extracellular vesicles (sEVs) escape from the heart as it heals from a myocardial infarction (heart attack). They enter the bloodstream and end up “feeding” cancer tumors in other parts of the body.”
[…]
“Researchers at Tel Aviv University say they’ve discovered a mechanism that encourages the growth of cancerous tumors in people with heart disease.”
[…]
“We thought that a single factor was probably not enough. So we decided to look at sEVs, which contain multiple factors, including proteins, cytokines, micro-RNA, and RNA,” Leor said.”
https://www.timesofisrael.com/tel-aviv-university-study-finds-link-between-heart-attacks-and-cancer-growth/
Oh dear! Yet another pathway for cancer.
A guess:
The mRNA in the vaccine had a modified version of uridine which is a pseudouridine. This causes the mRNA degrade more slowly. One could assume mRNA is meant to go through a ribosome once to encode a protein and then disintegrate. If this does not happen the mRNA can produce more than one protein, or the pseudouridine could be incorporated into additional mRNA. not specific to the vaccine. If this nucleic acid moves about the body that would be consistent with “turbo” cancers. There are lipid issues as well, the lipids were engineered to get the vaccine into the cells and avoid damage to the mRNA.
Summary: the stuff is dangerous. What if it gets into other organisms?
Most of us here sat this experiment out and it was an experiment from the beginning; even nature couldn’t come up with this one, not part of the fabric of the universe.
Dennis L.
The NYT has an article this week that addresses the inadequacy of the USA military-industrial base to produce anything like what UKR would need to stand a chance against Russia.
USA took a decision in 1993 at the ‘Last Supper’ to largely shut down its military-industrial base, it has neglected it for decades and it takes decades to build one.
It is no secret that USA simply does not have the ability to rapidly expand its productive capacity for key items like missile defence systems and 155mm artillery.
UKR has lost much of its air defence and Russia has largely open skies now. It is able to decimate UKR’s fortified positions in cities, its energy systems, logistics, factories and all the rest.
Zelensky and UKR military leaders have spoken in recent weeks about how UKR’s lines face imminent collapse and Russia is set to take more land. UKR faces defeat this year/ summer.
There is no ‘magic spell’ in the new UKR package from Congress that is going to alter that as the NYT article makes clear. Money is one thing and actual stuff to send is another.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/12/opinion/jd-vance-ukraine.html?ref=oembed
J.D. Vance: The Math on Ukraine Doesn’t Add Up
…. Ukraine’s challenge is not the G.O.P.; it’s math. Ukraine needs more soldiers than it can field, even with draconian conscription policies. And it needs more matériel than the United States can provide.
…. The most fundamental question: How much does Ukraine need and how much can we actually provide? Mr. Biden suggests that a $60 billion supplemental means the difference between victory and defeat in a major war between Russia and Ukraine. That is also wrong. This $60 billion is a fraction of what it would take to turn the tide in Ukraine’s favor. But this is not just a matter of dollars. Fundamentally, we lack the capacity to manufacture the amount of weapons Ukraine needs us to supply to win the war.
Consider our ability to produce 155-millimeter artillery shells. Last year, Ukraine’s defense minister estimated that the country’s base-line requirement for these shells was over four million per year but that it could fire up to seven million if that many were available. Since the start of the conflict, the United States has gone to great lengths to ramp up production of 155-millimeter shells. We’ve roughly doubled our capacity and can now produce 360,000 per year — less than a tenth of what Ukraine says it needs. The administration’s goal is to get this to 1.2 million — 30 percent of what’s needed — by the end of 2025. This would cost the American taxpayers dearly while yielding an unpleasantly familiar result: failure abroad.
Just this week, the top American military commander in Europe argued that absent further security assistance, Russia could soon have a 10-to-1 artillery advantage over Ukraine. What didn’t gather as many headlines is that Russia’s current advantage is at least 5 to 1, even after all the money we have poured into the conflict. Neither of these ratios plausibly leads to Ukrainian victory.
…. The story is the same when we look at other munitions. Take the Patriot missile system — our premier air defense weapon. It’s of such importance in this war that Ukraine’s foreign minister has specifically demanded them. That’s because in March alone, Russia reportedly launched over 3,000 guided aerial bombs, 600 drones and 400 missiles at Ukraine. To fend off these attacks, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, and others have indicated they need thousands of Patriot interceptors per year. The problem is this: The United States only manufactures 550 per year. If we pass the supplemental aid package currently being considered in Congress, we could potentially increase annual production to 650, but that’s still less than a third of what Ukraine requires.
These weapons are not only needed by Ukraine. If China were to set its sights on Taiwan, the Patriot missile system would be critical to its defense. In fact, the United States has promised to send Taiwan nearly $900 million worth of Patriot missiles, but delivery of those weapons and other essential resources has been severely delayed, partly because of shortages caused by the war in Ukraine.
If that sounds bad, Ukraine’s manpower situation is even worse. Here are the basics: Russia has nearly four times the population of Ukraine. Ukraine needs upward of half a million new recruits, but hundreds of thousands of fighting-age men have already fled the country. The average Ukrainian soldier is roughly 43 years old, and many soldiers have already served two years at the front with few, if any, opportunities to stop fighting. After two years of conflict, there are some villages with almost no men left. The Ukrainian military has resorted to coercing men into service, and women have staged protests to demand the return of their husbands and fathers after long years of service at the front. This newspaper reported one instance in which the Ukrainian military attempted to conscript a man with a diagnosed mental disability.
…. These basic mathematical realities were true, but contestable, at the outset of the war. They were obvious and incontestable a year ago, when American leadership worked closely with Mr. Zelensky to undertake a disastrous counteroffensive. The bad news is that accepting brute reality would have been most useful last spring, before the Ukrainians launched that extremely costly and unsuccessful military campaign.
…. The White House has said time and again that it can’t negotiate with President Vladimir Putin of Russia. This is absurd. The Biden administration has no viable plan for the Ukrainians to win this war. The sooner Americans confront this truth, the sooner we can fix this mess and broker for peace.
Sue for peace, beg for peace. Broker no.
Funny that out of all people J. D. Vance, a Zombie-American, mentions that.
(A lot of people born in USA are zombies. I think zombies should be recognized as a separate ethnic group.)
“The NYT has an article this week that addresses the inadequacy of the USA military-industrial base to produce anything like what UKR would need to stand a chance against Russia.”
the NYT is used by the US deep state to send out their desired messages.
so this NYT piece is there for a reason, possibly to soften the US change of direction to letting Ukraine fall because of these unfortunate industrial reasons, and because Ukraine was/is just too much smaller/weaker to stand up to the bigger/stronger Russia.
it’s not the US government’s fault, really it’s not, it’s all those other reasons, really it is.
You can bet that the writer, redactor, and NYT got no more than a few hundreds thousands. Meanwhile the manufacturer will get billions. The West is full of Zelenskys.
Perhaps not a problem but a feature?
Dennis L.
The Telegraph has an article this weekend about how UKR now faces the decimation of its key fortified positions east of the Dnieper river.
It has lost most of its air defence and it is massively outmanned and outgunned with artillery. Huge numbers of massive Russian FAB- glide bombs are also now in play.
Russia is now set to take the key fortress city of Chasiv Yar which will expose all of the UKR’s other fortifications east of the Dnieper.
UKR faces a retreat all the way back to the Dnieper river that runs through the middle of UKR, and they are already attempting to build emergency fortifications along the river.
Zelensky and UKR military leaders have warned in recent weeks that UKR faces retreat, the collapse of its lines and the loss of cities.
This is what they were talking about but operationally it is actually the loss of UKR up to the Dnieper. The US Congress UKR aid bill will make zero difference to this.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/04/20/ukraine-city-russia-war-putin/
Ukraine fears fall of key hilltop city ‘inevitable’
Outgunned six to one by the Russians, Ukraine is desperately trying to retain control of a hilltop Donbas city that holds the key to the country’s east, a front-line commander has told The Telegraph.
“Chasiv Yar is the most important high ground as it gives control and superiority and the chance to capture the Donetsk region,” said Lt Oles Malyarevich, deputy commander of the Achilles strike battalion, speaking by phone between firefights on the front line.
The city lies on hills overlooking interlocking river valleys and dominates a road network that links the occupied town of Bakhmut six miles to the east and a string of Ukraine’s “fortress cities” 10 miles to the west.
Ukraine’s forces in Chasiv Yar are outgunned by a ratio of six to one, said Lt Malyarevich, with the Kremlin manufacturing new weapon systems for its forces and bringing in artillery shells from North Korea and drones from Iran.
“The enemy attacks 24/7 with absolute superiority in the air, artillery, drones and manpower.”
Since a Ukrainian counter-offensive stalled last summer, the momentum of the war has swung towards Russia.
Analysts said that the Ukrainian counter-offensive flop, the decision to deprioritise building trenches and the failure of the West to supply promised weapons and F-16 fighter jets had allowed Russia to grab the initiative.
Ukrainian commanders have even said that Russia’s dominance is now so entrenched that even if they were given the F-16 fighter jets they asked for in 2023, they wouldn’t be able to shift momentum on the battlefield.
Chasiv Yar is of particular importance because it can be used as a springboard to capture the rest of the Donbas region.
“The key to Donbas is Sloviansk and the way to this is via Chasiv Yar,” said John Foreman, a retired Royal Navy officer and a former British military attache to Ukraine and Russia.
That view is echoed by the US-based Institute for the Study of War which said that the fall of Chasiv Yar would expose Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka and Kostiantynivka, which it described as the “backbone” of the Ukrainian army’s defence.
“The offensive effort to seize Chasiv Yar offers Russian forces the most immediate prospects for operationally significant advances,” it said.
“The stakes are incredibly high,” said analyst Mr Foreman. “Russia is now targeting the main line of defence with glide bombs to soften it up. Ukraine lacks air defences to prevent this.”
Glide bombs, which have improved precision, range and power, are one of an array of new weapons developed by Russia to push its advantage on the front line.
He paused for a few moments, as though to allow what he had been saying to sink in.
‘Do you remember,’ he went on, ‘writing on Twitter, “Freedom is the freedom to say that women have two X chromosomes and men have one”?’
‘Yes,’ said Winston.
O’Brien held up his left hand, its back towards Winston, with the thumb hidden and one finger extended.
‘How many fingers am I holding up, Winston?’
‘One.’
‘And if the party says that it is not one but two — then how many?’
‘One.’
The word ended in a gasp of pain. The needle of the dial had shot up to fifty-five. The sweat had sprung out all over Winston’s body. The air tore into his lungs and issued again in deep groans which even by clenching his teeth he could not stop. O’Brien watched him, the four fingers still extended. He drew back the lever. This time the pain was only slightly eased.
‘How many fingers, Winston?’
‘One.’
The needle went up to sixty.
‘How many fingers, Winston?’
Remember reading about how the people in Eastern EUROPE under communism realized all the proclamations of economic goals and achievements were bogus and just shrugged it off.
Pretty much we are seeing here the same now today in the West.
Everyone seems to be tolerating the pretending all is fine..
And we are not far removed at all from the “We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us” stage. In fact, we may already be entering it.
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Like people confusing Russia to be part of Europe, the upper class of United Kingdom confused USA to be part of Western Civilization.
