139 thoughts to “Open Thread Non Petroleum”

  1. Myths of Vaccine Manufacturing
    (OT)

    https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/myths-vaccine-manufacturing

    “Not all vaccine ideas work – we’re already seeing that with the current coronavirus, and if you’d like to talk to some folks about that, then I suggest you call up GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi and ask them what happened to their initial candidate, and while you’re at it, call up Merck and ask them what happened to their two. Note that I have just named three of the largest, most experienced drug companies on the planet, all of whom have come up short. “

  2. Tesla was founded 19 years ago & they just recalled 1/4 of their lifetime global car sales.

    Elon Musk predicts he will rocket people to Mars in less than 10 years
    https://thehill.com/changing-america/sustainability/infrastructure/587648-elon-musk-predicts-he-will-rocket-people-to

    A better headline would be ‘Musk tries to distract from gigantic Tesla recall by saying nonsense about Mars; The Hill plays along’

    Here’s Musk saying the exact same thing 10 years ago lol
    https://youtu.be/IiPJsI8pl8Q

    1. I’m a Tesla fanboy, and I’m saying so right up front…… although I have very little respect for Musk as a man or human being.

      You can’t expect people or companies to build cars to the same standards as commercial aircraft. Some problems are going to slip by even the best possible AFFORDABLE quality control and inspection system.

      I don’t personally remember reading about any accidents due to the hood flying up on Tesla cars. The nature of the recall business is that you call in all the cars that might have a defect, once it’s known to be a possible safety hazard.

      Perfection in mass produced goods sold at moderate prices is impossible.
      The largest auto recall occurred in early 1981, when the Ford Motor Company announced the recall of 21 million Ford, Lincoln, and Mercury vehicles from the 1970 through 1980 model years.Jul 24, 2021

      To date, Toyota is the automaker to have recalled the most vehicles in 2020, according to a report published by Finbold. Between January 1 and July 13, 2020, a total of 13,362,759 vehicle units were recalled to garages around the world for technical checks that mainly related to safety flaws.Jul 21, 2020

      https://www.hotcars.com/biggest-vehicle-recalls-in-history/

      1. Happy New Year OFM.

        “Led by Toyota, automobile companies have recalled approximately 13,362,759 vehicles globally in the first half of 2020 due to safety concerns.

        Toyota recalled about 3.95m, followed by Ford at 2.9m. Volvo recalled 2.8m while Fiat Chrysler recalled 1.74m. Honda took back 1.4m, according to a research carried out by Finbold.com”

        https://financialstreet.ng/toyota-leads-as-auto-firms-recall-over-13m-vehicles-globally/

        Toyota recalled 3.95 million in first half of 2020

        Toyota’s cumulative production reached over 200 million cars approx several years ago.

        https://www.attrelltoyota.com/tmc-worldwide-cumulative-vehicle-production-passes-200-million-mark/

        Tesla is the only car manufacturer to have in such a short period of time recalled 25% of its cumulative production.

  3. The Canadian Association of the Club of Rome (https://canadiancor.com/category/cacor-youtube/) has a pretty good series of talks, although some can go on a bit. One by Bill Rees (https://canadiancor.com/dr-william-rees-on-the-virtues-of-self-delusion-or-maybe-not/) is probably the best version of his overshoot talk and another (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wc84-udJUJg) well worth listening to concerns the huge difficulties coming if the world is to provide enough materials to build out renewables to meet 2˚C (or impossibility as the speaker says). It fits in well with recent the book Blip, the paper by Simon Michaux, work by Jean-Marc Jankovici or Harald Sverdrup, and Prof. Rees’s ecological footprint theories.

    Copper, lithium and cobalt may be having supply issues this year. A lot of copper mines will be depleting over this decade even as the demand will be increasing. Not all metal production can be recycled and by many studies we will be running out of exploitable resources for some towards the end of century. So even if we could build out enough renewables to replace fossil fuels we’d not have enough to replace them more than once or twice. There are theoretical possibilities for substitution but at the moment we’re going the opposite way, i.e. using more of the periodic table rather than less.

    As the ores become more diffuse more energy will be needed to extract new metals, which presumably have to be renewable (and built in increasing less attractive areas) so needing more mining and processing). There must also be issues of something similar to Liebig’s Law of Minimum, so the first key mineral that runs short limits all development (although declining energy availability, especially as EoRI falls, might be first and swamp all else). There’ll be competition for the declining resources and at the moment it looks like China will be winning.

    Given that we’re heading for 3˚C anyway the way we are going, which might well render cereal growing at scale impossible (i.e. the end of any kind of civilization), plus how ecologically damaging these mineral mines are, I think the only real solution there is would be for huge and rapid simplification. It won’t happen of course; it would take some extraordinary coincidence of outside events as no one, including me, would ever elect to implement the strategies required because of their immediate effects on themselves, friends and family.

    We are heading for a population of a few hundred million by the end of the century; possibly a broadly egalitarian, quasi-sustainable society could be achieved but if we continue on the present course most people will be, at best, indentured labour, and their numbers will be continuing to decline towards extinction. This year, and each thereafter, will be the best humanity will experience ever again, and still a very small proportion will wake up to what’s happening.

    1. Great links. Thanks a lot.
      Looking forward to your next article here.
      Have a safe 2022

      1. Maybe in a few months, I don’t have much inclination to argue the minutiae of the exact date of peak oil while the world is facing so many other issues (thanks for your links concerning many of these).

    2. Ain’t we wonderful apes? Our powers of discernment and analysis are so sophisticated, our visionary technologies so advanced, that we can see with unprecedented clarity the goddamned pickle we have gotten ourselves into.

      At least the fuckers during the Late Bronze Age collapse had the excuse that they could not have seen it coming, could not have done anything to prevent those Sea Peoples (“climate change refugees”) from burning their cities down. After all, it takes some doing to get those clay tablets of Akkadian out to their allies.

      Not us, though. Our incompetence travels at the speed of light.

      William Rees is the Jeremiah of our times. His talks are always bracing. Kudos to him.

      Moral: Human ingenuity is massive; human appetite, infinite.

    3. For a “back to the future” glimpse of the ride that awaits us, view this talk about climate change and the Bronze Age collapse (I recommend using earbuds as the speaker has a heavy French accent):

      Climate change and the end of the Bronze Age.

      Keep in mind, the horrors that transpired around the year 1200 BC were precipitated by local, natural climate variations. Just imagine the show that awaits us during the current global, selfish-ape-inflicted climate catastrophe!

    4. I’ve been hearing about running out of copper since i was a teenager in the 70’s, and yet the reserves now are more than double than back then, even though population has doubled.
      I’m not saying that we don’t have big trouble with some materials supply, but if you want to understand the source of constraint it is much more likely to be the processing capacity [separation/purification] than any other particular issue, including geologic resource. The rare earth metals and lithium are a great example of this pattern.

      Yet perhaps we will hit the wall on supply of some critical element of the energy production system down the road in 20-40 years. Then we will just have to live with what we’ve got. Similar story with petrol, gas, or coal- we are going to just have to live with what we’ve got. Sorry- no energy credit facility in this universe.

