78 thoughts to “Open Thread Non-Petroleum, June 26, 2021”

  1. Its just weather, but it is the kind of weather event that is happening more often now with climate change starting to be noticed by more and more of the worlds citizens. And this is just the first chapter of the story-

    The Pacific Northwest is smashing the heat records this weekend, starting today (Sat) with most of the populated valleys from Eugene up through Seattle pushing through all time heat records easily today. Portland 108. Not just records for the date, but records for any date. Seattle was 102 today which is 30 degrees hotter than average for the date.

    And the big show is still to come- Sunday and Monday are lined up to be much hotter.
    One of the senior Univ meteorologists at the Univ of WA said today- “Go inland a bit more (just outside Seattle), temperatures will be above 110F. I have provided a zoomed-in view for better viewing below. I never expected to see such temperatures in my lifetime.”
    Coming from him, that statement is a big deal. He has seen it all and is hard to impress.

    For reference, this area is not desert or prairie we are talking about. This is wet lush fern,salmon and beaver country with trees that easily get 200 feet if you leave them alone for awhile.

    It is striking to behold.

    I see that Dougs area is getting the same treatment- Kamloops BC Monday 117, Tues 120 degrees!
    Environment Canada is forecasting six days of 40-plus temperatures in Kamloops, which has never seen 40 C in June on record
    From CBC- “A heat wave stretching across Western Canada, from British Columbia into southern Saskatchewan and up through Yukon and the Northwest Territories, is set to break daily and all-time temperature records”

    More about this heat dome event later.

    1. As I remember Kamloops is desert, or at least high semi-arid. Away from the rivers and below the tree line the heat can just pound off the ground. North Kamloops especially is not very wealthy with plenty of apartment blocks and not much A/C. It could get very uncomfortable for some there. Best wishes to Doug – I think he’s a bit out of town, maybe a bit higher and amongst the trees or by the rivers.

      1. I wouldn’t worry about Doug, he lives in luxury, but I feel for all the people in the region who don’t have AC or anywhere to go that’s not oppressively hot during the night, this week is going to be very tough for them.

        1. A meteorologist was commenting that the Pac NW heat wave is essentially the equivalent of the Santa Ana winds that occur in So Cal. The description is of a downsloping adiabatic compression which ends up superheating the air as it comes off the Cascade range, all based on the thermodynamics of the ideal gas law.

          The issue of attribution of extreme events to climate change is still a tricky one. No one even holds a claim to understanding the biggest extreme generator of all — that of El Nino and La Nina events. It’s a hoot discussing the physics behind all this with other credentialled climate scientists — after awhile you come to realize that they don’t know much more than you do. It’s very similar to what I see on this site when talking about oil depletion scenarios with oil patch professionals. Overall its healthy to have insight from outside the discipline as that is one way that science advances.

          1. I suppose statistically the concurrent setting of multiple heat records, record sea rise, record wildfires, record everything else during the time of record CO2 in the atmosphere could be a coincidence. Or not.

            1. Statistical correlation doesn’t equal causation.

              You need a lot of rigorous scientific datum from different avenues to show causation between the increase in GHG and a severe weather event.

            2. This region of the Pacific NW of N. America [roughly the coastal zone of Oregon, Washington and British Columbia] has been often projected to be relatively less vulnerable to climate change as it sits immediately downwind of the cool ocean and it is heavily forested and gets very large snowfalls.
              Well right now there is 1000 mile ‘heat dome’ settling upon us, and all-time records are not just being broken, but they are being thrashed.
              I am seeing multiple stations with 116 F right now within 15 miles of here , and this area has a long term average of only 3 days over 90 F/year.

              Its the kind of event that does define the range of forest species, and the whole web of life that lives among the forests and meadows. Even though we don’t have deserts on this side of the cascade mountains, this is a form of desertification.

              Only about 20% of the homes around here have air conditioning. This event will push that closer to 100% over the next few years as orders get filled.

            3. “Quillayute,WA right on the coast is currently at 109F, a whopping 10F degrees above its all time highest temperature of 99F set on 9 August 1981. It’s the 2nd hugest difference between an old and a new all time high (for long POR stations) anywhere in the world since 1983”

    2. I’m living it as the ‘dome’ is actually right over Vancouver Island judging by the graphics and our wind. I live on a river about 4 km from Johnstone Strait. Usually, in weather like this, we have 35-40 kt westerly winds. Well, we had that all last week while the high was building then the wind stopped yesterday. Today it is supposed to hit 41C. We don’t get 41 deg here. Ever. Until now. The lack of our westerly, which is normal HP rotation for a blocking high (what we usually call this) indicates it is right over us. We have 2-3 more days of this as it slowly heads east. Luckily, we had tons of rain and everything is still green. Yesterday there was still pretty good recovery with a heavy dew.

      Town folk have water restrictions. We are lucky to have unlimited water with a table at 10′, year round and in all conditions. There is still a good snowpack. I have a drilled well to 70′, but like I said the water will be at 10′ in the casing. Watering the gardens as I write. This morning I will pull two gable ends off the greenhouses as the tomatoes looked pretty sad yesterday. Anyway, fans going (I put in two big overheads when I renovated). The fans are actually supposed to be used with our wood heat in the winter as we always have good winds in hot weather. The forecast for the strait is supposed to be 10-15 kts, and we should get an onshore with day time heating up the valley, but we didn’t get any yesterday.