Maybe the upper crust of USA , pre-JFK, belonged to the Western Civilization, but a lot of people in USA came from the lower rungs of society during Elizabethan times, which is why the southern dialect sounded like Elizabethan English prior to the arrival of television.
USA got a lot of people outside of the Hajnal Line (Ireland, southern Italy, southern Spain, and everything east of the Baltics and the WIsla river) who were not exactly part of the West as well.
Around the time of JFK, the balance tipped, and while the old civ which could be called West existed for 50 years more, now the old div has died completely, and USA can no longer be called as part of the west, but something else, showing more similarity to Asian countries like Russia and China.
You argue that imported culture (or is it race/ethnicity/genetics?) is the reason that the USA stagnated and reversed, but for some reason you never touch on the direct role of the elites/owners/power-centers in all of this.
The elites delivered the present incarnation of capitalism in which they seek to maximize their own accounting-entry wealth, which in turn requires maximizing economic flows and resource extraction. This led us much faster to the current resource predicament.
Furthermore, the offshoring of US industry was done at the behest of the elites, who wanted to maximize shareholder returns and thereby their own accounting-entry wealth. This industrial migration caused delays in innovation at the global level and reduced the fraction of advancements occurring within the US, the very things the elites hopes rested on.
Some would argue the US had no choice in offshoring – US oil reserves were running low. I disagree; we had the advantage of the world’s largest stock of industrial capital and could have imported oil just like China and many other producer nations do, if we had stayed competitive. However, this would have required a society more focused on advancement than consumption and shareholder returns/margins for the elites.
Thus, the factors that made us uncompetitive on world markets were largely driven from the top down. It was not Italians, Spaniards, and eastern Europeans that sabotaged our Jetson’s future – it was stupid, greedy, shortsighted elites that sold out their own posterity for temporary gain.
Kasarian mafia?
ok but you forgot that isolationism is unfeasible. you either eradicate other nations, which causes native people and everyone to hate you, to conquer them and rule and outpopulate them OR you are interdependent. russia processes your uranium and china has the rare earth metals and africa has cobalt. resources are distributed everywhere in the world and you need to play nice, or give them at minimum food or feed the local dictator to secure a trade route or resources.
if you are too advanced, everyone around you gets jealous and goes after you. hence you always have to play nice while having a balance of power or you lose control. its like being on an island. theres 20 diff tribes and beliefs, and aptitude levels. you outsource the garbage that consumes 0.1 unit of resources so everyone in western world gets to enjoy life, unfortunately that also produces more useless eaters, which is the fault of the elites in this sense.
Ordinary people who enjoyed lifestyle far beyond what they deserved are also to be held responsible.
It was the peoples who drove two trucks who ruined the future – ordinary people trying to live extraordinarily.
kul,
I confess, got more than I deserved, grateful every day.
Dennis L.
Some would argue the US had no choice in offshoring – US oil reserves were running low.
The problem was running out of high quality coal in the densely populated parts of the US that had plenty of fresh water where the steelworks were. The foundation of the industrial system is still coal not oil.
Also there wasn’t much offshoring in reality, it’s another area where people are hopelessly mixed up.
Say Ford opens a car plant in Mexico and shuts one down in Detroit. That does happen and that’s real offshoring.
Most of the time the US industries simply shut down and go bust then imports from China take the place of those goods. But Americans I speak to seem to widely believe that all of the factories in China producing all the stuff are actually US owned factories that moved over to China for cheap labour.
I hadn’t realized this:
“Americans I speak to seem to widely believe that all of the factories in China producing all the stuff are actually US owned factories that moved over to China for cheap labour.”
I agree with you. What has happened is that American factories went bankrupt, and Chinese owned factories replaced them.
The reason why leaders in the US and others were enthusiastic about the Kyoto Protocol and the World Trade Organization is that they thought that US businesses could become bigger and more international. It didn’t work the way they expected. It worked through US and European countries building up supply lines with many overseas businesses. The problem is that these supply lines are very fragile, especially when diesel oil supply is limited.
I think this point is also important:
” The foundation of the industrial system is still coal not oil.”
The US school system leaves people illiterate about the true way the system works.
One thing I found strange was that China started using coal a little bit very early on – for its bells in Wuhan, for example. But it didn’t industrialize the way that the US and Europe did. So it still had plenty of coal left when it joined the World Trade Organization in December 2001.
Unfortunately for what you think, Russia is completely part of the western civilization since the Kurgan tribes, but with great high contributes during XVIII, XIX and XX century.
From music, literature, politics, philosophy, various arts.
Also USA is part of the western civilization, but US is a decling hegemony power at the moment and so it preferes to destroy eveything than leaving its power.
What it is happening now has already happened in various hystorical periods in the past.
My impression is that the more US tries to divert this direction through wars, printing money and woke culture, the more the collapse could be violent.
In any way, from nuclear war to social insurrency.
Of course it is only my opinion.
People in North Germany used to be very poor if they hadn’t inherited farmland. Most of the boys went with 15 years or younger on the hand of their mom to a Captain and were not seen the next two years. Life on the windjammers were extremely hard and not everybody survived. Usually, in the late 40s or 50s a man like that had made enough savings to buy a tiny plot of land for a subsistence farm.
Women at that time were expected to keep men away and run a tiny farm on their own, while their husband was at sea. That led to a completely different approach of femininity, than in the overprotected south.
When the sailor came back he often suffered alcohol addiction. His kids may or not may have resembled him. In fact, only when he was too old to go to the sea, they could afford a family life.
People in Eastern Europe were also poor and thus died young.To make the lineage go on, people decided often on another system: The boy marries with 14 years and becomes father as soon as possible. His wife moves in with her husband and her in-laws. The father of the son, which is the grandfather in his 30s together with his brothers and his own father, the grand-grand-father in his late 40s pay for the young family. The freshly wed parents have no obligations that to care for baby and do housework. When the baby is a few years, its father, now in his end teens start to learn a craftsmanship to feed his family, his old parents and the families of his sons. This is a completely different economic approach. The East European dies as grand-grand-father, when the North German starts a family.
Hajnal believed, that family planning does not refer to economical needs but to genetic and religious settings. Looks to me like a view from someone that never experienced existential threats.
There are often quite a few different ways to work around a problem!
Hajnal was descended from the Hungarian nobility but not a Magyar. I have pointed out that no Magyars have been harmed during the development of the atomic bomb, aka a Budapest high school scientific project.
Basically Hajnal belonged to the class which was worth saving and his sympathies lay on that side.
It is said that the last surviving warship from the Great War, the Kommuna (originaly the Volkov), was hit by an Ukraininan strike and destroyed.
The Kommuna was built in 1915 at St. Petersburg, with designs copied from HSS Vulcan. Used as a salvage ship, it salvaged ships in the world wars, the Russian Revolution, various naval accidents of the Soviet Navy, and most recently the wreckage of the Moskva in 2022.
There is one more warship used in the Great War, the Liemba, but it is no longer used as a warship, being used as a passenger ship in Tanzania.
https://youtu.be/0X2Dz6PA1rQ?si=VGAdNuWQD5plnptM
The recent comments of the zombies talking about its demise are hilarious, given that today’s tech cannot really recreate something as long lasting as this.
Most people do not realize how far civilization has regressed since its height. All of the accumulated wealth having been depleted, without digitals the world will quickly regress to the level of Napoleon, or maybe Voltaire, within a year.
Oh no, he’s BACK!🙀
Fast Eddy
Jan 22
It would make sense to exterminate everyone … before we reach the tipping point and BAU collapses … resulting in the Gates of Hell opening.
Oh right… they are exterminating everyone
FROM THE HOBEST SORCERER
Gone, but not forgotten…he keeps on ticking
Hoping he’s recovering nicely..
Perth smashed its previous heatwave records last week, after sweltering through six days in a row over 40°C – and 11 days over 40°C this summer so far. On top of that, Perth has suffered widespread power outages and a bushfire in the city’s north.
No new material then. We aren’t missing anything until he develops some.
Keep waiting then, with deep breathing…what now, how many years do we have to wait till we all die?
very few, Herbie, very few.
(relative to the infinite space and time.)
Well, at my age 😜 it ain’t too difficult to figure out ..I’ll mark that on my calendar …
My forecast, before the end of the 2020s and the start of the 2030s
I heard that he ran away fom OFW because he got crushed in debates. Someone said that they saw him in tears. The phrase used was ‘crying like a little b. itch’.
Not language I would use but that’s what they said. The person said that Eddy was snivelling and that snot was running uncontrollably down his face and into his mouth. They said that he was literally gargling snot and was cry-choking.
He said that he thought he heard Eddy mumbling through the tears that he would never come back because he was too scared. He said that it looked as though Eddy had possibly peed himself too.
Obviously I dismissed the whole story as preposterous nonsense. Everyone knows that Eddy is in hospital waiting for his transition surgery and is now called Edwina. Why else did he move to Australia?
You have too much free time on your hands.
Relative newcomer WN has ramped up his rate of comments in a very short space of time. He has become a kind of FE parody, but with inflows of 1970s “punk” mentality, based on Kenny Everett, “Sid Snot”, etc. When one nuisance leaves, a worse one takes his place. I expect he’s also a fan of Johnny Rotten and all that dreary late 1970s era spit-n-sawdust sort of music. Gawd help us.
Comments are a self-organizing system. We can learn from a whole lot of different types of comments.
Russell “Texas” Bentley has been killed. Few embodied the human spirit like he did. Body language of pro-russian media points to him having been killed by russian soldiers in Donetsk (impossible to find anything about him on rt.com for example), although some details point to a Ukrainian hit. I will wait to form a final opinion, but do not understand western’s silence on what for them would be an incredible propaganda bonanza.
Yes I know all about it. It was Buryats from Russia’s 5th tank brigade. Never get into an argument with armed Buryats, especially if you’re an American in a place where an American guided rocket has just killed numerous people.
The Buryats didnt know he was some sort of minor alternative internet celeb. Very sad, I liked the guy a lot. I will not share the details of what they did to him before they killed him.
I think you probably have the right approach. Alex and Alexander are completely ignoring this, while they used a lot of video time to discuss Gonzalo Lira (honestly, a man not close to Bentley in stature). At smoothiex12 the censors must have worked overtime, leaving only a couple of teary comments by approved posters who have never been to Russia and did not address the events surrounding his demise. rt.com totally silent. I would be shocked if Escobar, Ritter, Haiphong, and others say anything at all.
Hindustan Times says that Putin thundered that justice will be made, but I am guessing they will just kick out of the army a few guys. No prison. I see nothing in the russian press. Russia pays a selected few but does pay and for people like Escobar, Martyanov and Mercouris this is probably the biggest revenue stream.
Have you heard the tale Escobar has been telling about an F35 from the illegal encampment and an EMP nuke being downed by Russia as it was leaving Jordanian airspace?
Seems ridiculous, but the made up reprisal clearly wasn’t them. Did they try something stupid, got slapped back by bigger powers and we get a covid level story to mull over?
I have but no facts to back it up. The only fact in favor is that they are extreme criminals.
Have you heard the tale Escobar has been telling about an F35 from the illegal encampment and an EMP nuke being downed by Russia as it was leaving Jordanian airspace?
It’s complete drivel obviously.