      In the current decade the electric energy system is much more likely to face big roadblocks in supply chain and industrial capacity in the areas of photovoltaics, turbines, motors, batteries, semiconductors and such. As petrol supplies begin to wane, there will be a huge scramble for things like electric vehicles, wind turbines, transmission facilities and energy storage, I suspect. The big risk is that demand will swamp supplies and manufacturing capacity. And the geopolitical tension and poor economic/industrial policy will exacerbate the shortfalls.

      On copper supply-
      https://copperalliance.org/sustainable-copper/about-copper/cu-demand-long-term-availability/

      1. Hicks , my prime candidate is aluminum at least in context of Europe . The reason is that aluminum is highly
        energy intensive and Europe has an electricity problem . Second is Magnesium that is used in aluminum smelters . No magnesium = no aluminum . Europe has zero smelting for Magnesium and it depends on China for its requirement . 87 % of the world’s magnesium smelting capacity is in China . The shelf life of Magnesium is short and stocks must be replenished continuously . China stopped the exports in November because of their electricity shortages . No idea how well Europe is stocked on this .
        Recycling is not enough to fill the gap . Further recycled aluminum can only be used for limited applications . There are applications where only ‘ pure’ ingots will do example high pressure die castings .
        For other metals ore quality is getting poorer by the day . When does EROEI become negative is the unknown and we may continue producing even though that would be eating the ” seed corn ” leaving nothing for the next harvest . Mike B makes an interesting observation regarding the bronze age .

      2. Given that the chart: 1) says nothing about where the copper is; 2) says nothing about the quality of the “reserves”; 3) says nothing about the accessibility of the “reserves”; 4) says nothing about what it would cost to “produce” those “reserves”; 5) says nothing about the potential rate at which the copper could be produced; doesn’t that make the chart meaningless?

        Also, on the statement: “I’ve been hearing about running out of copper since i was a teenager in the 70’s” etc.

        I’ve been hearing that I am going to die since I was a teenager in the 70s, and here I am, in my sixties, fit as a fiddle!

        1. Mike. copper is still cheap. when it gets expensive we will know supplies are constrained.

          1. Hickory,

            Oil is still cheap. Yet we are still concerned about future supply, are we not?

            1. Right, commodity prices tend to to be volatile, but the are mostly determined by the cost of acquiring the product. Prices are not determined by how many years the supply will last.

              Futures markets should deal with this in theory, but in practice they are driven more by psychology than by facts.

            2. Niko- sure enough.
              It is appropriate to be concerned about the supply of everything that we consume.
              My point is that we are not about to hit the geologic constraints of any of these metals in the near term, although the worry keeps repeatedly being raised as though its a reason to halt efforts to become less reliant on fossil fuels, or to drop our pants and take a crap right on our shoes.

              I’d reserve that response for some other issues first.
              Copper would be far down the list of constraints to worry about, as best i understand it.
              When I first heard that we were running out it was to be all gone by late 1990’s.
              The reserves are bigger now than then.
              Keep in mind that reserves indicate that portion of discovered resource that is both technically viable and financially feasible (at todays prices) to produce currently if needed.

              I worry a lot more about how we are going to voluntarily hit the brakes and go into reverse mode on population and industrial culture.

            3. What is a “geological constraint”?

              It seems to me geology always constrains. Geology doesn’t create infinitely growing sources of copper for us.

              This ain’t Cyprus during the Bronze Age anymore.

            4. Let me try to be a little more clear on this-
              First, like all of you i am no expert on these things, so take the point of view with a measure of skepticism-

              From what i have read, the big public copper producing companies [bhp, fcx, scco, teck]
              can produce much higher levels of copper than they currently do, but are not in rush at current global demand and price levels. They could swamp demand if they did intend to, but that would be economically foolish. They are in the industry for the longrun, and have secured mining rights/ownership to very large reserves.

              Other metals and other issues (energy) are currently of more concern.

            5. @Alimbiquated
              (I think it was you who made a comment on futures – could be wrong – it’s sometimes impossible to respond to a particular post if it is not the original one)

              Futures markets tend to not particularly accurate when it comes to predicting the future. That’s largely because for every long there is a short – the net is always zero. A lot of futures activity is to hedge some other position that one have may on the books and often don’t express a view on future prices.
              Rgds
              WP

      3. Hickory wrote:

        if you want to understand the source of constraint it is much more likely to be the processing capacity [separation/purification] than any other particular issue, including geologic resource. The rare earth metals and lithium are a great example of this pattern.

        Not so rare earth metals then. Something like that you have a lot of gold in the sea.
        Compare that with tier 3 oil/gas wells, or worse

        1. I don’t understand your comment Hans.
          There is a lot of rare earth deposits scattered around, but the process of collecting the deposits, and separating out the metals from the rough ore into the various elements is rather limited and difficult to ramp up quickly. It is the industrial process that is the limitation.
          Read about the experience of Lynas from Australia to get an idea. It has taken them a long time.
          It is certainly a constraint, especially if China decides to keep there production off the market.

          1. Agree. I own shares in Lynas and have actively been following rare earths since about 2010

            The trick in rare earths is the separation, not finding them. They are not rare but separating them is a hard and then you (almost always) have low level radioactive waste (often thorium and/or uranium) to deal with.
            Lynas has decades and decades of experience of dealing with them which separates them for so many of other companies that may have located deposits but have never actually extracted them.
            Lynas has a long-term off-take contract with a Japanese consortium which gives them financial stability but on the other hand reduces their ability to maximize income (my assumption is that the contract is relatively fixed in price).
            I have no clue who is going to be the 800lb gorilla in EVs but it is clear that as the world is moving from FFs to electric the demand is likely to increase substantially.
            Rgds
            WP

            1. WeekendPeak-
              I have wondered for a long time why Lynas chose to locate the separation facility in Malaysia rather than Australia.
              Do you know?

            3. Thanks Weekendpeak.
              I did a little searching on this.
              Quite the issue.
              It appears that we are like an elephant in crystal shop, or more accurately, we are
              8 billion manipulative apes living within a very thin habitable layer in the vastness of space. And we trash it with every move.

              “Dr Looi Hoong Wah, a fellow of the Malaysian Academy of Medicine and a specialist in radiology and radiotherapy, as saying that tin tailings were nearly 50 times more radioactive than waste from Lynas Malaysia’s rare earths processing plant in Pahang… the radioactivity from monazite in tin tailings was 284 becquerels per gramme, whereas the waste from Lynas gave out six becquerels per gramme, about the same level of radioactivity from phosphorus fertilisers used in agriculture.”

              Reviewing the situation, it is my feeling that the ore processing by Lynas should have been done all in Australia. If Australia thought it was too dangerous for them, it should have been done nowhere.
              But my opinion was not sought.

      4. Near term “running out of copper” is a pretty blatant reductionist straw man fallacy and not discussed in the presentation. The issues with copper as discussed are: 1) the supply/demand balance is marginal this year; 2) several significant mines are going to be shutting down over the next decade; 3) only just over half copper used is recycled; 4) it can take up to 20 years to get new mines planned and built; 5) to meet renewables targets would add (from memory) almost 50% to annual demand; 6) ores are getting more diffuse and require bigger mines and more energy to produce a given quantity; 7) human resources are limited; 8) new mines are ecologically damaging; and 9) China is ahead of the game in securing new ore resources – i.e. it’s the size of the tap (or shovel might be more appropriate), now and in the near future, not the overall size of the tank (or pile) that’s the problem.