      It is so hot outside I did not see one kayak coming down the river. people are just staying inside. My sister in law tried to pull some prawn traps and just came in as it was too hot out on the water. This was down below Courtenay. I think my son has an old portable air conditioner in his carport which I will score in about 10 minutes if his tenant hasn’t already done so. If not, we’ll sleep outside tonight by the river. I have an old westfalia. We were going to visit relatives for a few days but canceled due to heat as we have to keep an eye on the chickens and crops.

      1. Just scored the a/c. It works and will fit nicely in a window opening and I have lots of plywood to box in the top. We’ll just flash it up later on and cool the bedroom for sleeping as the house windows were open all night and the curtains will get closed when the sun peeks over the mountains. Better sleep tonight than what we had yesterday.

        I see the tenants were sleeping outside in a screen tent. I guess I woke them up.

        The mistake we made yesterday was working all morning and quitting when it just got too hot. We kept expecting the wind to arrive. We weeded, stained some projects, puttered in the garden. Sweated. We’ll shut it down by 11:00 today. I used to work construction in weather like this….in my twenties. At 65 I don’t even want to go outside. In town they have water trucks for people sleeping rough….well, vans that go around and pass out cold water. Plus, there are cooling centers. As our electricity is all hydro and we have surplus in BC, the cooling isn’t adding to the problem.

        I have no idea how people exist in hot climates. No idea at all.

        regards

        1. Paulo; “I have no idea how people exist in hot climates. No idea at all.”
          Yeah, and it ain’t a dry heat neither, eh? I grew up in Atlanta and we didn’t have A/C until I was a teen. We and our homes were acclimated pretty much, at least until they paved everything. But that was never like what you guys have been going through.
          Those small window A/Cs can be lifesavers. A couple of years ago I went into a Walmart in the next town over, late August I think, and they had a mountain of little 5000 BTU LG window units on clearance for $43 per. I bought 4. I have 3 still in the box. Not sure why …..
          They are reasonably efficient, can keep a descent sized room livable/survivable, and won’t put a big hurt on the grid; only pull a few hundred watts. I’m running them off grid on hot summer days. Probably should be on every prepper’s must have list, the way things are going.

        2. An interesting and slightly racist remark on that topic — Europeans dominated and colonized the world for 500 years, but only ended up being a significant part of the population in areas near the poles — Canada, Southern South Africa, Chile and Argentina, South America, Australia (especially the south), New Zealand, Northern US.

          My theory is they just can’t hack it in hot weather. Why did Europeans import slaves from Africa to America? Because European slaves just died if you made them do field work in hot climates.

          It’s also noticeable that the American “Sun Belt” got lots of white settlers after the invention of AC and should be called the “AC Belt”.

  2. Back to that new Russian oil field…… six billion tons, roughly forty two billion barrels, roughly twelve days supply per billion barrels, on a global basis……….

    This cannot end well, except for us old peak oil guys getting the last bitter laugh.

    1. Agree, OFM.

      Boy, did our gas prices take a jump this week, all the way to $1.629 per liter regular. With the current exchange rate that is just over $5 (us) per us gallon. One thing with Covid is how little we drive these days, at least in our family. While life is returning to normal, we pretty much just stay put.

      Covid info:
      Our vaccination rate on Vancouver Island should hit 80% for first dose, by tomorrow…….30% fully vaccinated. We were a month delayed due to Pfizer not shipping us vaccine. By July 21, the projected day the US Canada border might reopen, we (Vancouver Island) should be at 75% fully vaccinated, 90% + first dose. The ointment fly is that most Canadians want the border to remain closed for the rest of the summer. And having/not having a vaccine passport is non-negotiable. There is also a looming Federal election and the politicians are listening to constituents about this. Current projections show that 90% of BCers are planning to be vaccinated with the high 80% for Canada as a whole, maybe 90%. During this past year BC managed to have full contact tracing, and with declining cases there is full genome sequencing of every case to track the variants. Schools were open all year. Anyway, it looks like masks might be optional by July 1, with the removal of other restrictions. I can’t wait.

      1. Vaccination passport- I hope Canada is strict about it.
        The Universities systems in Calif and Washington are going to be.

          1. More interesting stuff from Juan Chamie below. It is extremely frustrating that support for early treatment has become a right wing vs left wing issue. Why can’t liberals and progressives see that Big Pharma has corrupted the science around medicines by fostering a system where, only drugs that have the backing of Big Pharma can get have the expensive, large, gold standard, “high quality”, double blind, randomized controlled trials required to get approval?

            3. @Mikeb The web page you linked to starts off:

              With the arrival of safe and effective vaccines to prevent COVID-19, bringing what looks like a pathway to a post-pandemic world, I wasn’t sure if it was still worth looking at unproven COVID-19 treatments.

              Now that would be funny if it weren’t so tragic. I am yet to see a single report of an individual death caused by ivermectin since the beginning of this pandemic (less than 20 deaths over 40 years with close to 4 billion doses administered) while the death toll directly attributed to vaccines is what? Four thousand plus and counting. Which approach is safer?