Amazon blurb for Growth by Daniel Susskind:
“Over the past two centuries, economic growth has freed billions from the struggle for subsistence and made our lives far healthier and longer. Yet prosperity has come at a price: environmental destruction, desolation of local cultures, the rise of vast inequalities and destabilizing technologies. Faced with such damage, many now claim that the only way forward is through “degrowth,” deliberately shrinking our economic footprint. But to abandon humanity’s progress would be folly. Instead, Daniel Susskind argues, we must keep growth but redirect it, making it better reflect what we truly value.
In a sweeping analysis full of historical insight, Susskind shows how policymaking came to revolve around a single-minded quest for greater GDP. This is a surprisingly recent development: economic growth was barely discussed until the second half of the twentieth century. And our understanding of what drives it is more recent still. Only lately have we come to see how humankind emerged from its millennia of stagnation: through the sustained discovery of powerful and productive new ideas.
This insight undermines the mantra that “we cannot have infinite growth on a finite planet,” for the world of ideas is infinitely vast. Yet growth’s critics are right to insist that we can no longer focus on its upsides alone. We must confront the tradeoffs, Susskind contends: sometimes, societies will have to deliberately pursue less growth for the sake of other goals. These will be moral decisions, not simply economic ones, demanding the engagement not just of politicians and experts but of all citizens.”
“Only lately have we come to see how humankind emerged from its millennia of stagnation: through the sustained discovery of powerful and productive new ideas.
This insight undermines the mantra that “we cannot have infinite growth on a finite planet,” for the world of ideas is infinitely vast.”
if anyone knows this guy, tell him he is an absolute moreon.
Oh I concur. I have spent time in Japan, cumulatively well over one year, in the last 15 years. They are no doubt prosperous, but they can not achieve what is the ultimate sign of prosperity, the consumption of red meat. In fact they have a less rich diet than the paupers of Paraguay, say. I am all for redirecting resources, and human nutrition has to be the #1 in receiving this redirection, but it can not be done (without major reduction in population).
Here is something to think about.
San Francisco and Los Angeles.
Over the last 100 years both city’s have seen huge growth explosions.
LA
This area was built on an oil boom on long beach during the roaring 20’s. The population doubled from mostly western middle settlers. Hence the nickname “City of Angels”. Also where nickname “SoCal” came from ie “Standard Oil” of California (now Chevron)
San Fran
This area of the country is where all the dropouts and drug users swarmed too. And their kids grew up and created companies like Apple and Google, etc. That’s why they have somewhat of a hippie style to them.
So, notice how one area was built with resources discovered by chance and other with ideas from “human resources”.
Ideas can be just as powerful of a growth force as fossil fuels. And so far, have keep limits to growth in check.
Now is sustainable?, I doubt it. And I think that’s the reason for the writing the book. IMHO
So, notice how one area was built with resources discovered by chance and other with ideas from “human resources”.
That’s not really true. Look at the San Fransisco area on google earth. It’s a tremendously good natural harbour and you can bring ocean going ships way inland to where all the food is grown.
Rudyard Kipling sailed from India and arrived in San Francsco in May 1889. The main reason he was in America was that they were pirating his books. He had this to say:
…In a vast marble-paved hall, under the glare of an electric light, sat forty or fifty men, and for their use and amusement were provided spittoons of infinite capacity and generous gape. Most of the men wore frock-coats and top-hats–the things that we in India put on at a wedding-breakfast, if we possess them–but
they all spat. They spat on principle…
Americans were not very cultured to say the least but in San Francisco at the time food was so cheap that in the bars of the city you got a free all-you-can eat buffet if you bought one drink.
Oh and he also visited Bohemian Grove which at the time was an actual art club for the wealthy where they would paint pictures in the European style.
I agree with you. I’m generalizing a ton. But, I think you see the point.
Ideas can be just as powerful of a growth force as fossil fuels. And so far, have keep limits to growth in check.
Ideas produce technology (in the Bay Area anyway) and technology always, always, results in more resources overall being consumed. Technology sends us over the cliff faster towards the rats, rubble and bones.
desolation of local cultures, the rise of vast inequalities and destabilizing technologies.
When you think about it cultures evolve from the ways we need to live to harvest energy in our particular part of the world. No need for them any more in our world so everywhere has become the same.
The interesting point is, that an equilibrum between economic growth and ressources will always lead to two aspects: a) restriction of population growth (no, I dont mean, Mr X should be in charge to select or mass kill people) and b) a loss or stagnation of complexity.
I think, these topics belong into the public discussion, otherwise it is left to a secretist elite group.
It means that we have to change our thinking. And this is always a challenge. It means to realize the difference between me and my neighbour is not so large. And it means to rely more on what the individual can do and invent with available resources than waiting for the industry to promote a solution.
I mean at the moment I’m in a position to travel anywhere I want in the world for many years, probably the rest of my life, and not have to work, but I havent gone anywhere.
But you know how it would be, right? I would be in Malaysia, or Peru or even Namibia or somewhere. What would I be doing? Probably sitting in some quirky little coffee shop that’s a randomised version of the 250 million other quirky little coffee shops worldwide. And posting on OFW. Outside in the street there would be old people shuffling along and young people staring at their phones; they could be Arabs, Africans, Chinese, Russians, whatever. It’s all the same.
“It’s all the same.”
True. You’re tired. You’re weary. Time for you to make that one last trip. To Switzerland. A nice hygienic clinic awaits you.
More details please…is it like this, I wonder?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KtTNhPm1_xg&pp=ygUrc295bGVudCBncmVlbiBlZHdhcmQgZyByb2JpbnNvbiBkZWF0aCBzY2VuZQ%3D%3D
I couldn’t possibly say. I just hope that whoever accompanies WN asks for a doggy bag so that Hoolio can be given a treat.
This Mike
http://www.dignitas.ch/?lang=en
The foundations of our future beliefs have been long laid(until it all falls apart. You won’t need dignitas for a quick, spinless exit then).
Just to spite you I’ll outlive you.
“Just to spite you I’ll outlive you.”
So if you did outlive me, I’d be dead, right? And just exactly how spited do you think I would feel if I was dead, WN? You clearly haven’t thought this one through, have you? 😉
Anyway, I dare say it’s against the law to try to spite a dead body in some politically correct countries – like Scotland, maybe. [/sarc]
you mad bruh?
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The magic formula for economic growth is
+ growing human population
+ an increasing supply of inexpensive energy products
+ increasing supply of other resources
+ improved technology
+ growing debt
It stops working when energy products get too hard (expensive) to extract, or population gets too high relative to other resources, or debt gets to be too much of a problem. Also, if another economy is doing much better than a given economy, it can overcome the lagging economy.
Growth hits limits pretty quickly.
Gail; I don’t understand how so many individuals can read your blog, ‘OFW.’ And yet not seem to understand what “FINITE” really means.
We seem to be programmed to believe that the future will be like the past.
We cannot imagine anything else. The stock market will grow forever, for example.
I think the future will be like the past 200 years ago. Heat from wood. Apples, beef and cheese by sailing ship to Manhattan.
But the lifestyle of 200 years ago can only feed a small number of people–say one billion. Maybe less, if we are lacking in skills and resources to provide this lifestyle.
Everyone always blames chucky for our current predicament but let us examine the real culprits who chose poorly and doomed the world to our present course this article is from 1972 I personally believe the powers that be were behind this attempt to steer the world away from certain death. WASHINGTON, March 3—There is i French children’s riddle about a pond with a water lily in it. The lily doubles in size every day. In thirty days it will cover the entire pond, killing the other creatures in it. The owner wants to avoid that, but he sees no hurry: He will cut the plant back when it covers half the pond. When will that be?
The answer is the 29th day. He has one day to save his pond.
The story is told in “The Limits to GrOwth,” a report by a team of scientists to the Club of Rome, an international group concerned with the future of man and the earth. The report has just been published as a paperback book. It is the most fascinating and the most disturbing book I have read in a very long time, The lily pond indicates why.
Like the lily, man’s impact on the earth is growing exponentially: doubling every so often. For example, the population curve Is rising so fast that the world total now doubles about every 33 years. Industrial production is also growing exponentially, as are pollution and the demand for food and the use of mineral resources.
And like the pond to the lily, there are limits to the growth of all these factors in human existence. The earth is finite.
The Club of Rome report, based on computer models, tries to explore where the limits are and what will happen when they are reached. It concludes that, if the present trends continue, “the limits to growth on this planet will be reached sometime within the next 100 years. The most probable result will be a rather sudden and uncontrollable decline in both population and industrial capacity.”
That conclusion has already begun to arouse the sharpest controversy. Some economists and scientists consider the computer models inadequate, the analysis too simple.
The authors of the report—Dennis L. Meadows of M.I.T. and others—would readily admit the, inadequacy of this first effort to measure the whole trend of man’s relationship with his environment. Their object is not to provide final answers now. It is to make the world realize.there is a problem and start to think about it.
The sense of earthly limits has begun to come into our consciousness without any need for a scientific re‘ port. We know that it is increasingly difficult to find place to build power plants urgently needed in’ the United States. We know that the catch of ocean fish is dropping. We know hove difficult it is to dispose of our Industrial and household wastes.
The special value of this reports is its compelling exposition of the truth ecologists have been trying to teach us: that the elements of life are interconnected. They make a whole, circle, and they have to be considered together. There is no easy way out when we approach a limit in one area, because anything we do to avoid the limit will have consequences elsewhere.
Consider the example or oll The most skeptical critics of ecological thinking recognize that we are rapidly approaching the limit of ordinary estimated oil reserves. The critics deal with that by saying that we shall simply get our, oil from new sources —say oil‐shale rock.
But massive efforts to extract oil from shale would have consequences. There would be a huge disposal problem, for example, and large amounts of new electric power would be required. What would fuel the generating plants—nuclear power?. But the relatively few nuclear generators we have now are already creating such a problem of radioactive waste that the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission has suggested rocketing it to the sun.
Or consider food production. green revolution has allowed us to multiply crop yields, but people tend to forget that there are costs—as always. Fertilizer must be used intensively, so much more has to be produced, and that takes energy. Fertilizer pollutes nearby streams as it runs off the land, and it gradually lowers the fertility of the soil. Then more capital has to be invested to produce the same crops, and so on.
Those who advocate economic growth as the sovereign remedy for our social ills ought at least to expose themselves to the Meadows report. If they did, they could no longer content themselves with the simple notion that ecological limits are only a matter of resources, for which substitutes can always be found. They would begin to consider resources together with food, pollution, population, industrial production: they would begin to understand how deceptive it is to think of a limitless lily pond.
The Club of Rome says that the purpose of its report is to provoke thought, not despair. And the thinking cannot be left to the ecological enthusiasts. It would be quite wrong, intellectually and morally, to suggest that resolution of the dilemma of economic growth be left to those who have identified it. The decisions required are political: They are for all of us.
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The Limits to Growth
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ByPeter Passell,Marc Roberts andLeonard Ross
April 2, 1972 limits to growth being trashed by the above 3 authors
“Fifteen years ago, nuclear incineration was the fashionable apocalypse. The doomsday clock on the cover of The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists marched inexorably toward midnight. Today the vision is mass death from insecticide poisoning, climatic changes, or some other form of retribution from an angry biosphere. None of these fears is chimerical. Ecologists are surely right in shaking us from our unconcern about the side‐effects of growth. A fair volume of propaganda is tolerable—indeed necessary —to counter years of smug neglect.