        1. To the many other aspects of your posting George,
          I assume that we won’t be able to build out solar, wind, nuclear, geothermal, energy storage and transmission
          fast enough to effectively replace fossil fuel on a global level (some places will).
          And therefore we will see population forcing (decline due to indirect effects of energy shortage).

          And I assume that the world will fail to come up with successful measures to limit global warming to 2C, short of running out of affordable fossil fuel more quickly than anticipated or some big geoengineering experiment (good luck).

          And thus for many reasons I am general agreement with gist of the ideas your presented.

    5. “the only real solution there is would be for huge and rapid simplification”

      Indeed. So far, it looks like just about all the movement toward simplification will be involuntary.
      The pressure towards simplification will come in the form of gradual and sustained price escalation for things like food (fertilizer, wheat, meat, cotton), energy (electricity, petrol, coal), and materials of all sorts…if we are lucky.
      How much pressure would it take for the population to actually decline in the setting of much higher prices for everything? -Longer than we’ve got for a smooth path of contraction. Much longer.

      More likely we will see harsher pressure in the form episodes of outright shortage of certain critical items of current life.
      In the past this has opened the door to civil society breakdown with things like government overthrow , mass migrations, and wars.
      Some areas, and some cultures, are somewhat more amenable to surviving in a more simple way, than most of the rest.

      1. Or we could just stop wasting so much. Higher prices might help.

      2. If the climate doesn’t go totally haywire, and there’s no hot WWIII, we will see populations start declining sooner than expected, in my opinion, in places such as the USA and Western Europe, and possibly sooner than expected in many other places as well.

        Birth control is dirt cheap, and in spite of generally tough living conditions in the poorer parts of the world, more people are getting at least some schooling. Furthermore the idiot box, powered up by a solar panel and tuned to a satellite tv station will be found in just about every third world village, excepting a few places such as North Korea, within another decade or so.

        There’s nothing like a tv show with a woman in it with two or more dresses, and two pairs of shoes, and a job of some sort, to convince women that one or two kids are enough, and three or four are bad news.

        Tough times mean low birth rates where birth control devices are easily obtained. Tough times are baked in now.

        My personal belief, assuming that we avoid outright global war, and that the climate doesn’t go totally nuts, is that places such as the USA, Canada, and Western Europe can pull thru more or less whole by doing what’s NECESSARY.. going electric, eating down the food chain, giving up throw away merchandise of all sorts, quitting unnecessary travel, diverting materials and man power away from such things as more highways and travel infrastructure, renovating and building new housing and commercial properties to be much more energy efficient, etc.

        Hundreds of millions of people are very likely to die in place, or while attempting to emigrate to other countries that don’t want and can’t afford to accommodate them by the millions.

        They will run up against armed coastal navy vessels that will turn them back, and up against fences built to turn them back…….. and the fences WILL BE BUILT. They will also be patrolled by soldiers who will not hesitate to shoot as many people as necessary to prevent them from crossing the fences.

        Now I know how harsh and hard core this sounds…… but it’s really pretty much of a middle of the road scenario…. far more optimistic than out right doomer scenarios, far less optimistic than some scenarios cherished by well meaning and idealistic people who just don’t understand the scope of the overshoot crisis.

        In places such as rural India and China, depending on how the cards fall, a major regional crop failure here and there will wipe out enough of the local population to take enough pressure off the food supply to allow the survivors to make it another few years, or even another generation….. depending on how long it is until the NEXT crop failure.

        Nobody can say just how fast the climate will deteriorate, but my guess is that it won’t just go nuts all at once and stay nuts. It seems more likely that there will be an increasing percentage of bad years over a few decades, rather than a fast abrupt change, as I see it…….. but I’m just a layman who does a lot of reading.

    6. I am not sure that we are heading to 3°C. Indeed, this temperature rise corresponds to the scenario RPC 4.5. The scenario RPC 4.5 supposes that the emissions starts declining in 2045 and that the emissions in 2100 are half of what they are in 2050. That’s completely impossible. In the reality, Chinese have at most 25-35 years of economically available coal reserves. In the process, we can suppose that the coal extraction cost and the coal produced electricity will increase year after year and will make financially prohibitive the use of coal for electricity production. I am sure that you are aware that by 2050, most of the oil reserves will have been depleted and the remaining oil reserves will be so expansive to extract that they will be left in the ground. Apparently, the most plausible emisssion/climatic pathway is the RCP 3.4 which gives 2-2,4° temperature rise in 2100. That would already bring disorders in human societies at a planetary scale. I think that in coming years the impending threat of sea level rise coming from the glacial debacle in Amundsen Sea Embayment will provide motivation and incentive to find and implement low energy ways to extract carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

    7. Indonesia suspended its coal exportation to supply domestic market. The march toward the RPC 4.5 doesn’t begin well.

    1. Weather is variable. Wind power production in Q4 was a record high, but that is not a surprise are more capacity has come on line.

      http://www.mygridgb.co.uk/last-12-months/

      Some models of climate change do predict that global wind speeds will reduce. At least in the UK, wind is still and will always be our cheapest and most abundant renewable electricity option. We need to make hay whilst the sun shines, and power society whilst the wind blows.

      1. Or you can build thorium reactors and have enough fuel until the sun swallows the earth… Add fusion, the parts are ready now to make them working.
        Or everything together, use the wind to create some energy intensive goods cheap when it blows like fertilizer, steel and cement and use nuclear for a base load around the clock.
        Wind will have an impact when overused – shadowning other mills and slowing down weather patterns with not yet modelled consequences.

        The creating of the big russian river lakes on the Wolga had already noticable weather effects – with the less drag than the previous woods weather patterns changed. So plastering whole Europe with wind mills will have an effect. Good or bad, nobody knows.

        Even big scale solar will have an effect – changing albedo since the cells reflect less than desert sand for example. Everyting has a consequence.

        Nuclear energy is a widely existing energy source – much of the earths warmth (vulcanoes, continental drift ) comes from thorium decay. There is a lot of this stuff in the earth.

        1. Eulenspiegel-
          Lets say there was general agreement to replace 1/2 of the current oil/gas/coal with nuclear fission
          (not fusion) energy production.
          In a real world scenario, how long do you think it would take to get the job done?

          Currently fossil fuels comprise about 82% of energy use, and will peak later in this decade.
          Nuclear power provides 4% global primary energy production (from 445 operating nuclear plants).
          Roughly- it would take about 4500 more 1000MW nuclear plants to be built, to replace half of the current fossil fuel use.

          I assert that a 1/2 full scale nuclear replacement scenario effort will take far too long to get much of the job done, even if attempted at greatest effort.
          That doesn’t necessarily mean that some countries who are flawlessly competent, very very wealthy, risk takers, and have agreeable populations shouldn’t make the effort.
          If they decide too.

          Afterall, just how much worse and permanent damage could the effort result in….?

          1. You have to do it on a new way. Conventional reactor design was from the atomic age, building huge machines on site. This is production stone age. So it takes 10 years to build one in the current days (not in China, but still).

            The chinese approach to the thorium reactor is right – build medium sized modules in a factory, use economy of scale there and transport them to the site only for final installation.