              I am disappointed by the lack of curiosity about what is going on in the countries Trump described as $#!t#0L3 countries. The prediction was that there would be mass casualties but, that has not really materialized. As the wealthy countries hogged their prized vaccines, those who could not get their hands on sufficient supplies turned to what they could get their hands on. The WHO has desperately tried to keep a lid on alternatives but India blew that lid and the India story continues to unravel. We will see WHO is full of shite!

              I clearly won’t change the minds of anyone who is happy to be firmly in the grips of the “for profit” health care/treatment system. For those who don’t want to question things I say suit yourselves! Below is a graph of New covid cases vs vaccinations in Lebanon. Their peak in new cases was on January 15. To give a better idea of the time period that vaccines covered , I shrunk the vaccine graph to try match the time scale of the new cases graph and put it as an inset in the new cases graph. On June 30 only 13.1% of the population of Lebanon had receied at least one dose with slightly less than half (6.1%) being fully vaccinated. Guess what is going on in Lebanon apart from vaccination?

            4. Well said, IB. There are a number of prophylactic strategies that are effective and inexpensive, avoiding big pharma.

              Chris Martenson is stumped, btw, as to why cases in India have dropped rapidly. At the end of the clip:

              https://youtu.be/8VudnjD3Jks

          2. “Vaccines are lame! ”
            Now a spokesman for Q Anon?

            You have no science training I am guessing.

            1. “You have no science training I am guessing”

              Does electrical engineering count as science?

              “Now a spokesman for Q Anon?”

              Hell No! I would be considered a communist, Bernie Sanders supporter if I was in the US. My political leanings are more in line with left leaning western European politics. I believe that education and health care are best provide by the state. For profit education tends to lead to wider inequity while state funded education tends to “level the playing field”. For profit health care is just plain evil IMO. It incentivizes treatment (repeat business) over cures and allows unscrupulous players to profit from poor health of others. Just look at the US health care system with the highest costs in the world and the worst outcomes in the developed world.

              The physicians that came together to form the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (flccc.net) have impeccable credentials as can be seen from their cvs at https://covid19criticalcare.com/about/the-flccc-physicians/. One of them, Joseph Varon has been the center of a fair amount of media attention and has given over 1600 interviews with the press since the beginning of the pandemic. See:

              Pursuing Truth in COVID Drug Treatment Amid a Censored Media Landscape (does not play properly on phones)

              Now that my politics are out of the way, is anybody willing to offer an explanation for the 99.5% decline in new case counts between April 24 and July 1 in the state of Uttar Pradesh in India? As of July 1 only 20.2% of the population had received at least one dose of a vaccine with 4.3% fully vaccinated. With a population of over 240 million, Uttar Pradesh recorded just 10 deaths on July 1.

              Active Covid Cases Decline Further in Uttar Pradesh as Recovery Rate Touches 99%

              How Uttar Pradesh is managing to flatten the Covid curve is could be attributed to the T3 testing mechanism — Trace, Test and Treat.

              In a bid to break the Covid chain, chief minister Yogi Adityanath emphasised on intensifying contact tracing to enable early detection and treatment of patients.

              Treatment of patients? That’s an interesting concept! What treatment are they offering? Here’s one possible answer:
              Uttar Pradesh smashed Delta with Ivermectin, says Australian MP Craig Kelly

              LUCKNOW: Australian MP Craig Kelly On Wednesday tweeted that Uttar Pradesh, with a population of 230 million, “smashed the scary Delta variant” with Ivermectin
              While the UK, with a population of 67 million, “rejected Ivermectin and worshipped the vaccine” but against UP’s positive cases of 182 on Tuesday

            2. In the US past 6 months- over 99.6% of Covid deaths have been among the unvaccinated.
              Simple.

              I am not into medical conspiracy theories. There is massive competition for truth and fact checking in the science fields.

            3. Is no one even a little bit curious about what’s happening outside of the developed world? Only 11% or so of the global population lives in the G7 countries.

              WHO: ‘Dangerous period’ with delta variant

              At a press briefing on Friday, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the delta variant, first found in India, is continuing to evolve and mutate, and it is becoming the predominant COVID-19 virus in many countries.

              “I have already urged leaders across the world to ensure that by this time next year, 70% of all people in every country are vaccinated,” he said, adding that would effectively end the acute phase of the pandemic.

              He noted three billion doses of vaccine have already been distributed and, “it’s within the collective power of a few countries to step up and ensure that vaccines are shared.”

              Of the vaccine doses given globally, fewer than 2% have been in poorer countries.

              So we in the developing world are going to be asked to endure all sorts of restrictions on economic activity till this time next year? F___ that! I want to see the strategy that was used to bring the recent spike in India under control employed globally! What’s not to like about ending this pandemic early.

              In the video I linked to above, it was pointed that the hospital where Dr. Joseph Varon is in charge the death rate is 6.7%, about one third the international average but, the protocol he uses was never given more than scant mention in a single news report.

            4. Death-Grip Dazes Moving Forward

              Alan, you would do well, as anyone would, to take up an anarchist lens/perspective.

              Bernie Sanders? LOL Free your mind.

              At any rate, large-scale centralized governments are complex ‘sociomaterial technologies’ that, as such, rely on vast amounts of energy just to maintain, never mind expand.

              Who’s talking about that?

              Rather, many seem to mindlessly cling to the concept almost with a kind of intellectual death-grip, as if it always was and will be.