But there is a real danger involved in exploiting modern society’s intimations of disaster. Ecologists studying pest control have taught us that the remedy is often worse than the affliction. This principle has an intellectual analogue. To insist that pollution control is pointless without a halt to growth is not simply wrong; it is noxious. Instead of inspiring a zero‐growth policy, it is more likely to rationalize even further stalling over the few basic steps needed to curb pollution. Con Ed can fume away, secure in the knowledge that the fault is not theirs but mankind’s.
The planet certainly has its problems—and maybe even a “pmblematique” or two. But public‐relations stunts which imply a false inevitability of doom do not speed the day of salvation. Crying wolf is too important a function to be left to invisible colleges.”
the result was this Letters to the Editor
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David W. Stickel
July 30, 1972
Letters to the Editor
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“The Limits to Growth,” a product of an M.I.T. team led by Denis Mead ows, and subtitled “A Report for the Club of Rome’s Project on the Predicament of Mankind,” is an at tempt to explore the “complex of troubles affecting men of all nations” that—in the authors’ view—threaten the survival of our species.
These “seemingly divergent” prob lems, the authors state, are in reality part of a single “world problema tique” that can now be analyzed with the help of computers—specifically, the techniques developed by M.I.T. systems‐engineer Jay Forrester. The book is a statement of the team’s findings — and a warning of lethal consequences in the near future, un less human needs receive priority over continued industrial expansion.
The Book Review’s trio of critics— Peter Passell, Marc Roberts and Leonard Ross—found “The Limits to Growth” an “empty and misleading work.” In their collective opinion, “its imposing apparatus of computer technology and systems‐jargon con ceals a hind of intellectual Rube Goldberg device—one that takes ar bitrary assumptions, shakes them up, and comes out with arbitrary con clusions that have a ring of science.”
A record outpouring of letters was received from the scientific commu nity (and lay correspondents) pro and con this conclusion. Excerpts are printed below — followed by Mr. Ross’s reply for the triumvirate.
To the Editor:
As a humanist (and a believer in man’s fallibility) I am firmly con vinced that, in the words of the microbiologist and Nobel laureate Albert Szent‐Gyorgyi, man “should make a sharp turn. There is too much vested interest. We must make a new beginning . . . .”
At no place is it stated that “Limits to Growth” was written not as a typical scientific document (un derstandable only to those of the scientific community), but as a work for the layman . . . .
The M.I.T. team made it clear that they did not advocate a complete shutdown of economic improvement. Meadows, et al., acknowledged the crying need for an improvement in the economic base of all peoples. ..
and then in 76 a new direction Need for Social Change Is Seen by Club of Rome
By Ann Crittenden;Special to The New York Times
April 15, 1976
Need for Social Change Is Seen by Club of Rome
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April 15, 1976,
PHILADELPHIA, April 14—The world can avoid a catastrophe only by substantially changing its social and political institutions as well as its growth patterns, according tc a concensus of the latest studies by the Club of Rome, a private group of about 100 businessmen and scholars concerned with the future of man.
All of the club’s current projects, discussed during three‐day conference that ended today in Philadelphia, concur that the following actions must be taken quickly if global problems are to he solved in democratic fashion;
Underdeveloped nations must act cooperatively and independently of developed countries to correct the world’s economic imbalances, essentially by using 19th‐century trade union tactics to form their own artels and new trading and monetary systems.
¶Future economic growth must be strongly differentiated, tvith conservation ‐ oriented growth based on recycling in the developed countries, and an emphasis on industrial growth in developing countries.
¶International institutions must be adjusted or created to manage such common problems as the uses of the oceans and of space and the development of new energy sources.
Summarizing the conference’s conclusions, Prof. Hell Jaguaribe, a Brazilian political scientist, said the danger to civilization if corrective measures were not taken was not that man would perish from a lack of food or raw materials, but that, long before that happened, democratic and humanistic institutions would he destroyed.
“In the conditions of the coming times, the necessity of re‐establishing a viable world balance between population and resources—if the present generation is not able to timely adopt the necessary corrective measures—will inevitably tend to bring about a technocratic version of oriental despotism, of which Stalinism and Nazism have already given us an anticipated view,” Professor Jaguaribe said.
Thus, in its most recent anal. yses, the Club of Rome contInues to hold firth the possihility of disaster if today’s pat. terns of growth and development are not modified.
But the thrust of these warnings has shifted since the orga, nization’s first study, published in 1972, emphasized the physi. cal limits to growth, determined by the finitude of the earth’s resources.
That hypothesis has now been substantially modified by subsequent studies, some of which demonstrate that it is technically possible to produce enough food and energy to sustain large world populations in affluence without undue pollution.
But the latest studies indicate that such solutions will probably not be found under existing sociopolitical conditions and constraints. Unless these systems are modified, some studies conclude, catastrophic outcomes will result in the not‐toodistant future.
This is the scenario foreseen in a sophisticated mathematical model dividing the world into 10 regions and developed by Mihajlo Mesarovic of Case Uni‐: versity and Eduard Pestel of the Technical University of Hanover, West Germany, and of a model developed under the direction of Amilcar Herre‐: ra of the Bariloche Foundation in Argentina.
I notice in the plans:
“growth based on recycling in the developed countries, and an emphasis on industrial growth in developing countries.”
Recycling uses fossil fuels. It is severely limited in what it can do.
Emphasis on industrial growth in developing countries–what better way to do this than to focus the attention of advanced nations on local CO2 emissions?
In German speaking social media people suspect the Club of Rome to be financed by the elites and their fear p**n and transhumanist agenda. They conclude, if Kill Bill says there is no oil there must be plenty of it. They dont see that, if the end of oil were a conspiration, the conspirators could easily stop oil extraction even if plenty were left. That is very hard to deal with in discussions. I doubt that a praisal of the Meadows are of any help.
If you teach basic maths, like 2+2=4, you dont have to say, Mr X used it, so pray to Mr X and say thank you twice a day! It is enough to teach, why 2+2=4.
There is the idea that Malthus was a bad man with respect to his eugenicist ideas and that therefore world population cannot be restricted by resources. I see this meme at least in the German speaking discussions.
The dependence of population, food and resources is older and more universal than what Malthus made out of it. We dont have to repeat Malthus mistakes for 10.000 years to honor him. We are free to come to have our lwn thoughts.
If we recommend people to bend down and pray to the biggest God next to ole Brandon, we might achieve the opposite effect of what we need.
We need people to think about it and come to their own conclusions.
We need these discussions going on, otherwise we leave them to a tiny group of elitists and as we can see they dont provide solutions, not even for themselves. They can’t do it!
Everyone always blames chucky for our current predicament but let us examine the real culprits who chose poorly and doomed the world to our present course this article is from 1972 I personally believe the powers that be were behind this attempt to steer the world away from certain death.
You’re saying the Limits to Growth people were the good guys or the bad guys?
No. No one really mentioned Chucky before me. He is mentioned briefly in John Keegan’s book, and also briefly in an anthology of alternate history stories.
The British did the best to bury the memories of the person who created the biggest fkup of its history.
The British patriots, those who are in soaps like “Coronation Street”G, who still think it is 1900, cannot admit their fathers and grandfathers fked it up so badly. Ironically they are precisely the kind of people who the Duke of Wellington called “The Scum of Earth”. Unfortunately a lot of the “Anglos” in USA also come from these stock.
His fkup depleted the stock of those who were able to drive civilization decisively, since the survivors, now disillusioned, either did not reproduce or began reproducing with people not in their class.
Without Chucky, no Irish independence, no Indian independence, no independence of the third world countries and no mass consumption, and none of the issues you have talked about would have mattered.
This guy is good. Reports from China how the US sanctions on sale of US chips to China has backfired. Tech stocks in US like Intel are hurting. Nice concise summary with financial charts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9oMJ6WmlwU&t=69s
Energy, fresh water supply issues may be lurking though for all chip producers, but those scarce resources may gradually be diverted to the most efficient producer, and that is China.
I like him too, short and to the point, nice catch.
Dennis L.
Moore’s Law (which we had not understood, but rested on the assumption of infinite energy) is getting violated left and right. It is just too tough to go smaller than what they do now. So computing power worldwide is plateauing (peak computing I guess) and as the guy says from now the competition is on cost. China will emerge the winner and in case of was the US can bomb TSMC into oblivion, no difference.
Not really worth going further. My phone is 4 years old and does everything I need it to do just like it did when I bought it. People buying the newest models now are just doing it for status or the better cameras which are still improving.
I keep forgetting my phone even has a camera because I’m old.
Improvement has now moved to packaging. More chips closer together. Includes chip stacking. There is at least one more factor of ten for NVIDIA.
I’m looking forward to reading Norman’s new book, The End of Moore’s Law.
well Tim
my next book is “How the Men of Iron put the World to Work”
if i finish it before collapse (mine as well as everyone else’s .)
btw–applying Moores Law to normal life and living would mean that the motive power of a motor car could be extracted from something the size of a matchbox.
Or your home could be heated from a lit match.
which is of course nonsense.—yet one sees it bandied about as if it can be made reality
I like this analogy for Moores Law:
“your home could be heated from a lit match.”
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“We can’t make wind turbines or solar panels without fossil fuels. What do we plan to do for energy without fossil fuels?”
The fossil fuels are needed for plastics, not for burning, to make wind turbines or solar panels. And there will be plenty of fossil fuels for plastics for a very long time.
The problem is that the whole system needs to keep operating. In theory, plastics could be made without oil, except there is a whole system involved. Diesel is needed for road building and for pipe laying, for example.
When we extract oil, we get a mixture of different length hydrocarbon chains. We have to be able to economically process the whole mixture, and to pipe the refined mixture of refined products to different users.
probably very hard for people to grasp the nature of the problem that the ponzi scheme will blow up permanently very soon leading to permanent deflation which means everything will become a stranded asset the worlds people will also be stranded no food no petrol no order chaos will soon follow that is why the likes of Gatesy has got his bunkers ready for his loved ones what have we got?
The system is extremely complex and everything connects with everything else. it’s not possible to make radical changes without severely disrupting it. It can’t take much disruption without collapsing.
⊙ω⊙
agree. look what happened in the soviet union circa 1990. and all it took was a 3% IIRC decline in fossil fuel production. Russia was given a second chance when oil production increased around 1998, and it probably took that much time to come up with a new economy structure. 200 dollars prices around 2005 gave them a firm foot in the door. there will be no second chance for the west.
The green activists keep coming up with ‘brilliant ideas’ because they haven’t the slightest idea how the system works.
They are being tolerated for now and even encouraged and given platfforms because that’s politically convenient. Everyone knows who Greta is but can they name their country’s energy or environment ministers?
Who will the mobs be coming after first when it turns out it doesnt work and people are cold and hungry?
a house of cards built on foundation of dominoes from coffers of poker chips.
We need fossil fuels to drill or mine fossil fuels, have done since the start of the industrial revolution. We need to burn them for those purposes.
Assuming your insane idea were possible, which of course it is not, we would end up with 10s of millions of barrels a day of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel which we didn’t need. There is nowhere to safely dispose of it so we would have to burn it to get rid of it.
Suicide is on the rise for young Americans, with no clear answers
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68782177
Even young people can see that there is a big problem.
They won’t catch young new zealanders. Suicide world record holders.
https://mentalhealth.org.nz/suicide-prevention/statistics-on-suicide-in-new-zealand
Government figures fake. Real rates much higher.