            Then you can build a few factories, and roll them out.

            This is the same method a wind turbine doesn’t cost 50 million $ and 2 years to build. It would cost 50 million $ if you would weld the tower, the gondola and the blades on site. That’s how you build an atomic power plant at the moment.

            Or think a big plane – they are factory build, too. How expensive would they be in single production?

            Medium sized modules have additional advantage. You still can build huge power plants simply by installing several of them – and can do a rolling maintainance there. Less complete plant down maintainance.

            And when one gets a real big problem – it’s more easy to emergency cool one 150 MW block than an 1.2 GW giant block. Passive emergency cooling systems will get much more easy to build.

            Or you can install them in medium sized cities in the cold countries and heat the city with the warm cooling water.

            The Bill Gates initiative:
            https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/08/bill-gates-terrapower-is-building-next-generation-nuclear-power.html
            China:
            https://www.europeanscientist.com/en/features/china-shows-us-the-path-to-the-nuclear-future/

            If you want clean stopgap energy fast, consider existing coal power plants with a new build CO2 storage. There is plenty of coal, more than Nat gas or oil. The coal peak is only by demand, not geology.

            Wind and solar are good – but storage technology is at the same level as thorium reactors. There are small test installations. So building up both will be a good thing.

        2. We can’t build thorium reactors since they don’t exist outside of youtube videos.

    1. Why’s it important? There’s hardly any insolation so the albedo doesn’t matter. It”s just weather. The Arctic is warming so fast that huge changes can be seen each year. More important is that their is now little permanent land fast ice and hardly any multiyear ice left and how that affects summer ice melt.

      1. To add to your answer 1) The current ice surface is packed with the other previous years, at the bottom of interdecile range of 1981-2010 average : http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/1999/12/asina_N_iqr_timeseries-.png 2) The multiyear ice surface in september has been reduced to almost anything : http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/2021/10/Figure-4e.png 3) Beyond surface, the volume is especially to be taken into account and this volume is decreasing with a trend of -320 km3/year for september : http://psc.apl.uw.edu/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/schweiger/ice_volume/BPIOMASIceVolumeAprSepCurrent.png 4) The current volume of ice pack is 4 million km3 under the average 1979-2019 : http://psc.apl.uw.edu/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/schweiger/ice_volume/BPIOMAS_CY_IceVolumeAnomaly.V2.1.png So, there is nothing to be reassured

    2. Alex, I think your Twitter source thinks the sun shines out of his ass.

    1. Tesla released its Q4 2021 results and confirmed that it produced “more than 305,000 electric vehicles and delivered over 308,000 electric vehicles during the quarter.”

      These results were about 40,000 electric cars over Wall Street expectations, which is a massive expectation beat – even for Tesla.

      https://electrek.co/2022/01/03/tesla-tsla-market-cap-surges-100-billion-ev-production-lead-undeniable/

      Fracking raises NG production to new heights. Transforming electrical production from coal to NG. Old news

      SurvivalistBullies gotta SurvivalBully

        1. Don’t Let The Perfect Be The Enemy Of The Good

          In a democracy or governing everyone is never going to be satisfied. You can’t expect to get everything you want. There are millions of others that want something different than yourself. Suck it up, your a big boy. You come across like a spoiled cry baby.

          Calling a group “ShitLib’s” is not constructive criticism. Go back and check it out. You will find my personal attacks follow those who attack others. Your just one of the worst and most frequent. Your so clueless that you think I’m trying to protect Musk. I don’t give a shit about him. I’m just tired of your attacks on others. You need some of your own medicine. If you can’t take it, don’t dish it out.

          1. What a snowflake lol

            “We cannot solve a crisis without treating it as a crisis. […] And if solutions within the system are so impossible to find, then maybe we should change the system itself” ~ Greta

            Your mediocre BAU bullshit won’t amount to a hill of beans. Enjoy the famine.

            1. Your personal never ending stream of cynic’s bullshit is contributing nothing at all to the conversation her.
              Doing nothing, which bottom line is what you seem to be advocating, won’t help at all.

              Some portions of our modern industrial civilization and culture are worth preserving.

              When I wanted apples, I planted little trees ten years ahead.

              From little acorns… come mighty oaks.

            2. OFM, I sympathize, but “doing nothing” doesn’t need “advocating”: it is the default mode. It is inevitable.

              I, too, plant apple trees. I have one acre of heritage varieties. This will change nothing. I do it because I like it (and because it makes me a little money).

              Yet I still think we are doomed. This is much, much bigger than any one of us. All the railing against those of us who say so will. change. nothing.

            3. Not at all certain how you have concluded what it is that I’m advocating for. Perhaps my explanation of the human predicament is seen by you as a justification for accepting it; to clarify, I’m not justifying anything, I’m explaining it.

              I’m a prepper- that is to say I also have a self planted orchard; in preparation for the famine; the one that EVs will have no influence whatsoever in averting. I haul my own water and chop my own wood (deadfall and dead standing that I harvest from my woodlot). I’m quite certain I have the lowest fossil fuel footprint of the bunch. I’d advocate for more of that, as well as frugal minimalism, but let’s not pretend anyone here is interested in that, or indeed able.

              “The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.” ~ George Bernard Shaw

            4. Everytime I come back to this site, you are spouting your Musk hatred and ignorance. It is a shame you don’t listen to the multiple people here who recognize you for what you are. Spoiled crybaby is too kind of a criticism. For all of our sanity, please shut up.

            5. “What a snowflake lol”

              Are you able to recognize that you are obsessed with the cult of personalities, from Greta to Elon? It comes across as not just pathologically obsessed, but entirely juvenile.
              More respect might be garnered by sticking with subject matter and skipping the black and white demonization of people or groups.

            6. “Are you able to recognize that you are obsessed with the cult of personalities” ~ Biden Bro

              Someone’s been reading my dossier lol

              The Washington Generals are half the show of a Harlem Globetrotters game; now you understand why lots of people see many Corporate Democrats as willingly complicit in the problems that the GOP creates.

              I liked the good old days on here, this highly esteemed blog, when criticizing musk’s bullshit predictions would earn me the title “Russian fossil fuel troll”. Oh how the times have changed!

              How to Test Conformity With Your Own Psychology Experiment
              https://www.verywellmind.com/conformity-experiment-2795661

              Tendency to Conform: A New Measure and its Relationship to Psychological Reactance
              https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.2466/pr0.96.3.591-594?journalCode=prxa

              I’m thinking of becoming a coward during the upcoming fascist rule – reinforce the narrative, betray my friends, suck up to authority, just absolutely shred any bit of morality – could be fun sarc :/ What’s your plan?

              Profanity Bombs
              https://youtu.be/BSfTXaqo18o

              PS- I don’t come here for approval. I get that elsewhere. Although I do suspect Doug Leighton finds me interesting lol

    2. All the name calling around here is extremely destructive.
      Demonetization, scapegoating, bullying.
      ‘Verbal bulling includes name calling, insults, teasing, intimidation, homophobic or racist remarks, or verbal abuse. While verbal bullying can start off harmless, it can escalate to levels which start affecting…”

      Lets recall that hate crimes, ethnic cleansing, genocide and justification of war have all used hateful name calling as tools for demonizing an adversary. It acustomizes people to see things in terms of black and white, with us or against us.
      I admit to having been guilty of this practice myself, but I work hard to extinguish the juvenile habit. It takes persistent effort of mindfulness.
      Every time I recognize namecalling used in a derogatory sense I see the person as discrediting themselves, and undermining their message.