              Oh, and vaccine technologies seem only as viable as there are viable (Big Pharma/Gov) infrastructures to support them. Failing that, it’s (gasp!) natural immunity and whatnot.

              Vaccine passport mandates? LOL

  3. A comment about collapsing buildings.
    The building collapse tragedy still unfolding in Florida led me to think about traveling to Rome oh-so-many years ago and being impressed with the durability of the ancient buildings, particularly the Pantheon. The dome of the Pantheon is about 140 feet in diameter and was made of unreinforced concrete about two thousand years ago.
    What strikes me is that this concrete dome is still standing and a building in Florida, a mere 40 years old has collapsed. What is wrong with this picture? Aren’t we much more technologically sophisticated than the Romans?
    What I have to conclude is that we have no sense of permanence. In the modern world a relatively short life span is accepted on the alter of low price. When I lived in Southern California it was quite common to see reinforced concrete walls and stairs near the beach. Often you could see the chunks of concrete laying on the ground and the adjacent wall would be a maze of crumbling matrix and rusted rebar. There are recent photographs of this type of damage on Champlain Towers South . The problem with this modern engineering is that the contractor was not willing to spend the extra money to make a “permanent” building nor would the buyers be willing to pay the price, nor would the occupants be willing to pay the maintenance cost of assuring that a catastrophe like this couldn’t happen.
    So the ultimate cause of the disaster, whatever the engineers decide after screening the rubble, is that as a society we primarily value low prices and that, at least in Surfside Florida, there are no government standards to prevent such a disaster from happening due to cutting corners.
    Or, in other words, they have Republican building codes.

    1. Looking at new build houses near me, I’d be surprised if any of them outlast my 1960s bungalow, let alone classical Roman architecture.

    2. In the run-up to this collapse there was a big fight among the condo-owners about whether there should be repairs. The problem is an unwillingness to make long term investments.

      This makes the idea of Americans colonizing Mars look very dubious to me. The country can’t even keep its electricity grid running. A few days without electricity to run the air pumps would be no joke.

      Meanwhile Biden is meeting governors of Western states to talk about droughts.
      https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/30/biden-to-meet-with-western-governors-about-record-heat-wave-drought.html

      It’s important to keep in mind that 150 years of bad land use are the primary cause of aridity in the American West. Flash flooding is a widespread problem all across these supposedly waterless areas.

      The solution is capturing rainfall and stopping the flow of water on the surface. But it will take decades to turn the situation around and refill the aquifiers. Will America choose to do it?

      1. I take issue with the statement that “150 years of bad land use are the primary cause of aridity in the American West. Flash flooding is a widespread problem all across these supposedly waterless areas.”

        I can only assume that you are not familiar with the geography and climatology of the west.
        For the extreme example of how things work, look at the Colorado River basin. For millions of years you have had a very dry and mountainous zone with widely intermittent rainfalls, often very heavy. It is a recipe for flash flooding and erosion on a grand scale, in fact they call it the Grand Canyon.
        The same dynamics are in play in all the other river basins to a less severe degree.

        The aridity in the summer in the coastal region is why it is classified as a Mediterranean climate, It is a core feature, even if no human ever existed. The aridity in the Great basin is why is it primarily desert/dry forest/shrub and patchy grassland (except high up on the biggest mountains)- regardless if humans ever existed.

        I do support you contention that human exploitation of the environment accentuates the issue. Especially degradation of the soil via overgrazing and repeated clear-cutting. Both of these things result in decreased soil moisture, often to a dramatic degree. That results in a more flammable vegetation situation.

  4. Interesting, but way off topic:
    “Researchers examining living people’s genomes have found evidence of a coronavirus epidemic that plagued east Asia some 20,000 to 25,000 years ago. Scientists detected 42 genes in east Asian populations that had rapidly evolved antiviral mutations, suggesting these people had adapted to the emergence of an ancient coronavirus that swept the region and probably lasted for generations.”

  5. Another important post from Tim Watkins: https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2021/06/28/climate-change-relegated/

    “With oil extraction already in decline, we simply no longer have time to wait while physicists, engineers and material designers figure out how to make potential future technologies work. And as the entire global economy tips into a permanent recession there are not many years left before further work is both economically and politically unacceptable. An increasing part of our economy will have to be diverted into energy production – which includes food production – and other genuinely essential activities. The corollary being that a great deal of what we were doing – including having more leisure time than any previous age – prior to the pandemic is going to have to disappear. And one thing we can more or less guarantee will disappear is the current metropolitan liberal concern with climate change – together with a raft of fashionable celebrity activist causes – and, especially with a particular narrative which claims that all can be solved with faux green technologies that just happen to benefit the usual corporate suspects at the expense of the poor.”
    …
    “Climate change is, of course, real and already baked in. And that is something that future generations are going to have to adapt to… or not. But as we enter an age of shortages, economic depression and unplanned de-growth, people’s concerns will be more local and immediate. And so the current climate change infrastructure of special committees, expert working groups and conferences in Swiss ski resorts or Mediterranean islands will be relegated far below more immediate policy concerns.”