Sometimes just mstrbtn helps. The population growth stops, but the people try to be more and more sxlly attractive, which, of course, does not help, if the energy available for the population declines and the society atomizes.
We killed God, we killed hope, we killed direction, we are making it up as we go and people can’t change nor can they adjust this fast.
The elites have fairytales.
Very frustrating to see it happen. But, at my CC they young men are going forward.
Question of the day. Were Harvard to close for a year would anyone notice?
Dennis L.
after the degrowth of IC to when most people will be living in relative poverty, there will be a big return to reeligion and pie in the sky hope.
this brief age of vast prosperity will end soon enough.
the Universe decided that relative poverty was good enough for most humans for tens of thousands of years, and will have to be good enough for the survivors in the coming tens of thousands of years.
good news, no fast paced lives with tech distractions, just many millennia accompanied by the loss of most science and knowledge, where reeligion will regain its place since the superstittious myths will once again be unchallenged.
it’s all good.
‘God is dead’. Nietzsche
‘Nietzsche is dead’. God.
“… on the rise for young Americans, with no clear answers.”
no need for any answers.
because it’s not a problem.
they merely enter the nothingness of eternal death a bit earlier.
thus not using anymore resources.
Imagine what it was like getting old in the Roman empire. People used to pray to the gods for a quick death rather than one of the many ways it can be horrifically protracted and painful.
If a disease didnt get you, your teeth would as they used to get worn down by millstone grit contaminating the bread. This was a problem right up until fairly recently historically and I think we use hardened steel now instead of stone. Hopefully the ‘traditional stone ground’ flour you can buy nowadays isn’t really stone ground.
Not to mention parasites, like a lot of countries here did until recently and us too before guano fertiliser, the Romans used to use human sewage as fertiliser and were therefore riddled with worms and more.
You can use human feces as a fertilizer if you compost it. It should be done on a family basis though and ill people’s feces should be excluded. You need to compost it 2-4 years, depending on the composting method and developing heat.
The main principle of gardening without fossile fertilizers is, that all that has been taken from the garden must return to the garden, except the energy provided by the sun. Otherwise there will be depleations.
The idea to produce food on the countryside and transport it to the cities, where people’s feces are flated into rivers and oceans is not possible without fossile fuels.
The principles behind it are present in a lot of biological effects, for example if you let sheep or cows graze on some natural meadows they will fertilize those spots where they like to gather and draw nutritians out from grazing areas. It changes the flora.
Nutritians are also newly freed from rock by root acids and especially by mushrooms. But usually this process is too slow for gardening. More research pn this would be interesting.
In my understanding, without petrochemical agriculture, gardening is providing more yield than wheat and soy fields and I think that will be the future. I may be influenced by living in the Alps, where space and sun is limited and plants need a lot of care. That may be different in the classical loess areas.
You can use human feces as a fertilizer if you compost it.
That’s right but they didnt do that. Of course nowadays people tend to think they were just stupid, but they had no choice. You need fertiliser, right now, today, for the food you’re growing, you can’t wait 3 years. That was the situation they were in. It will be the same for future people.
This is disturbing and shows the need for local church communities.
https://www.theburningplatform.com/2024/04/19/the-trump-trial-self-immolation-manifesto/#more-335417
This is the second one in about a month. Surely the US Spring is not very far away. Although the means of social control in the US are orders of magnitude better than in the arab countries.
(Al Arabya)
Cloud seeding
“As climate change warms the oceans, Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf countries are set to experience bigger and more frequent rainstorms, experts say, while a surging number of cloud-seeding programs will enhance rainfall and boost freshwater reserves in the region. […]
In neighboring UAE, cloud seeding has been undertaken for more than 20 years to squeeze more rainfall out of passing storms. Officials told Al Arabiya English earlier this year that the country plans to carry out around 300 cloud-seeding missions in 2024.
The UAE program has become especially vital as climate change and rapid population growth strain the natural water resources in the arid country, pushing it to rely heavily on energy-intensive desalination plants.”
Additionally, I would say that the water they take from themselves from the cloud they seed, it is surely taken out from others who cannot have any more the water UAE squeezes out.
Many Countries do like that so it is another fight for resources.
https://english.alarabiya.net/News/saudi-arabia/2024/04/16/saudi-arabia-gcc-to-see-more-rainfall-due-to-warmer-weather-cloud-seeding-experts
This is largely correct, but it needs to be seen what fraction they are able to wringe out of a cloud, that would not otherwise have fallen. I suspect it is small. I know winter weather is largely from the West, in which case they are robbing Iran (if it is from the North West they are just robbing the Indian Ocean). In case of monsoons from the south they would be robbing Iraq.
Just wondering . How good is the construction in Dubai since it is located in the desert . Can the water leach under the foundations and cause instability of the multi storeyed buildings ? Dubai has a poorly designed sewage system.
This is largely correct, but it needs to be seen what fraction they are able to wringe out of a cloud, that would not otherwise have fallen. I suspect it is small.
It’s the kind of stunt they can afford to do in Dubai, for now. I think but I’m not sure that entropy tells us it’s never really going to be worth doing.
Interesting physics problem. How does seeding a supersaturated cloud increase entropy? Probably the same way a hurricane increases entropy, by creating a pathway through which an unbalanced system can thermalize.
Fuel used in construction of the aircraft, runways, radars, the fuel for the aircraft itself, the silver particles used for the seeding, the list goes on and on.
I completely agree with your vision Withnail, it is not suistainablle at all for long.
I posted about my home town about to lose one of the two towers that symbolize Bologna. I also pointed out that the last few years have seen extreme drought and extreme precipitation there and that flexed the soil enough that the tower started leaning and twisting over a matter of months. Dubai’s soil is sand so it might be more able to dissipate water due to the much larger pores, but the destiny of Dubai’s towers is the same as the towers of Bologna. There were 100 in 1400, there are 2 complete now and maybe 10 which have been shortened or were short all along.
No doubt the clymat is blamed. I imagine but I’m not sure that the real problem is too much water being taken for human purposes before it reaches Bologna underground.
well, I saw Bologna underwater 11 months ago, first time in my lifetime. Two years of precipitation fell in May, in two separate weeks which may have contributed to the total effect (dry clay is hydrophobic). And the aquifer has been pumped for a long time, since the area grew corn (it is now too dry and sorghum is grown).
and the aquifer depletion was correlated to a small measurable increased lean (no twist) but it is a slow process and the ground had time to flow and adjust. I assure you that the weather in the last 21 years has been quite extreme. we used to have no air conditioning, and now it is not possible to live there without.
I assure you that the weather in the last 21 years has been quite extreme. we used to have no air conditioning, and now it is not possible to live there without.
Yes fair enough, I know the summers have been crazy like that in Rome as well for quite a while now.
This sounds like a mess.
Speaking of myths
1) We are not in massive overshoot.
2) We do not need to restructure society from continuous growth to steady state.
3) Governments will protect individual freedom.
4) The wealthy can live in a hole in the ground for two years and return victorious.
Ed,
4 is nonsense; when they emerge an entirely different skill set will be required. Guess: generalists will rule.
4 is definitely a myth.
Dennis L.
I know that we had a commenter long ago who was convinced that there would be a quick die-off of everyone except the handful who were fully prepared. Therefore, those who had stored up food for a year or two would prevail.
If things are really going backwards, I have attached this which agrees with LTG.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/1972-study-warned-of-global-collapse-by-2040-and-new-research-agrees/ss-AA1nml7X?ocid=msedgntp&pc=U531&cvid=048f32a9f3194150bbd6dc0b6b06e1aa&ei=13#image=12
Were I pessimist, looking backwards at what worked, a castle, turrets, moat and slits for cross bows. Would live on a waterway, Mississippi comes to mind.
The linked msn above mentions the date 2040 for collapse; good news is student debt will become moot. Borrow with confidence, that is only sixteen years away.
My bet is still Starship, man has come too far and the universe is a strange place. Yeah, throw in a cubic mile of Pt for good measure.
Amish continue to grow, one fellow has a very nice herd of horses, saw another fellow today plowing a small acreage with only 2 horses, have seen him use six as I recall. Very peaceful pace.
Dennis L.
I know that we had a commenter long ago who was convinced that there would be a quick die-off of everyone except the handful who were fully prepared. Therefore, those who had stored up food for a year or two would prevail.
This is a good way to make money on Youtube from socially isolated people. We don’t need to spell out what will actually happen to anyone foolish enough to have had, say, 2 years supply of food arriving on their driveway that their neighbours have seen.
what if the elites have got underground cities prepared for themselves you are underestimating them they have had a long time to prepare if Noah had an ark what do you think they have got ready for themselves?
It’s castles I tell you, castles for the long haul. Joking, tired, I am preparing for tomorrow and it is not doom and gloom. It will be bumpy but man has survived worse and we have Starship.
Musk launches next month, I hope for the best.
Dennis L.
Nothing. This isn’t a video game.
Mike S on the US oil production .
I have now read this G&R article at length; it is incredibly important that everyone does.
At the risk of sounding conspiratorial, I believe the EIA is a big government entity that recieves orders from headquarters regularly, from whomever its boss is at the moment. For several years those orders have been to create as much confusion as possible as to how oil the US is producing, what it will produce in the future, what is on hand in storage and inventories… all to make the appearance of abundance seem more real, create oil that really does not exist, drive, and keep, the price of oil down as much as possible. It is a big lie.
How could any American dispute that the government will not lie at the drop of a hat to mislead the citizenery for the sake of votes, money, and political gain? Prove me wrong. If you intend to, please do not refer to this article. This is pretty good stuff right here.
The great lie has failed and gasoline prices are increasing and hurting the average American consumer badly. The lie was based on abundance that never existed. Clearly. Let there be no better example of that than the horseshit this president, with a small P, has done to our SPR. Less than a month ago it promised to refill the SPR and today it has crawfished on that for fear of rising gasoline prices and losing votes.
Most Americans don’t care where their oil comes from, as long as it gets here, and its cheap. They are energy illiterate. Apparently college basketball is more important; I don’t know.
YOU will pay the price, I am sorry to say. You will do so with this president, AND the next, whomever the son of a bitch is. They all lie.
https://blog.gorozen.com/blog/is-us-oil-production-surging
This You Tube video on Peak Prosperity addressed this two months ago.
In my opinion, Adam Rozencwajg is a a very sound analyst.
most Americans believe the US is swimming in oil and supplying other countries with the surplus and as you say you cant blame them really.
The story we get is as misleading as possible. As soon as it become clear that we had a problem, the EIA switched to reporting “liquids” instead of crude oil. There are many types of crude oil, also.
Yup. Oil is running out of steam.
Good point, I like it.
Dennis L.
We can steam the oil out of Venezuela and Canada.
Copilot is being difficult, want the energy/barrel today compared to 1970, it is beating around the bush.
Best I could get, I get bored easily on these things.
Copilot:
Given these energy contents, here are the calculations for the energy produced per barrel of petroleum production in 1970 and 2024:
1970: The product mix was 100% crude oil, so the energy produced per barrel of petroleum production in 1970 was approximately 5.8 million BTU.
2024: The product mix is 90% crude oil and 10% NGLs, so the energy produced per barrel of petroleum production in 2024 is approximately 5.61 million BTU.