      Probably this can all be said with much more grace and directness.

  8. Here Nick accuses Jason Bradford of pushing fossil fuel talking points.
    http://peakoilbarrel.com/usa-oil-production/#comment-686913

    Here Nick accuses Nate Hagens of pushing fossil fuel talking points.
    https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-october-2020-production-data/#comment-711028

    He seems to make this accusation because they differ in opinion from him in terms of future economic scenarios.

    Does anybody else here think Nate and Jason are pushing fossil fuel talking points?
    Does anybody here take Nick as an ethical broker of intellectual honesty?

    1. No, I think none of that (tho I’m nothing myself). My sense is that Nick is generally an ethical person who needs to believe the conspiracy that the FF industry is behind all our current failures and thus deserves the blame. The alternative is to blame ourselves, all of us. It is a general failure of the human species, though I suspect a natural and inevitable one.

      I continue to see lessons to be learned from the Late Bronze Age collapse. Those folks, too, were limited in their ability to control their appetites, but they could not have done otherwise.

      Let’s not forget what both Carl Sagan and King Hubbert told us, almost simultaneously, back in the mid-80s: Now is the time.

      Carl Sagan, after min 2:30 If you don’t worry about it now it’s too late later on.

      King Hubbert, after min 31:00 We know how to do it now.

      Now was 37 years ago.

      1. MIKE B

        Yes, and seems the world’s climate targets are getting further out of reach. Electricity from coal plants actually rose by 9% in 2021. Perhaps peak will arrive this year, which is good news — sort of. Please note, for those who would claim otherwise, the fact I am making this comment DOES NOT mean I am pro coal.

        THE WORLD GENERATED MORE POWER FROM COAL IN 2021 THAN EVER BEFORE

        According to the intergovernmental organization’s Coal 2021 report: “Coal is the single largest source of global carbon emissions, and this year’s [2021] historically high level of coal power generation is a worrying sign of how far off track the world is in its efforts to put emissions into decline towards net zero.”

        Of course Asia dominates the global coal market, with China and India accounting for two-thirds of overall demand. These two economies — dependent on coal and with a combined population of almost three billion people — hold the key to future coal demand. The pledges to reach net zero emissions made by many countries, including China and India, should have strong implications for coal, but these are not yet visible, reflecting the major gap between ambitions and action.”

        https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/dec/17/global-demand-coal-high-electricity-plants-covid-economic-recovery

        1. I must bashfully admit that we burn anthracite in our antique cook range here in Maine. It is a lovely fuel, which we cook, heat, and make all our hot water with. We supplement this with firewood, and have kerosene heaters as backups. What else are we going to do in our old farmhouse, install an oil burner, like everyone else around here?

          Yes, I needlessly agonize over this stuff…

          1. L.O.L.

            I suppose I should feel guilty as well — wood stove! I rationalize because there are millions of acres of dead trees here, all caused by various bugs and diseases. Dead trees are perfect targets for wildfires which seem to make my small stove seem insignificant.

          2. I burned coal in my stove in Mammoth in the very early 70’s.
            Didn’t see my yard until June—

  9. The last few days the wind in Germany was blowing strong.

    So the electricity price was down from 50-60 cents before chrismas to -2.75 cents and renewable was 75% of all electricity produced during the calm holidays.

    Wind is calming, so the price is climbing to 18 cents again for tomorrow… there is still no storage besides the old pumped hydro from the atomic age in the 80s. So renewable still needs a 100% backup from conventional.

    Gas caverns filled at 53% – it stays exciting. Under 20% the withdrawl will get slower with the low pressure. So still hoping for a warm windy winter.

    1. “So renewable still needs a 100% backup from conventional. ”

      It makes sense to keep all the nat gas and coal generating facilities in operating order for the intermediate future.
      And any production from other sources will offset the fossil fuel consumption, gradually more and more over time.
      Thats how I’d handle it.
      To retire baseload generating facilities or nat gas peaker plants prematurely would be naive.

      1. Our government IS naive.
        Coal is sheduled to be shut down 2030, not taken to reserve. Gas to 45. And still not even a plan of a backup storage – in a country where building an medium sized air port takes 15 years.

      2. Hickory’s dead on as usual.

        We’re going to need to maintain a huge percentage of our existing fossil fuel generating capacity for a long time to come.

        Fortunately maintaining it in working order will cost a hell of a lot less than we’re collectively going to save on the purchase of coal and gas by staying pedal to the metal on wind and solar power.

        Doing away with too much fossil fuel capacity would be a political mistake of the worst possible sort.
        Sooner or later an extreme weather event could and WOULD lead to a black out, if we retire too much FF capacity.

        The political backlash would be horrible……. people would be screaming for new coal fired power plants.

        1. OFM–
          That is why German utilities have been asking for “capacity subsidies” from the government. Keeping an unused plant online costs money.

          1. “Keeping an unused plant online costs money”

            I suspect it will be very very expensive to simultaneously run a country on fossil fuels as these fuels deplete and the combustion facilities age,
            while at the same time attempting to seamlessly build out a whole additional replacement system based on other sources of electricity.

            Nations and their peoples will need to realize this and adjust for it.
            The only other path is one of more rapid and severe energy shortage.

    2. Every kilowatt hour you generate with wind and sun is one less kilowatt hours worth of electricity you don’t generate using Russian gas.

      I can’t imagine living in a country so dependent on imported gas from a traditional enemy. I wouldn’t be able to sleep well at all.

      History isn’t over.

      The Japanese and the Australians are in the early stages of an arms race ….. because they feel threatened by China…… I would feel the same.

  10. Another nightmare, as if we needed one!

    DEFORESTATION IN BRAZIL’S AMAZON HAS SOARED TO ITS HIGHEST LEVEL IN 15 YEARS

    “Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest surged in 2021, reaching a 15-year high as it emerged that the forest has begun emitting more carbon than it can absorb. Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE) estimated last month that 13,235 square kilometers (5,110 square miles) of the forest was cleared between August 2020 and July 2021 — the greatest area lost to deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon since 2006.”

    https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/30/why-deforestation-in-brazils-amazon-has-soared-to-its-highest-level-in-15-years.html

    2. Brian,

      Good news indeed, but some of it could make the overpopulation problem worse.

  12. One final note.

    AGRICULTURAL AND INDUSTRIAL SOURCES AS THE MAIN CAUSE TO THE SOARING ATMOSPHERIC METHANE

    The authors found that the methane sources most likely driving the increase are from human activities, including agriculture, landfills and waste management, and from the use of coal, oil and gas. These activities are responsible for more than 80 percent of the rise of atmospheric methane since 2007. The analysis suggests that wetland emissions have not contributed significantly to increases in atmospheric methane, despite continued warming and climate extremes.