    1. Tim Watkins pretty well nails it. Thanks George.

      From your link: “For a quarter of a century, a particular – “bright green” – version of climate change has been allowed to drown serious discussion of a predicament in which 7.8bn humans are attempting to continue growing on a planet that could not sustain an eighth of that population without the energy we derive from fossil fuels. Those who warned that technological solutions could not work – not least because the technologies are themselves dependent upon fossil fuels – were ostracised and censored. Nothing, it seems, can be allowed to hurt the feelings of those who – with no grounding in physics or engineering – insist that we can run a modern industrial economy solely on sunlight and wind. And so discussions about the true sacrifice and hardship involved in weaning ourselves off fossil fuels were pushed to the fringes; even as we continued to increase our fossil fuel consumption. And as a result, the gathering storm which we now see looming before us – of a rapid economic simplification – is going to be far harder than it need otherwise have been.”

      1. Yeh , why get all fussy about about crop failures, flooded ports, energy shortage, forced migrations when you could be focused on your poor pension performance?

        Watkins restates a ludicrous notion- “with no grounding in physics or engineering – insist that we can run a modern industrial economy solely on sunlight and wind.”
        As if this is some kind of ‘all or none’ question, and that if you can’t run business as usual economy based solely on Solar and Wind energy, then you shouldn’t use those energy technologies at all.
        So, we might as just throw up our hands and stick with coal and internal combustion engines [sarc]

        When oil and coal global trade becomes a declining business many places will not be able to import as much energy as they are accustomed to.
        Some of these places can replace 100% of the transport needs of their region with electricity based transport, and much of that energy can come from solar and wind. These places would be fools [or have policy makers just too old to give a shit] to not go whole hog on the attempt.

        This is not an all or none consideration.
        Implementation of renewable energy production is adaptation while downsizing begins. The effort can be limp (like today) or it can be robust.
        If you prefer the quickest crash and burn scenario, then support a limp effort.

        1. I don’t think he’s recommending a course of action, he’s just eaying what he thinks is going to happen, given our current situation and the way modern society works … and I think he’s pretty close. Closer than any idea that we are all suddenly going to embrace a long term, one-for-all outlook to save the world. The election of Trump would suggest places are only too willing and able to “be fools”.

        2. “then support a limp effort” Speaking of limp, here’s one for you.

          TAR SANDS COMPANIES AIM FOR ‘NET ZERO’ BY 2050 – WITH NO PLAN TO EXTRACT LESS OIL

          “Tar sands companies said the alliance aims to “develop an actionable approach” to cut emissions while “preserving the more than $3 trillion in oil sands contribution” to Canada’s economy to 2050. But they made no mention of phasing out production. The “net zero” strategy does not extend to emissions from consumers burning the oil, which are many times larger than those from the extraction process.”

          https://www.climatechangenews.com/2021/06/10/tar-sands-companies-aim-net-zero-2050-no-plan-extract-less-oil/

          1. The 2050 net zero carbon plan for the Tar Sands (and for all sorts of other energy sources and energy consuming industries) is a very convenient target. The 29 years goal is just long enough for the current hoard of business leaders and policy makers to be in their twilight or beyond. So, its a very good goal- achievable. By someone else. By some other generation. Nice.

        3. It seems that often people read the writing of someone who says something along the lines of “renewables won’t solve our problems” and they conflate that with meaning “so we should keep using fossil fuels”. In some cases that is what the poster is saying, but in many cases they are simply stating a fact. In this case, from Watkins, the latter is true.

          Watkins is not prescribing a course of action. He is deriving from a number of sources of information what the future is likely to be. When we combine the profligate consumption, lack of political will, relative ineffectiveness of renewables when compared with fossil fuels, and the fact that there is no way to create, deploy, or maintain renewables without depending on fossil fuels, the future course is clear – fossil fuel decline will be the end of our industrial way of life.

          For some reason, this statement often gets interpreted as someone saying “so we should do nothing.” I myself have made similar statements and been interpreted in the same manner. That is not what is being said. Many who do not believe that renewables will “save” us (myself included) do in fact think we should probably deploy them as much as reasonable over the next years. However, ultimately they will provide only a fraction of our current consumption, and due to the nature of people and politics, that small amount (even say, 100% of our light vehicle transport somehow being renewable powered, a very far away goal) will not stop the panic, anger, frustration, and eventual social collapse. I don’t think Watkins gives one fuck whether we deploy renewables or stick with fossil fuels. His point is that either way we are fucked, and to that I agree.

          1. So, in regard to “the fact that there is no way to create, deploy, or maintain renewables without depending on fossil fuels”

            Perhaps, even likely.
            But again this is a reversion to the all-or-none false argument.
            Fossil fuels are not about to go to zero reserves or zero production anytime soon.
            Picture the scenario in the 2030’s- there will still be a hell of lot potential oil, gas and coal production capacity compared to now.
            And there will be a significant chunk of hydro and nuclear energy.
            And there will be a hell of a lot more wind and solar energy.

            Niko you and I do see things differently in one big regard. When you say-
            ” Many who do not believe that renewables will “save” us (myself included) do in fact think we should probably deploy them as much as reasonable over the next years. However, ultimately they will provide only a fraction of our current consumption,”

            I take exception to that. Of course there is no ‘saving us’ to be done. Nonetheless, they can be a huge chunk of the productive energy mix of various countries, if deployed at more than a ‘reasonable ‘ pace [currently very slow]. I would argue that a very brisk pace is what is reasonable given the twin situation of oil depletion and global warming. Industrial policy has taken a vacation the whole month, and people are stumbling around as if drunk.