So, you’re correct. If a barrel of petroleum contains 10% NGLs, it will produce less energy than a barrel of 1970’s crude oil. This is because NGLs have a lower energy content than crude oil. If you have any other questions or need further assistance, feel free to ask”
“The percentage of Natural Gas Liquids (NGLs) in today’s barrel of crude can vary based on several factors, including the source of the crude oil and the specific extraction and refining processes used. However, it’s estimated that NGLs can make up about 43% of a barrel of crude oil1.
It’s important to note that this is an approximate value and can vary. For the most accurate information, you may want to refer to specific data from oil producers or industry reports. If you have any other questions or need further assistance, feel free to ask”
Now, what we have been waiting for Copilot again:
“Sure, I have done the calculations considering the energy content of different petroleum products and the product mix of a barrel of oil produced in 1970 and 2024.
Energy of a Barrel of Crude Oil: The energy content of a barrel of crude oil is approximately 5.8 million BTU/barrel.
Energy of a Barrel of Natural Gas Liquids (NGLs): The energy content of a barrel of NGLs is approximately 3.9 million BTU/barrel.
Given these energy contents, here are the calculations for the energy produced per barrel of petroleum production in 1970 and 2024:
1970: The product mix was 100% crude oil, so the energy produced per barrel of petroleum production in 1970 was approximately 5.8 million BTU.
2024: The product mix is 57% crude oil and 43% NGLs, so the energy produced per barrel of petroleum production in 2024 is approximately 5.1 million BTU.”
So .7 million BTUs down or .7/5.8 is about 12% down in energy.
Now for you enquiring minds, look at the decline in volumetric production and compare to energy production and one should have a good guess as to the future based on oil. You could also quiz Copilot on the rate of increase in NGL in a barrel of oil and further refine your guesses.
My best forecast: A castle, on water and a herd of horses with a good to keep the tribe in good spirits.
Enough, time for a glass of wine.
Good night all.
Dennis L.
Have you not heard? We are the Saudi Arabia of shale 🙂
Squeezing rock bottom. America fuck yeah.
i had already posted that the SPR will never be re-filled. even with another lockdown. I think it is becoming apparent to all.
Its not the US spr that counts, what counts is the ratio between proven and unproven reserves of SA. Its a big club, and you ain’t in it.
“Mike S on the US oil production.
I have now read this G&R article at length; it is incredibly important that everyone does.”
no it’s not important at all really.
most people living in the bAU of IC are all in on pedal to the metal resource usage.
our human nature makes it almost certain that IC will continue full speed to whatever degrowth or collapse is ahead.
it’s all good.
As I have said earlier , anything and everything to keep prices low .
You have to save gasoline and lower the price.
https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insights/latest-news/oil/041924-us-epa-to-allow-e15-gasoline-sales-this-summer-cites-wars-opec- production-cuts
The sale of E15 over the summer will protect Americans against price increases by increasing supply and reducing dependence on imported fuel, the EPA said.
“Under President Biden’s leadership, the EPA is taking steps to protect Americans from fuel supply challenges resulting from ongoing conflicts abroad, ensuring consumers have more choices at the pump,” said the EPA Administrator Michael Regan said in a statement. “Allowing E15 sales during the summer driving season will increase fuel supply, while supporting American farmers, strengthening our nation’s energy security, and providing relief to drivers across the country.”
The EPA estimates that E15 is about 25 cents/gal cheaper than E10.
“Earlier this year, the Biden administration finally confirmed that E15 can be offered permanently in eight Midwestern states, but postponed year-round access in those states until summer 2025,” the director said in a statement. American Ethanol Coalition executive Brian Jennings. “Today’s action is an important reminder that higher ethanol blends play a critical role in our nation’s energy security, as well as contributing important climate and air quality b
Of course, a tank full of E-15 won’t travel as far eight.
Ethanol is made from corn. It already uses a disproportionate share of the corn supply. Some is grown particularly for this purpose. The Department of Agriculture says that 40% of corn is used for this purpose now.
https://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/pub-details/?pubid=105761#:~:text=Ethanol%20manufacturers%20use%20about%2040,the%20domestic%20transportation%20fuel%20market.
Rob on April 17, 2024 at 3:09 pm
Close to half the corn grown in Iowa is used to power machines while vast tracts of land in Indonesian and Brazil are now growing crops, with all the attendant destruction of modern industrialized agriculture, to fuel the internal combustion that is producing gigatonnes of CO2, while leaving the rainforests that transform CO2 into O2 in ruins.
It isn’t robots’ artificial intelligence, but mankind’s actual stupidity that is the real intractable problem.
Reply
Panopticon
Panopticon on April 17, 2024 at 6:05 pm
I’m afraid this era is rife with such bitter ironies, Rob
https://climateandeconomy.com/2024/04/17/17th-april-2024-todays-round-up-of-economic-news/
Just wanted to share this…made me see the bitterness of this age
Nothing whatsoever we can do about the clymate. The oil is going to be burned one way or another.
When you’re looking at something that seems weird or dumb like corn ethanol and you don’t understand why it’s happening, it’s highly likely that you just don’t know enough and there is in fact a sane reason for it and there is no alternative.
I am dealing with this now.
Ethanol is a PIA, ethanol is also water friendly.
BIO diesel is a mess and one needs to purchase #1 diesel in MN to avoid that mess.
Filters are expensive and to me it looks like one needs to fill the tank with a dry, inert gas — Oh, you get the idea, a mess.
Dennis L.
Imagine how much bourbon whisky could be made from that corn. The US is now blending whisky into gasoline. Just how daft can the world get?
I occasionally talk about water shortages in metropolises . The heat this year is beyond fathom in India . Understand air-conditioning is greatly inefficient if the outside temperature is too high . My sister in Bengaluru informs that prices of apartments in high rises have fallen by 25%because of the water problem . Collateral damage .
https://twitter.com/extremetemps/status/1780937034967724401/photo/1
It does look awfully warm over there. It has been warm here, also.
I can see why it is tempting to tell people that it is their bad behavior that is causing the problem. It reminds me of the Old Testament. God is angry because you did not obey his commandments. Turn from your evil ways and repent. You have committed environmental sins.
Original environmental sin having children.
Just stop burning stuff. Problem solved.
https://stopburningstuff.org/
With the world’s tech edge passing towards Asia, with the techies in USA increasingly replaced by those with ties in Asia, the global civilization will progress like a typical Asian civ does – eternal stasis with increasingly worsening reality.
Europe no longer has the stock to replace what was lost in the World Wars, increasingly dominated by people from Africa.
Pingback: The World’s Economic Myths Are Hitting Their Limits – NewDYRTO
In an earlier post we had discussed how out of the blue UAE announced it was going to do a $ 35 billion investment in Egypt and then a day later IMF bailed out bankrupt Egypt with a $ 8 billion loan . Read here . TINA for Europe .
https://medium.com/visionarye-talks/ill-tell-you-the-geopolitical-game-behind-europe-s-8-billion-bribe-to-egypt-852b2e7c534b
The IMF gets its funds for loans from rich countries. It needs Egypt to be in reasonable shape to keep the Suez Canal open and to handle refugees from Gaza. The $35 billion investment in Egypt by the UAE will very much help Egypt. (The article is mostly behind a paywall, so I didn’t read most of it.)
I want you to open up a map. Then I want you to look at two positions.
The position of Egypt.
The position of Europe.
Then I want you to come to a conclusion where each stand on the map and if the conclusion you’ve reached is the same as mine.
Egypt is in the underbelly of Europe.
Then you’ve reached the right conclusion my friend. Because for Europe, Egypt is a lifeline that they cannot allow to go into chaos.
Egypt’s significant value stems from the Suez Canal and its strategic location as a focal point into Africa and Europe. Historically, Egypt has always been a very important strategic location because it connects 3 regions together and many empires have come and gone from Egypt.
But it’s not a history lesson that I want to tell you today. It’s the effects of $8 Billion that the EU gave to Egypt and the purpose of it.
Some people, well actually, a lot of people think that the EU gave $8 billion to Egypt because they wanted to keep the Palestinian refugees in Egypt and yeah that could be a partial factor but that’s not the important factor.
As Egypt controls the Suez Canal, one of the world’s busiest maritime routes, it facilitates the transport of goods between Europe and Asia. That’s just general knowledge.
Should let’s say a civil war breakout, it could disrupt traffic through the Canal, leading to delays and increased shipping costs for European businesses. This disruption could send global oil prices through the roof, given that a substantial portion of Europe’s oil supplies passes through the Suez Canal.
Currently right now Oil prices are increasing globally in Europe and America, thanks to the Houthis, they have already blocked off Israeli ships, attacking them as they pass by, now they’re shooting at American ships for attempting to help Israeli ships and if Europe sends its coalition to the Red Sea, they could also block and attack European ships.
Right now, Europe’s goods are being delayed, their prices increased. This has affected the general population extremely badly who are now facing increased cost of living prices.
And if a civil war occurs, then there’s a bigger issue of refugees. There is no roadblock in place for refugees to travel into Europe, there could be millions of them at Europe’s doorstep, plunging them into a crisis and we have already seen what the Libyan and Syrian refugee crisis has done.
Turkey is holding the majority of them, but Egypt doesn’t have any country holding them back, it would signal a massive migration issue the likes of which has never been seen before.
Now if Egypt breaks down internally under economic pressure and the government is sent home packing, then a new government could come into power that could possibly be more anti-Europe. Hardliners could take up seats in power, where they could control the Suez Canal and use that to blackmail Europe.
But another scenario could be that extremists’ outfits could come into power in Egypt and they’d be able to export that extremism abroad without any blockers.
And let’s not forget that if Egypt goes down then so do the majority of the middle eastern countries within the region.
But why am I talking so much about the civil war?
Well, the situation in Egypt is tense. Unemployment is sky high; the general public is angry with how the government is run and they’re angry with Sisi. Add in a genocide happening next door and the government isn’t doing anything, will make a lot of people very angry at the government.
Sisi, is unpopular, because he hasn’t been able to improve the economy in the last 10 years and because of the economy and air of helplessness towards Gaza, there are creaks appearing in the system which tells the average international observer that the dam is about to break. We’ll be facing an Arab Spring 2.0.
This money and also UAE’s money is basically stalling for the future, it doesn’t fix the existing system, because a large portion of that money is going to go to the pockets of some very powerful people and maybe a small amount will be spent on the general public to patch up the large holes in the system. They’re delaying the inevitable for what’s about to come with money and they will keep throwing money and delaying it because they don’t have a way to fix the issue.
The current system in Egypt, the military dictatorship serves them as it is, but to continue serving them, on occasion, when it’s about to fall they need to send some money to stop it from falling immediately. However, the dam will burst eventually, and Gaza is going to make the damn burst in Egypt eventually.
Thanks for the full article. Yes, indeed, it still is important that Egypt continue to function as an important trade route.
Back in Biblical days, we remember that the trade routes went through what is now Israel and Egypt. The Luke narrative about Mary and Joseph has them fleeing Bethlehem to Egypt, to escape King Herod.
We also have the story of Joseph (the favorite of 12 sons of Jacob) in Egypt, saving his family in Canaan from famine.
https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-sites-places/biblical-archaeology-sites/joseph-in-egypt/
And the end of the world rapture party is to start in biblical Middle East too according to some religious prophecy I am told..perfect
All Muslin dictators need to be removed. Start with Sisi. We need a worldwide spring of dictator removal.