    Since 2007, atmospheric methane concentrations have increased at rapid rates, with 2020 having the largest observed methane increase since systematic measurements began.

    https://phys.org/news/2022-01-agricultural-industrial-sources-main-soaring.html

  17. The poll results are in-
    97% of people under 59 yrs old (6.7 B) indicate a yes vote with-
    ‘strong preference for all-out attempt to apply innovation and adaptation efforts to the interrelated problems of fossil fuel depletion, climate change, overpopulation, environmental degradation’,

    while only 3% indicate
    ‘a preference for immediate action to enact restriction/contraction of global economic activity and human population’.

    Apparently people are still people, and want to push further along just as those for all the earlier generations have.
    And so, despite the prospects, collectively they will.

  18. 2024 Chevrolet Silverado EV Revealed with 664 HP, 400-Mile Range

    Chevy faces off against the F-150 Lightning with its new electric truck. The high-end RST model will offer 664 horsepower and a 10,000-pound towing capacity.

    The 2024 Chevrolet Silverado EV is an all-electric pickup slated to go on sale in 2023

    Prices will range from around $40,000 for the base WT trim to $107,000 for the fully loaded RST model

    The Silverado EV shares no parts with the regular Silverado, and Chevy swears any resemblance to the Avalanche is coincidental

    The 2024 Chevrolet Silverado EV may be late to the electric-pickup party, but from our early look it appears to have been worth the wait. Rivian, Ford, GMC, and Tesla have set lofty expectations for range, power, and towing. To match them, the Silverado EV offers up to 400 miles of range, up to 664 horsepower, and up to 10,000 pounds’ worth of tow rating.

    https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a38594208/2024-chevrolet-silverado-ev-revealed/

    1. Imagine the vehicle landscape in 2025.
      Its a whole new deal.
      Last year i made the statement that 90% of new car sales would have a plug by 2030, on the oil thread-
      got an incredulous reaction. I think its likely.

      Here is an example of a small car that is getting a battery pack with roughly 200 mile range.
      that will be plenty for the vast majority of people
      https://www.vauxhall.co.uk/cars/new-mokka/Electric.html

      1. Chrysler unveils Airflow Concept EV at CES 2022; first BEV by 2025, all-electric lineup by 2028
        06 January 2022
        Chrysler revealed the Chrysler Airflow Concept electric vehicle at CES 2022. Chrysler also announced that the brand’s transformation will include the launch of its first battery-electric vehicle (BEV) by 2025 and a future all-electric Chrysler vehicle lineup.

        https://www.greencarcongress.com/2022/01/20220106-airflow.html

    1. What drivel. Whatever effects of climate change are experienced will be mitigated by technical and scientific innovations, not the words of clueless politicians and consultants.

      1. Berman is a trained geologist. One of his sources, Bill Rees, is a professor of Ecology.

  21. You don’t give up the fight because the odds are against a complete victory. Whatever is accomplished over the next few years in the way of building up the renewable energy industries will be the base, the foundation that the next couple of generations build on.

  24. “My low-skilled workers: my cooks, my dishwashers, my messengers, my shoeshine people, those who work at Dunkin’ Donuts—they don’t have the academic skills to sit in the corner office.” ~ NYC MAYOR ERIC ADAMS, Democrat.

    I was a dishwasher and a cook once, in high school before I enlisted.

    Shitlibs gotta shitlib

    1. Modern Democrats are trying their damnedest to ensure that in 2024 either Joe or Kammala gets fewer white working class voters than any other Democrat in the last 100 years. Latte liberals are now so deeply entrenched into the Democratic party apparatus that they have managed to ditch people who work the trades and other union jobs for socially liberal soccer moms and woke suburban imbeciles. That makes for a vastly different Democratic Party than the one of just 20, 30 years ago, no? I strongly argue that this exchange has made the Democratic Party elitist and far less responsive to the so-called “low-skilled workers” who actually do the hard work of our society. The new mayor of New York basically proved this so with his grossly misinformed comment.

      1. This is what they call “concern trolling”. Pretending to be helpful to people you hate.

  25. “Shitlibs gotta shitlib”

    Adios Survivalist. Your talk has become pollution to me.
    Life is too short to surround yourself with such negativity.
    It can be infectious.
    Best luck to you.

    I am thankful for the ignore button.

    1. When Mailer punched out Gore Vidal at a party, Vidal, while still prone on the floor, quipped, “Norman, once again words have failed you.”

      Shitlib ~ Portmanteau comprising the words “shit” and “lib.” Used in LEFTIST political discourse as a perjorative, mocking the spinelessness, stupidly, hypocrisy, and willful ignorance of American Democrats.

      Typical Biden Bro. Maybe I should have picked on the Qtards instead?

      Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.

      2. Survivalist, I am getting tired of your “shitlib” shit. Democrats are the smart ones. A vast majority of Republicans think Trump actually won the last election. That just shows how fucking dumb they are. And most of them are too fucking stupid they think there are microchips in the covid shot. Republicans are dying at about 5 times the rate of Democrats because they are too goddamn stupid to get the covid shot.

        It is unbelievable that Republicans wanted to overthrow the duly elected president of the USA. Trump, who told so many lies than any other gangster in the history of the world, said: “I won by a lot!” And over half of Republicans are actually so fucking dumb that they believed him.

        That so many Repubs believe a chronic liar is astounding. Aren’t you ashamed of them? Ashamed of how fucking dumb they are? That’s a rhetorical question, please don’t answer because I know you are not ashamed. You must be proud of them because you probably believe Trump never lies. And that says something very profound about you.

        1. “You must be proud of them because you probably believe Trump never lies.” ~ Ron

          Ron seems to equate criticism of Democrats with being only a Republican position. Seems a superficial & flawed analysis, Ron. I’m to the left of the Democrats, which I’ve made explicit here several times. If I was to their Right, or a Trumpster, I’d call them LibTards, not ShitLibs.

          “Democrats are the smart ones”

          Democrats’ Betrayals Are Jeopardizing American Democracy
          https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/democrats-fdr-new-deal-financial-crisis-1248615/

          The president’s top media buying firm is helping Big Pharma fight Democrats’ drug pricing plan.
          https://www.dailyposter.com/the-biden-consultants-working-to-sink-his-agenda/

          Good luck with the “smart ones”, Ron. Perhaps they unfurl moral exhortations that you find more palatable; a more tasteful veneer. It seems to me, however, that nothing will fundamentally change, because America is a political sewer pipe.

          Actually, it seems more like a bunch of petulant children; with a lot of money; arguing over shit that won’t amount to a hill of beans; while they watch us all die.

          The Democratic chairman of the House Select Committee on Economic Disparity & Fairness in Growth is a former Goldman Sachs exec who represents Greenwich, Connecticut. He was elected while Goldman was destroying the economy & being bailed out. There is no option on the ballot to vote against the interests of Goldman Sachs. We’re living in a political cartoon.

          It’s quite telling that in all the elite media debates about politics, “actually just helping people” is never considered a good strategy for winning elections.

          But hey I get it; a lot of folks here are toilet trained in the Dims vs Repugs paradigm; a stage set for fools to argue upon how they should best be destroyed.

          FWIW- I vote Green.

          If not voting for Biden is a vote for Trump;
          then not voting for Trump is a vote for Biden.
          I guess I voted for both of them!
          Flawless lol.

          Cue the histrionics.

    1. It’s getting difficult to say that there hasn’t been a major change in the Arctic with a step change in the rate of increase in the rate of increase of the three main greenhouse gasses in the last three years as shown in the readings at the Barrow observatory in Utqiavgik, Alaska. Accelerating permafrost melt seems the most likely culprit.