            Maybe people find being proactive about local energy production is too much of a task, and they would rather just wait around for interesting conversations at the petrol rationing line.

            1. Whether or not renewables will ever supply an amount of power large relative to what is currently supplied by fossil fuels is a matter we could (and do!) debate endlessly.

              My estimation of the costs, material requirements, land requirements, energy requirements for initial build, political and social will, land use requirements, complexity, and limitations (intermittency, not good for all regions, not good at all latitudes, susceptible to environmental stress, can’t be applied to many essential processes like shipping, aviation, heavy industry, etc.) leads me to conclude that the challenge to transition, or even create large build out relative to fossil fuels, is beyond our reach. I am sure you have a different opinion. I do not think it is worth debating however. Such debates never seem to lead anywhere, especially not among this crowd where everyone already has a very well informed opinion. I’ll be happy to be wrong, as it means I will get to live the rest of my life in relative comfort. Unlike many on this board, I am young and have probably 50-60 years left ahead of me.

              If the renewable build out fails as I suspect, I’ll at least be kept warm by the fact that I was right, if not by an electric heater 😜

            2. I’m sure you are correct Niko.
              The challenges for humanity to get much solar and wind deployed are just too great.
              Even though the energy is available, on a global scale it will be not harvested at anywhere close to the level that would be required to replace current fossil fuel energy levels.
              Most places will have big energy shortfall, starting this decade likely.
              I think most here are in understanding of that reality, even though I suspect no one has really digested the implications.

              Some countries will hit wall the first, and some places will do better.
              That is a whole other set of discussions. More important ones.

              One more wild idea- Any country faced with an impending shortage of a major energy supply source [oil] would be an absolute fool to not take advantage of a cheap and abundant available domestic energy source [solar and in some case wind], at full level of effort. Only exception being if the country has poor resource, or does not believe in the idea of oil depletion and finite supply.

            3. Hickory wrote:
              “Even though the energy is available, on a global scale it will be not harvested at anywhere close to the level that would be required to replace current fossil fuel energy levels.”

              Just a friendly reminder that we don’t need to replace current fossil fuel energy levels, only about 40% of them, due to the efficiency advantage of non-thermal sources.

              Still a big job.

      2. Doug, you and George are both displaying confirmation bias in action.

        1. All I said about it was it was important, what bias do you think that is confirming? That I admire Tim Watkin’s writing. If so then yes I do, but I read each of his pieces critically and do not recommend every one, neither do I agree with everything he writes, even in this one. But that is not a reason for me to censor it, I assume readers here are capable of making up their own minds, you maybe think differently.

          1. Mr Kaplan , agree with you . I have been following Tim Watkins and Tim Morgan from last several years . Very lucid in their writings . Storehouses of information and alternative viewpoints .

    2. I think Watkins does a good job in pointing out the naivety of the culture at large regarding energy and environmental issues. Its a huge story.
      He seems to hate the term ‘renewable energy’, but he does even worse when trying to rename the sector.

    3. According to the US Dept of Energy the Energy Payback Time [EPBT] for solar varies from 2-4 years depending on the particulars such as type of photovoltaic cell utilized. The next 30 yrs+ is surplus energy.

      EPBT-
      “The energy-payback time (EPBT) of a PV module is the amount of time a module must produce power to recover the energy it took to produce the module initially. Although assumptions vary among EPBT calculations, the energy to produce the module … inclusive as possible, accounting for everything from the energy needed to mine, transport, refine, produce, and deliver all module subcomponents to that required to deposit/assemble/package the module, deploy it, and eventually recycle the module at the end of its life.”

      https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/35489.pdf

      1. Given the huge excess power generation it really becomes a political / societal question regarding how much of our production should be geared towards renewables. Government has a place in this – when you decided to either buy an F150 (that you don’t really need, but want), or use that money to go effectively off-grid taxes / incentives can play a role.

  6. Cooler this morning on Johnstone Strait (Salmon River). I actually kayaked an hour ago with my Jack Russell buddy sitting on my lap. Yesterday was freaking brutal, but today the long awaited westerly is supposed to ramp up today to gale force which will really cool things down. Tomorrow should be around 24-25, with temps rising later in the week, but nothing like the past few days.

    I removed several more panels from our greenhouses the other day and our plants seem okay….even the lettuce. When it was hitting 40 outside we ran a sprinkler on the panels and roof. This morning at daybreak I finally got my dock in the water. Had to work in my gitch because of the heat/humidity. Tonight I will get my fire pump running and get the hoses all ready to go in case a fire sparks up. I have 300′ of 2″ hose which would probably save my house until the fire trucks could arrive. never had to use it but nice to have.

    As a reply to the above comments, if taxation on FF was raised to effect $5-6 (US) per US gallon at the pump, it would go a long way to changing consumption habits. All it takes is political will. That is our rate right now and when fuel costs turn this high it is on the news every night and people start to drive less.

    Here’s a comparison/analogy. I like to cook and for years would buy pine nuts to roast and put on pasta dishes. Then several years ago the price jumped from $6 per pound to almost $40 per pound. No one buys them anymore except for wealthy overseas orientals, (according to the store manager). They stock them but few actually purchase.