Some peoples do better with dictators.
How is the state of Vermont doing wrt individual freedom?
The US police force is a great social experiment, since the social engineers have succeeded creating a race of people who are completely desensitized from killing others, and will not even blink to shoot someone whenever they can.
David Grossman was a Lt. Colonel but he did not see a real combat. Nevertheless, he founded the study of killology, how to kill others without impunity and regrets.
His courses are a must for most US police departments. He had been invited by many police depts to deliver lecture, and while some depts did not provide the funding the police union did so for their own men.
Which basically means whatever coming after BAU, at least in USA, will be a police state, with the police chief assuming the position of warlords and killing anyone they don’t like at will, and will make Wyatt Earp, who was little better than the gunmen he fought against, really look like a real warrior for justice.
All of us are killers. But we are also primates. When there’s plenty to go around we have a powerful urge to make things a bit better even for the poorerst, or, say, prisoners.
The whole idea of everything for the rich no matter what doesnt work. We are group animals. Of course when there isnt enough to go around, our other attributes come into play.
How about all of the violent video games? Don’t the desensitize people from killing?
The fine sizzle of grease fat dripping onto hot stones as the impaled thighs of law enforcement personnel rotate on spits turned by highly traumatized legal secretaries…….
Judicial brain matter served finely sauteed on platters of attorneys shoulder blades……
Law clerks strip loins barbequed in Sheriffs fat and sprinkled with bile extracted from still living (though terrorized) judges……
Mmmmmmm……..finger licking good…….
Leaning sideways with superb balance on the small sturdy horse as the lopsided Hunnic bow stretches into a semicircle.
The whiz and whisper of the arrow as another dirt grubber is sent to Ceres,
Excellent. Consider writing a book.
I see Cro Magnon and his sons as future Hunnic barbarians on the Canadian steppe, and it would actually work. It would be possible to live like that.
Sounds like it will be a mix of the two below books.
https://www.waterstones.com/book/lords-of-the-bow/conn-iggulden/9780007353262
https://joeabercrombie.com/books/the-heroes/
Speaking of brain matter, the JFK assassination was revisited by Dr Jerome Corsi last night in SGT Report.
https://www.bitchute.com/video/9Uhw3IeWcOOu/
Brain matter spraying out the back and even splattering on the secret service officers (Clint Hill, Barbie Hargess) at @ 20:55
IMO, this hit was and will prove to be the sentinel event, along with 9-11, for the downfall of the US , which rapidly approaches us, and the creation of the FED has been the universal enabler.
IMO, this hit was and will prove to be the sentinel event, along with 9-11, for the downfall of the US , which rapidly approaches us, and the creation of the FED has been the universal enabler.
Politicians are of no importance. I know a lot of people are still very upset about the JFK thing but nobody except a nutter would assassinate one in America. It makes no difference. You remember Reagan was shot as well, right? Was that the CIA?
I wonder if you have ever heard of the assassins or the Janissaries. Not to mention Tamerlan or simply what the Poles did in Russia in the 1600s. Even the samurais would not think twice, or lose sleep, over beheading a commoner.
Foolish Fitz says:
>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
#1 USA
#2 People’s Rep of China
#3 Japan
#4 S Korea
Although people do not bother to look at the names of the programmers, Jerry Mao, Mingyang Deng, Xiao Mao, two of them not even bothering to anglicize their names.
So it is actually China Team #1, China Team #2, Japan and SK.
Countries do not exist.
In our minds they do and so influence our actions or reactions.
Reality ….or imagination..you be the judge..
Do we actually own anything?
The earth owns us. All we’ve done is temporarily rearrange some molecules.
Kulm, I wrote consistently. Look again and count up all the 1sts, 2nds, 3rds and 4ths(or just 1sts) for each. You’ll then see that one nation alone stands out and it’s none that you mention.
My point is programming has shifted to Asian countries, including the country you want to mention which showed its true Asian colors recently.
Also, autistic men sometime excel at programming. A handicap is really a benefit in this case.
Let me mention that the Russians have always been able to do more with less. Having been in contact with them for 30+ years, I observed it many times. With computing now hitting hard limits, due to chip size, loss of plants due to war, and energy restrictions, I expect that gap to increase.
Because clock speed is no longer going up appreciably, and also because die shrinkage is getting more difficult and costly, it is forcing some interesting new compute paradigms. It’s not all bad.
To be honest I myself am horrified at the lackadaisical attitude today’s programmers have about saving memory space, disk space, and their inability to make algorithms faster. That was everyone’s problem 40 years ago.
I know that my son who is doing programming is still working on making programs run faster.
memory sure is cheap. I have 1Tb on my phone and another Tb on my keyring.
Yeah it’s pretty disgusting all around. Pull in a library for this, a library for that, pile abstraction layers on top of abstraction layers, and you end up with the current situation. The tools make it easy and the business imperatives require it. Next-gen Windows will require an NPU (“neural processing unit” for AI) to run neural nets that basically will just be more black-box spyware.
PS – I recently heard it stated – and it makes sense – that code bases reflect the organizational structure. Put 100 developers on a project and you’ll end up with 100 pieces for what might be better constructed some other way.
The names of the programmers certainly look Asian, even if they reside in the US.
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https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/02/29/collapsing-energy-use-reveals-britains-economic-disaster/
An update on the electricity situation in UK.
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/04/11/energy-imports-poised-to-hit-record-after-power-stations-mothballed/
Once covid runs its course, which currently in progress (long covid). + low birth rates.
The country will stabilize and bounce back like Europe did after the black plague.
Don’t give up hope – there is a reason we’re speaking English right now.
Don’t give up hope
Hope wasn’t the last thing left in Pandora’s Box because the gods wanted to help us.
Pandora’s Box did not exist.
In breaking their fragile truce, Israel and Iran have opened a Pandora’s box
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/apr/20/in-breaking-their-fragile-truce-israel-and-iran-have-opened-a-pandoras-box
A nothing burger . The equation has changed .
https://indi.ca/the-impact-of-iran/
Ravi, do you take me for a fool? The general’s name is “Salami”. Nice try!
Hope exists but is a curse.
The first article says:
“While declining energy use is happening across the economy, a large part of the story is the ongoing demise of Britain’s manufacturing sector.”
Also, electricity is too expensive for homeowners.
The second article ends with
“It takes a special kind of idiot to justify our throwing away of energy security by claiming that at least it cuts emissions!”
Plus various comments indicating that the countries that the UK is buying electricity from will soon need it for themselves.
On various youtube commentrs sections concerning Teslas and green energy and so on, people think its great that electricity demand is declining.
There’s an absolutely side splitting slogan they have:
Stop Burning Stuff
https://stopburningstuff.org/
In all seriousness, these people need to be careful. When the blackouts start, being a public figure who advocated shutting down power stations might not be a very comfortable position to be in. Imagine if theres a medical emergency with someone’s child and the hospital can’t operate due to power cuts. This grinning imbecile could get himself lynched.
“This mathematical tweak transformed how economists would think about growth. To begin with, the Solow-Swan model now explained why more investment was an economic dead end: more roads, bridges, buildings, and factories might increase output, but in a world with diminishing returns, the additional contribution they made as you built more of them would shrivel over time. As The Economist magazine put it, “giving a worker a second computer does not double his output”28—and offering a third one would help even less. For that reason, more investment might give the economy a temporary boost, but it would never cause permanent growth in average incomes. Where Malthus focused on the diminishing returns of an increasing population, Solow and Swan now described the diminishing returns of a growing capital stock instead.”
Growth: A History and a Reckoning. Susskind, Daniel. Harvard University Press. (2024)
“Picture a factory where workers use machines to produce some output. As we have seen, if you increase the number of workers and do nothing else, you will hit diminishing returns: perhaps the machines get overcrowded or people get in one another’s way, and new workers will start to add less than those that came before. Similarly, if you increase the number of machines but do nothing else, you will also hit diminishing returns: maybe the equipment sits idle or the workspace becomes too cluttered, and those new machines begin to add less as well. Now imagine that instead of just employing more workers or installing more machines, you decide to build an identical factory next door, doubling the number of workers and machines at the same time. What would happen to output then?
If the first factory had already hired all the best workers and the second one has to make do with less skilled ones, you might hit diminishing returns again. But suppose there are enough talented workers that these sorts of worries don’t apply, and you succeed in exactly duplicating the original factory. In that case, you might sensibly expect the second one to produce exactly as much as the first. The best you would hope for, in other words, is constant returns: double all the inputs and you double the output. But that is not economic growth, properly understood—because although output has doubled, so too has the number of workers. The output per person, which is what matters, has remained the same. The apparent lesson is that you cannot simply use more and more resources and expect economic growth to follow.
Growth: A History and a Reckoning. Susskind, Daniel. Harvard University Press. (2024)
tantalizing stuff there, thanks IATM.
does he get the truth about surplus energy?
please let me know if he does or doesn’t.
if he grasps surplus energy, then that might reach a newer audience from this Harvard U Press book.
thanks.
I answered my own question farther up this page.
I laughed out loud at
“As The Economist magazine put it, “giving a worker a second computer does not double his output”28—and offering a third one would help even less. “
A few days ago I saw my neighbor cut down the biggest tree in his garden. When I asked him why he was doing this, he replied that he wanted to install photovoltaic panels on his roof and that the tree was providing shade. He admitted it was a pity, as the shade was nice in the summer for eating out and relaxing.
So he lost out on all the benefits the tree could bring him to produce electricity that will no doubt be used to power his air-conditioning. There’s a French expression for this that goes something like this: “lacher la proie pour l’ombre” (let the prey go for the shadow). This is like chasing mirages that only exist in your mind. I tried to joke that at least he could use the wood to make furniture, but he didn’t get it.
This man is well educated (he’s an engineer) and has acted with the best of intentions. But he is incapable of perceiving the magnitude of what he has lost. If we extrapolate this kind of behavior to an entire society, I think it becomes easier to understand how collective stupidity has led us into such a complicated situation.
The trees will grow back from the rubble and bones. it will be as if he and his house never existed.
I Hope so!
I think of the book “Green Illusions” by Ozzie Zehner.
Also Bright Green Lies by Derrick Jenson and others.
Having trees helps prevent our homes from overheating. Cutting them down is hardly helpful. Over the long run, we will get more benefit from trees than the solar panels.
I agree. But humans will never stop chasing mirages and cut down trees I am afraid.
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Occasionally I dream about a trivial but unique future event in my immediate future. I do not realise that I have had a precognitive dream until that event happens. Precognitive dreams are a noted phenomenon. But why do they happen? Past, present and future exist simultaneously, certain scientists tell us. But why does our sleeping mind sometimes fast forward to the future? This never happens in waking life. Does it mean we are “in the Matrix” ? Stuck on a kind of DVD where the whole story is known, and we are just waiting to work our way to the end of our story?
I found some intriguing videos today about the Kozyrev mirrors. True story, apparently, of Soviet scientists using concave mirrors to look into the past. Einsteinian physics meets the paranormal. Intriguingly entertaining, whether you believe the story is true or not. Makes me want to investigate scrying. Some esoteric activities have worked for me, others have not. I don’t know until I try.
Time Mirrors: Experiments at the North Pole
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WP1uNa45_Yk
Bending Time: The Successful Time Travel Experiments using Kozyrev Mirrors
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9hwXoCrEUs
Kozyrev Mirrors_Breakthrough into the Future – (English subtitles)
The future does not exist.