        1. Thanks George,

          For anyone who doesn’t know, as a greenhouse gas, N₂O has roughly 300 times the warming potential of CO₂ and stays in the atmosphere for an average 116 years (or, a 116 year half life).

          1. These charts are pretty strong evidence that there has been no reprieve in the accumulation of greenhouse gases related to the pandemic slowdown.
            I suppose the uptick trend in levels would have been even higher if the pandemic had not occurred.

        2. Hello everyone,

          The uptick in greenhouse gas emissions seems to also line up with the very recent changes in earth’s albedo. James Hansen speculates that this could be due to a reduction in sulfate aerosol emissions from ocean freight shipping and other industrial sources. I’ve posted these links before, but I think it bears repeating, and would be interested in hearing if anyone has additional thoughts on this. I do not believe that this is actively being considered by the IPCC, but please correct me if I am wrong.

          https://news.agu.org/press-release/earth-is-dimming-due-to-climate-change/

          https://insideclimatenews.org/news/15092021/global-warming-james-hansen-aerosols/

          https://twitter.com/SunnySimons/status/1456615526952755200

          1. CHILYB,

            It is more than speculation that James Hansen does. It tends to a proof.

          2. My belief is it’s just routine decadal variability and we’re now swinging the pendulum back to lower aerosols (ie a bigger “greenhouse”). Evidence for this has been apparent lately with California getting excessive moisture, high water levels in the Great Lakes, and all the severe weather in December.

      3. “Almost every country on Earth could experience extremely hot years every other year by 2030…The researchers found that over 90% of countries studied are expected to experience extremely hot annual temperatures [defined as a once-in-one-hundred-year hot year in the pre-industrial era] every two years.”

  27. OFM, (and other sane people who may want to offer a perspective)
    I am increasingly concerned that there will be severe civil unrest after the 2024 election.
    Putting it gently.

    Currently about 75% of republicans now believe that Trump was the winner of the 2020 election
    -The Big Lie-
    and they will feel justified at supporting the behind the scenes plans now underway to take the 2024 election regardless of the actual voting outcome.
    Trust in our democracy, and the process, is minimal, and the general populace is so easily misled.
    And people in this country have no idea what authoritarianism, private militias with free reign and ill-intent, jailing/sentencing without due process, internet surveillance and restriction, and economic gerrymandering can look like.

    They didn’t live through Germany in the 30’s, N.Korea for the last 50 years, Chile under Pinochet, the Spanish Civil War, etc
    I fear we may be on the path to learning these things the very hardest way.
    And there are some very well-armed, fundamentalist, and misguided group who believe they would benefit from stimulating such chaos.

    Is this just a misplaced worry, or do you read this scenario with similar concern?

    1. Hickory, I share the same fears.

      We Are Living Through a Democratic Emergency – recent article in The Atlantic

      https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2022/01/jan-6-anniversary-american-democracy/621155/

      >> …the story has basically three main strands. One is that January 6 was the culmination, but really only one small part of a long and systematic campaign to overturn the election—that it had a specific role in that, which was to buy time, and that it came fairly close to succeeding in that sense.

      The second strand is that January 6 is probably the debut of a mass political movement that, for the first time in a hundred years in this country, is prepared to use violence as a tool, that there are tens of millions of Americans right now who are passionate, conspiratorial-minded, and believe that the use of violence is justified to restore Donald Trump to the White House.

      And the third is that there is an ongoing conspiracy, really an ongoing operation, in which Republican operatives are looking through all the places which were obstacles to Donald Trump’s attempt to overthrow the last election and are going through and uprooting those obstacles. So it is paving the way for another coup attempt in 2024.
      <<
      Scary.

    2. Well, then, if that’s the case, we’re dead here. One of us has a chronic illness and both of us are strictly non-violent. We’re also atheist and homosexual. We hate republicans and are utterly indifferent to democrats. Contemporary American politics consists of A–holes versus Pu–ies.

      It’s too bad, really, if we get wiped out. I was counting on being able to see the results of having stupidly ignored 40 years of warnings about climate change, resource depletion and overpopulation. I have a near anthropological interest in such things. Human beings are magnificent. People suck.

      At 62, after decades of being a modest and unobtrusive citizen farmer, volunteer EMT and writing teacher, I just don’t give a flying fuck anymore.

      1. Don’t Let The Perfect Be The Enemy Of The Good

        The Democrats are the party that fight for equal rights for women, people of color, homosexuals and also climate change. I just don’t find it believable you “don’t give a flying fuck anymore”. I have my own frustrations with the Democrat party looking and acting weak. But, one thing is for sure. I prefer Pussies over Assholes.

        The fight for equality is not going to be won in our lifetime. Many have given their life fighting for personal freedom you enjoy.

        “If you quit ONCE it becomes a habit. Never quit!!!”
        ― Michael Jordan

      2. Mike B “I just don’t give a flying fuck anymore”
        I hear you
        and often find myself harboring the same attitude, as a form of exhaustion or self-protection I think.
        At other times I return to a baseline where i really do care how things go.
        I’m not quite ready to just quietly hand over the keys to my house to the Nazis, and walk voluntarily up the ramp onto the boxcar.
        I hope to hear more of your thinking on these things.

        If partisan conflict reaches the tipping point, my state which is dominated by democratic voters could nonetheless undergo an extremely destructive form of fragmentation, violence and dysfunction. It would open the door for authoritarianism (from the right or left), or simply a prolonged state of chaos that would severely diminish the life of everyone.
        And a tipping point is never easy to predict.

        HB- I absolutely agree.

        1. “I’m not quite ready to just quietly hand over the keys to my house to the Nazis, and walk voluntarily up the ramp onto the boxcar.”

          For god’s sake, don’t be silly. They will shoot me in the back.

      3. Hi Mike,

        I saw an interesting article in the New York Times this morning. Of course, I know next to nothing about the U.S. “system” but for the sake of our planet I hope this piece is highly exaggerated (or better, wrong). In any case, you might find it provocative. The title is:

        BIDEN ‘OVER-PROMISED AND UNDER-DELIVERED’ ON CLIMATE. NOW, TROUBLE LOOMS IN 2022.

        No idea if this is behind a paywall or not. The basic idea can be summarised: “As the new year opens, President Biden faces an increasingly narrow path to fulfill his ambitious goal of slashing the greenhouse gases generated by the United States that are helping to warm the planet to dangerous levels. His Build Back Better Act, which contains $555 billion in proposed climate action, is in limbo on Capitol Hill. The Supreme Court is set to hear a pivotal case in February that could significantly restrict his authority to regulate the carbon dioxide that spews from power plants and is driving climate change. And the midterm elections loom in November, threatening his party’s control of Congress. Since Republicans have shown little appetite for climate action, a Republican takeover of one or both chambers could freeze movement for years………..”

        https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/04/climate/biden-climate-change.html

        1. The Build Back Better Act is being blocked by a millionaire Democrat Senator Joe Manchin. Whose family owns coal mines. If the Dem’s want progress on climate change. They need to unite and vote out Dino’s and Republicans. Dem’s need to educate and stop bashing themselves. Realize this is a marathon and vote every election not quitting. Otherwise your part of the problem.