    What will it take for political will to develop to raise fuel prices? This heat wave won’t do it. How about some red states coastal cities being flooded out….maybe more condos coming down? That would do it. But by then…..God help us all as the system would probably be in pieces.

    1. >As a reply to the above comments, if taxation on FF was raised to effect $5-6 (US) per US gallon at the pump, it would go a long way to changing consumption habits.

      It would also have the advantage of decreasing net imports, and helping america pay ff its debt. They should have started in the 80s, increasing the tax by a few cents a months.

  7. ‘THEY JUST KEPT ON RISING’: DATA REVEALS ALARMING GREENHOUSE GAS INCREASE

    More greenhouse gases were produced in 2018 than any previous year, despite more than 20 countries reducing their carbon emissions since 2000. In a study published this week in Environmental Research Letters, the researchers show that road transport, meat consumption and a global trend towards expanding floorspaces—otherwise the hallmarks of affluent economies—were big factors behind greenhouse gas increases while industry, agriculture and the energy systems continued to account for a substantial slab of the carbon emission total.

    From 1990 to 2018, humans have shrunk primary forest areas by more than 7 million square kilometres, almost as much as the size of Australia. This is often for pasture and cropland in Latin America, Africa and South-East Asia that now produces food for Europe, North America or China. Land use emissions are also driven by a ‘westernisation’ of diets, with meat and internationally sourced refined products replacing traditional and seasonal produce.

    https://phys.org/news/2021-06-reveals-alarming-greenhouse-gas.html

    1. Meanwhile,

      ASIAN COAL PLANT DRIVE THREATENS CLIMATE GOALS

      China, India, Indonesia, Japan and Vietnam are planning to build more than 600 coal plants. The stations will be able to generate a total of 300 gigawatts of energy—equivalent to around the entire electricity generating capacity of Japan. The projects are being pursued despite the availability of cheaper renewables, and they threaten efforts to meet the Paris climate deal goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

      https://phys.org/news/2021-06-asian-coal-threatens-climate-goals.html

      1. If renewables are really cheaper then why is this happening. Is it something to do with time value of money – i.e. the coal plants can be up and running much faster, or for the same reason the power is needed now to keep the population happy in the short term (which fits in well with Tim Watkin’s theories). Or are the renewables not really cheaper if you factor in likely inflation of raw materials as demand increases, the costs of grid upgrades (or the consequences of not upgrading), storage etc. Or is it just that the momentum behind fossil fuels is too great – i.e. that is what society and industry knows how to do, has the necessary organisations and processes in place to accomplish and is comfortable with. Or something else?

        1. You see a lot of reports about new coal plants in Asia, but little on net capacity change. A lot of inefficient coal plants are being shut down at the same time as new one are being built.

          Also news about what is in the pipeline is less reliable than news about what has come online in the recent past.

          So I would take these “Asians are building gazillions of coal plants someday” reports with a grain of salt.

        2. “If renewables are really cheaper then why is this [coal plants being built in Asia] happening”

          I have some thought on this George.
          Most countries are going in more than one direction at once. Just as there is a very active solar and wind industry (and advocates) in China for example, there are also powerful forces in industry and government who have everything invested in coal. So some of this simply a reflection of very heavily vested interests, and maintaining power.
          Secondly, many of these countries have insufficient domestic energy resources and rapidly growing demand. So they are struggling to go all out on every source they can, a multi-faceted approach just as every other country will likely need. I’m sure it feels extremely vulnerable to be in their position, and the deployment of coal seems very solid to them. Its a known quantity and available to get done in a timely manner.
          On the other hand, solar and wind are fairly new industries. China is expert now, and has big works in progress, but many other countries are still in early days of developing the industry.

          Third, they are dealing with the same limitations of solar and wind that other areas of the world are- for the foreseeable future other sources of ‘baseload’ energy are integral to a reliable system. Until/if energy storage mechanisms become cheaper, balanced energy generation will be needed.
          In the USA we are using nat gas to primarily fill that function in areas where wind and solar are becoming significant sources. in much of Asia nat gas is imported, and is relatively expensive.

          I also wonder if places like Viet Nam, Korea and Japan struggle to find large utility scale locations for solar. These countries are heavily populated and also have very large areas that are too steep for simple solar deployment. All of the flat areas of these countries are already being used for human living. It is more expensive and slower to deploy solar on rooftops.

      2. Coal consumption peaked in 2015, and is in slow decline. Those new plants will be stranded assets if they are ever built.

        The big boom since 2000 came from China, but growth stopped in 2010 or so. It’s old news, and India and Indonesia will not follow the same trajectory.

  8. I may have missed something, but what happened to Islandboy’s monthly article about “EIA’s Electric Power Monthly”?
    I’m really wondering what the covid-crisis did to the energy mix.

  9. The Canadian heat dome, like the pandemic, is killing the aged and infirm first. I expect food and drug shortages, if and when they show up, will di the same. One near term effect of the continuing collapse is likely to be a lessening of major concerns about long term care and final year medical costs. I suspect societies could become comfortable with this trade off quite quickly as things deteriorate. One positive outcome might be a more open minded approach to assisted dying, rather than waiting for an increasingly irate mother nature to do the job for us, but maybe not – avoiding the difficult decisions seems to be one way to stay elected at the moment.