I’ve seen my own future more than once in my dreams.
Send me physical proof in a jam jar that the future does not exist, by the end of next week, and I’ll send you a 50 pound note.
show me the future. where is it?
I listened to part of one of your videos.
I discovered a major point is that Kozyrev based his theory at least partly on his photographic memory of the works of Hermann Minskowski, who argued that gravity is not a force, but rather a distortion of the 4-dimensional space-time continuum.
I have run across this view elsewhere recently. There seem to be things “out there” that we don’t understand.
> There seem to be things “out there” that we don’t understand.
True. Science often advances by huge paradigm shifts. And anyway, if time and gravity were that straightforward, I’m sure we’d be able to buy boxes of them at the supermarket and on Amazon. 😉
time is entrooy and entropy is time.
Strange!
If everything was the same temperature and nothing was moving any more, basically no events happening at all, there would be no time.
“gravity is not a force, but rather a distortion of the 4-dimensional space-time continuum”
That is correct as best I understand current physics.
see Gravitation and Inertia by Ignazio Ciufolini, John Archibald Wheeler
Einstein’s standard and battle-tested geometric theory of gravity–spacetime tells mass how to move and mass tells spacetime how to curve–is expounded in this book by Ignazio Ciufolini and John Wheeler. They give special attention to the theory’s observational checks and to two of its consequences: the predicted existence of gravitomagnetism and the origin of inertia (local inertial frames) in Einstein’s general relativity: inertia here arises from mass there.
If people thought he was serious I am sure Mr. Putin would have asked Mr. Kozyrev who would win the conflict in Ukraine.
“If people thought he was serious”
Which people? “Science advances one death at a time”, as you know. And people in general are not interested in science. Nor is Pewtin. He’s a politician. He knows who will win. Russia always wins. That’s why he has taken the war rather slowly as he grinds Uk ryne down. Not that I’m pro-Russian, because I’m not.
But there is certainly science of which we know little. Think of Nikola Tesla. And we’re not even sure to this day how some of the massive pyramids were built to such precision, or what the purpose was of some of their strange sonic qualities that have been noted.
In any case, science needs people who can think outside the box. So that excludes you and the old fellow.
” 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 safest and only currently known long term store of wealth is one’s children. Without biology there is no economics, physics perhaps but Ed would know better than I. If one does not observe a particle, is it there?
Dennis L.
Well now, depends on the offspring, heh?
Many cases of messed up children and even those that dispose of their parents for no apparent reason, especially in today’s disfunctional society.
Lots of cases where parents are ignored and not visited in assistant/nursing homes.
I suppose if one is fortunate enough to dwell in a Leave it to Beaver household with Wally in the 1950s it may ring true.
I should add caring for my 101aged parent that has been under hospice care for over a year now…so it surely worked out for her…been disabled unable to work since 1980! Remember her saying back then she wasn’t going to live long…..so you never know
Advanced countries do not seem to think so.
Only primitive countries, the countries which are not too likely to build the stuff you imagine of, do so.
There is no difference between primitive and advanced humans and there are no countries. There is just the earth and humans.
It seems like a person’s wealth comes in the form of their children is sort of an Old Testament view, as well. I think of Abraham’s dream of a multitude of offspring, and the emphasis on “Be fruitful and multiply.”
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Getting old ….
The severe storms that swept through the South April 10-11, 2024, illustrated some of the risks: In New Orleans, rain fell much faster as the city’s pumps could remove it. A water line broke during the storm near Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Other communities faced power outages and advisories to boil water for safety before using it.
We study infrastructure resilience and sustainability and see a crisis growing, particularly in the U.S. Southeast, where aging water supply systems and stormwater infrastructure are leaving more communities at risk as weather becomes more extreme.
To find the best solutions and build resilient infrastructure, communities need to recognize both the threats in a warming world and the obstacles to managing them.
https://phys.org/news/2024-04-south-aging-infrastructure-pounded-climate.amp
The fragility of aging water infrastructure is evident in many communities. The American Society of Civil Engineers’ U.S. Infrastructure Report Card in 2021 estimated that a water main breaks every two minutes somewhere in the U.S., losing 6 billion gallons of treated water a day. The engineers gave U.S. municipal water systems overall a grade of C-minus.
The American Society of Civil Engineers in 2021 estimated the difference between infrastructure investments of all types needed over the decade of the 2020s ($5.9 trillion) and infrastructure work planned and funded ($3.3 trillion) was $2.6 trillion. It expects the annual gap for just drinking water and wastewater investment to be $434 billion by 2029.
Not having fossil fuels to fix all of these things is the issue. Our building of all this infrastructure mostly took place the 1960s and 1970s. They have been neglected because we really don’t have materials to fix everything. If the US bought all of the materials, the cost would be very high.
Wind and solar investments will not fix our infrastructure. In fact, they need disproportionately more electricity transmission.
Thank you writing this fact…and yet we continue to expand suburbia and developments…even in cities like the one I live in can’t resist expansion…high rise, condos and apartments…
Never mind the resources needed to supply them and needed transport services…cash and grab…see ya suckers
It’s a Ponzi scheme. revenue from the expansion funds whatever repairs can be afforded on the previous suburban rings. It’s the main engine of America’s economy in my opinion.
Yeah, some guy with a YouTube channel explains this Ponzi Scheme..I posted it here before..very true too
The problem is much more complex. Before the Middle Ages people lived in longhouses under a 15m truss. This beam could not be carried, so the house was build where the tree for the truss was felled.
A roof holds 30 years or 10 years. To replace it without fossiles, there are little possibilities: birchbark and soil, larch or spruce shingles, straw. In most cases the construction of the roof cannot carry the additional load. By the way, the garden is too small to feed a family and the suburb cannot be easily defended. The windows are too large to be replaced. The bathroom has no lights and cannot be used. It is cheaper to build a shed close to the garden.
The end of BAU will lead to a COMPLETE change of human civilisation. The idea to maintain an electric chainsaw or modern machine is just a dream! The big question is, how fast all will crash. There is BAU, there will be an intermediate time, in which a lot of inheritage will still be usable and there will be a new world. Perhaps you can use your chainsaw a few years with a wood gasifyer. Perhaps that construction can help you survive. But your kids can hardly maintain it, you need to find a way how to make metals.
Get some books, so you can fizzle out how to make lenses or sauerkraut. Invest in some seeds and livestock. They cannot steal knowledge from you. If you believe BAU is gonna end, leave the cities.
And keep your DNA healthy.
And keep your DNA healthy.
Mine isnt. I’m very short sighted. Imagine what would happen to my children if I had any when it all starts.
Withnail,
If you read a great deal and were not in sunlight, that is most likely the cause of near slightness.
Copilot has reference to this issue.
In my early youth prior to say 17 had 20/15-20/10 vision in both eyes, went nearsighted until cataract surgery in my sixties, back to 20/15 20/20 although not as much at night. It was a blessing, Viet Nam, I wanted to be a fighter pilot, tough job and if you had to walk home natives were not friendly.
Mostly it is environmental I think.
Huberman had a session on this released 6/26/2023.
My current significant other is Filipina, she has perfect vision, grew up in the islands, plenty of sunlight.
Dennis L.
its genetic. nothing can really be done. i was always short sighted. thats probably why some of my preindustial ancestors were cobblers.
without my glasses i cant see much beyond a few feet but if i have something very close to me like literally 6 inches away i seem to really be able to zoon in to the details better than someone with normal sight.
i did read a great deal but my eyes were no good from the start. very healthy eyes otherwise the optician used to say. its DNA thats all.
in the modern world i can buy contact lenses i can keep in for a month that give me perfect vision. its amazing really isnt it what we have today. incredible.
Welsh slates last from about 100 to over 500 years. It seems to be the most durable material for roofing, especially if the roof has a reasonable slope so that the water drains off rapidly.
Recent UK forum: https://community.screwfix.com/threads/can-you-re-use-slate-roof-tiles.229501/
Before metal nails the slates were held on the roof with oak pegs/dowel rods.
We still have such buildings in regular use in the UK. As one American couple said: ‘Living history’.
Buildings with slate roofs have to be constructed bearing that extra weight in mind.
Yep, assembled an extensive library while living in Boston of those books and magazines on survival, homesteading ect
That were plentiful in used books shops there from the 70,80s
Like Firefox, Mother Earth News, Co-Evolutionary Quarterly,
Whole Earth, and many others to mention.
Moved away and they stayed there back to where they came..
Almost impossible to move with them…probably ended up in the dumpster if they didn’t not sell at the dollar section in the used book store.
you are quite correct
civilisation is an artificial construct–always has been.
every other animal is contained by its biological envelope.
only humankind attempted to move out of that,—it was and is unsustainable, because we will always try to take more that we are entitled to.
even an axe is ultimately unsustainable because we use it to cut down more trees than we need.
Agreed: “even an axe is ultimately unsustainable”
Starship Norm.
Prior to Columbus(yes, I know he wasn’t first, but he had a good thing going with a certain queen)the world was flat and limited. Some decided sailing west and ran into a continent.
We are sailing up, we have no idea what we shall encounter.
Dennis L.
dennis old boy starship can become a reality with unlimited cheap energy source the answer natural or gold or white hydrogen it is all there for the taking if only the elders start taking more notice of this natural resource unfortunateley they are obsessed with renewables solar and wind along with the EV maybe a massive economic collapse will be a good thing it may knock some sense into the elders to look more closely at natural hydrogen as the go to replacement for fossil fuels that way population can grow as much as it likes if we had infinite energy where there is a will there is a way.
The first — and so far only — natural hydrogen source in regular use is in the village of Bourakebougou, north of the Malian capital of Bamako. It was discovered after the cigarette of an engineer digging a water well set off a small explosion. The well was tapping a shallow underground reserve of almost pure hydrogen.
Since 2012, a company formed by former Malian presidential candidate Aliou Diallo has been capturing the hydrogen from the well at a rate of around 50,000 cubic feet per day. The gas fuels a small turbine that generates power for the village’s 1,500 inhabitants. The company has also worked with Canadian engineers to drill another 24 wells across the surrounding area, finding extensive hydrogen reserves in rock cavities near the surface.
see this is the answer to all our fossil fuel problems a cheap energy source so why arent the elders looking into this more enthusiastically i beieve the reason they are not is because they have become complacent and believe in their own vision for a future world that is why only a massive crash in the financial system could wake them up hopefully it is not too far away one can only hope.
How lucky is that, the inhabitants of Bourakebougou hit the jackpot there. Sadly they won’t be able to benefit from it for long.
Jan,
Always an optimist, but gardening is hard, there is a learning curve, canning is necessary, lids are a problem. We canned when I was young, generally had pretty bare shelves along about April. Everyone had gardens
Lifestock are also tough. My neighborhood had stalls for horses in the garages,, neighbor across the alley even had a loft for hay, believe he was a blacksmith. Don’t have a clue where the poop went.
Fuel is a problem, biodiesel is a mess and degrades, ethanol in the fuel seems to collect water and is hard on engines. Storing the stuff is hard. Recently put out $825 for some engine work on a Honda engine, water problem.
Starship, that is the ticket.
Dennis L.
If you’re going to use biodiesel there’s a process people use in their garages to remove the traces of water, I think it gets like 99.99% of it.
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