          I never fail to vote. So that Mike B has the right to freedom to love and live with who he wants too.

          1. So I can only love who I want because you vote?

            Get a fucking grip on yourself.

            1. “So I can only love who I want because you vote?” I never said that.

              Mike, the world doesn’t revolve “only” around you. I lost my oldest brother to AID’s 30 years ago. I distinctly remember having a conversation with him explaining to me that no one would choose a gay life style. But, it’s just who he was. My parents accepted him and his boyfriend for who they were.

              I believe everyone should be entitled to the freedom to be who they are in peace. If this country falls to Republican fascism. I wish you the best of luck. You will need it.

            2. “I never fail to vote. So that Mike B has the right to freedom to love and live with who he wants too.” ~ HB

              HB seems to perhaps be a narcissist; with binary opposition disorder; fighting against an imaginary enemy; that has an imaginary argument; that HB has himself constructed & assigned to it.

              Alex Jones does the same thing.

              Not exactly an ethical broker of intellectual honesty.

    3. Hi Hickory,
      I’m worried too…… perhaps not to the extent I should be though.

      I live in the heart of a backwoods culture, in one of the darkest corners, so perhaps I have a better sense of just how dangerous the hard core right wing trump cult actually is.

      And for what it’s worth….. my opinion is that the vast majority of people who talk that talk aren’t about to walk that walk. They’re venting, shooting off their mouth, in ninety nine percent of all the individuals I’ve run across so far.
      I don’t know exactly how to express this point, but suppose you were to run into me at a local country store, and ask me if I believe in Heaven and Hell, etc, you can bet that I’ll say the safe thing, yes, in order to maintain my in group status in the community, rather than be shunned as an outsider.

      The loudmouths I see every day are happy and glad, gleeful, to say outrageous things when somebody asks them. They WANT to create controversy, they WANT to own libs, they’re full of fight…… so long as the fight is hypothetical and someplace down the road, in some other community. They revel in feeling powerful and in control, by imagining they’re going to march on Washington, and run the dimrat’s outta town on a rail.

      I can’t say that I know a single local person with brains enough to understand what it means to actually pick up one of his ( many ) guns and actually threaten somebody with it, or use it, who will ever do so, except to defend himself and his own.

      But unfortunately I know a substantial number of idiots who are subject to being lead around by their noses by anybody who tells them what they want to hear.

      I’ll put it this way.

      Among my neighbors and kin, if one of us actually starts something in the way of a riot, the rest of us will kick his ass, and kick it well, and his wife and mother will approve. We don’t PLAY GAMES with guns, no siree. We aren’t going to rush off to start a civil war, the way young men have historically hurried to enlist so as to win honor fame and glory, not to mention the girl.

      But …….. but…… but…… there are enough idiots out there, idiots who can be brought together by people such as trump……… who WILL bring them together…… to create some really serious problems. If the cards fall this way……. the end result will depend on whether the local and state law enforcement community take’s its stand….. for law and order, or otherwise.

      They may burn some urban real estate…. but nearly everybody ” back home”, when they see their WHITE neighbors STARTING the trouble, will shun them after that.

      For every idiot I know of, or suspect, I’m of the opinion that there are fifty right leaning citizens who will decide they’re STAYING HOME, keeping their gun handy, to keep an eye on THEIR OWN business, farm, or neighborhood.

      It scares me to think that in some cities in this country, the cops are already more or less a mafia, one that protects itself and looks after itself before it looks after the public.

      We’ll just have to wait and see. I’m figuratively praying that the current crisis will pass without much in the way of organized large scale violence.

      Bottom line, most of the time I’m optimistic that peace will prevail…….. but sometimes I’m scared it won’t.

      1. IS THE US HEADED TOWARD CIVIL WAR?

        https://politicalviolenceataglance.org/2022/01/06/is-the-us-headed-toward-civil-war/

        Around my way, in the PNW, a lot of the Qtards and Trumpsters look & sound very willing to throw down; that is to say, walk the walk. Shirt Movements are always concerning.

        My guess is that if any of them should ever find themselves on a two way gun range then they’d fold pretty quick, although they would doubtfully capitulate without getting into a bit of a fight. Most are cosplaying ‘Operator Chic’ and can’t run a mile or navigate a patrol route. They don’t have the minerals, and their OpSec really sucks; they publish their ORBAT on Facie. They’re laughable. Many also lack basic muzzle etiquette, and would no doubt negligently shoot themselves and/or each other when things get a bit dodgy or in a flap.

        They would however do quite well at scaring a lot of citizens, which is obscene & completely unacceptable.

  28. The FAO Food Price Index reaches a 10-year high in 2021, despite a small December decline.

    1. Thanks for this. I think chances are the uptrend will continue well into 2022. Mostly possibly due to supply chain issues.

    2. It would be interesting to see the longterm FAO index plotted against price of oil.

    3. here is an older 2018 attempt at charting both Food Price Index and price of Oil.
      I nominate ‘someone’ to do a new version

        2. Thank you very much Dennis.
          The correlation looks very strong, as we should expect.
          The oil price is more volatile. If the oil price scale was compressed to bring volatility in line with the degree of FPI volatility, the close relationship would be even readily visible.

          Some other big factors we should expect to affect the overall global food prices situation, aside from energy input cost, include
          -fluctuation in harvests due to climate instability (esp drought)
          -growing food demand in excess of growth in production capacity
          -change in ‘quality’ of food demand (especially populations eating more meat)
          -general inflation in other inputs like phosphate mineral, farm machinery
          -lower harvests due to society chaos (such as seen in the past decade in places like Yemen, Afghanistan, Syria)

        3. “Yield volatility is gonna go through the roof”

          Climate Change and Global Food Security: Prof David Battisti

          https://youtu.be/YToMoNPwTFc?t=45m36s

          “On the weather depends the harvest; on the harvest depends everything” ~ apocryphal

          Cue the famine.

  29. 832,311

    800,000 is starting to get in the rear view mirror here in the USA.

  31. Europe is likely to be ground zero for escalating energy shortage/price escalation this decade, despite a decade or two of successful efforts to lower consumption through efficiency measures.
    Oil, gas and coal cost will be more expensive for a variety of reasons all pointing in the same direction- up.
    And supplies may not be reliable.

    There will great impetus to build other forms of generating capacity at a much more rapid pace than the past decade. This despite concerns for the inherent industrialization this will entail- mining and metal production, concrete, transmission, storage mechanisms.

    Of course the price/kwhr will be the primary consideration when weighing the options, such as offshore wind vs nuclear power plants.
    But perhaps underappreciated will be the analysis of time/kwhr- Just how quickly can new production capacity be brought online, from the first day of project planning to the day when production is commissioned.
    I expect a considerable degree of urgency to arise.

    Of course this also applies to other countries that are heavily dependent on imported energy and have high demand with industrial economies- such as Korea, Japan, China

  32. Crazy idea: Maybe Dems should pass bills to economically help lots of voters before the midterms, just spitballing here.

    The current global political and economic leadership appears to be a bunch of petulant children; with a lot of money; arguing over shit that won’t amount to a hill of beans; while they watch us all die. But hey, I’m a cynic. Maybe you find their leadership inspirational.

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