    1. Interesting George. My take on assisted dying is that it’s letting Mother nature take its course but with the help of morphine. Rather than using tech to keep everyone alive as long as possible. But if the morphine’s not working, please pass me the cyanide.

    2. Good point.
      I assume that as the population of countries gets older, that there will be an eventual rebellion of the elderly against the religious dogma that suicide, and euthanasia, and assisted dying are somehow evil and therefore against the law (despite supposed separation of church and state in a country like the US)
      Why do populations accept this form imprisonment.

      1. Hickory:
        I think it is cultural inertia. As I “look forward” to my upcoming 78th birthday I question how much bearable life I can look forward to. But I will tolerate it as long as I can because my wife and my children would be humiliated if I were to decide to bail out before being in the last agonies. If you read the obituaries in the paper virtually all of those who die of a long term illness are congratulated for fighting the disease and not giving up in spite of the likely needless suffering. Western culture simply still regards suicide as a sin even after most have given up on whatever western religion is the basis of their culture.

        1. Yes, I hear you JJHMAN.
          “I will tolerate it as long as I can because my wife and my children would be humiliated if I were to decide to bail out before being in the last agonies”

          That is a profound realization. And I think it represents a failure of our culture to understand ageing and death. Families should find a way to avoid putting pressure on someone to endure suffering that they would prefer not too.
          Short of change in culture, talking to our families about our personal attitudes/wishes regarding our late years is a critical thing.

      2. After my mom reached her 90’s, she got more and more depressed saying she didn’t want to live anymore as it became increasingly difficult for her to perform ordinary tasks. All we could do is reassure her that only God is able to decide when our time to go is. Although the care center she had to transfer for her final years wasn’t as good as a premium senior facility there were at least decent religious services available. Attending service and prayer was one of the only things that got her in a better emotional place needed during the struggles and suffering she experienced in her final 2 years of life before God released her into His Kingdom.

        1. Sprouse- ” All we could do is reassure her that only God is able to decide when our time to go is”

          Or, she could have a role in choosing her path without Big Brother (the Church and dogma) being her en-slaver. Personal freedom when it comes to end of life is a core human right.

          1. No Hickory, Sprouse is a lazy selfish f’n piece of shit.

            His mother carried him around for 9 difficult months. Pushed his 5 inch diameter head though her 2 inch birth canal. Cleaned up his genitals and asshole for another 2 years every few hours. Helped him learn how to walk, talk, sent him to school and cared for him for almost two decades. I’m sure you get my point. Looks like she failed to teach him empathy.

            Religion is just a cowardly excuse for selfishness. A 90 year old depressed because of ordinary tasks and he couldn’t do anything. Sprouse is a failure to his mother and humanity.

        2. ”All we could do is reassure her that only God is able to decide when our time to go is.”

          Right, being old and kept alive with tubes in a hospital bed all the while tying up medical staff for months, or years, just waiting to die, when that same bed could be used by a child in need, or a critical accident victim is somehow related your God’s decision. I would have thought dying with dignity, and not being a burden on the living, would be the preferred way to go.

          1. He said depressed because of ordinary tasks. This is not about hospitals and feeding tubes. This is about simple caregiving and a childs failure to their mother.

  10. Interesting way of “going green”.

    NORWAY IS GOING FULL STEAM AHEAD ON ITS OIL VENTURES

    “Despite announcements last year that it is striving for net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, Norway has now said it will go full steam ahead in its oil ventures over the coming decades. While neighboring Denmark plans to end all North Sea operations by 2050, Norway, Western Europe’s largest oil producer, continues to offer exploration and production contracts to several companies, as it intends to develop its already well-established oil industry further.

    Norway’s ambitious carbon-cutting targets do not consider the emissions from the oil and gas that it sells to other countries, meaning it could still achieve net-zero without curbing its fossil fuel production.”

    https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Norway-Is-Going-Full-Steam-Ahead-On-Its-Oil-Ventures.html

    1. “While neighboring Denmark plans to end all North Sea operations by 2050”
      That is going to a sacrifice? The oil will be depleted anyway. And it just a way to put the decision making and burdens on the next generation.

      The biggest importers of Norwegian oil is UK, China, Netherlands and Sweden.
      Did you know that Norway is the third largest exporter of natural gas in the world, behind only Russia and Qatar? Norway supplies between 20 and 25 per cent of the EU gas demand.

  12. In order for carbon capture to be considered as feasible in this peak energy world, the energy cost of the mechanism must be zero.

    1. Bangladesh is apparently on track to be among the first areas to flood significantly if climate change/sea level rise has its way.

      Is there such a thing as Hot Blob Bob, BTW, or is it merely Cold Blob Bob?

  14. Never Mind The (alt.energy) Build-out: Here’s The US’ Infrastructure

    Report Card For America’s Infrastructure

    “America’s Infrastructure Scores a C-

    There is a water main break every two minutes and an estimated 6 billion gallons of treated water lost each day in the U.S., enough to fill over 9,000 swimming pools.

    Growing wear and tear on our nation’s roads have left 43% of our public roadways in poor or mediocre condition, a number that has remained stagnant over the past several years…

    [edited for space]

    Aviation D; Bridges C; Dams D; Drinking Water C-; Energy C-; Hazardous Waste D; Inland Waterways D; Levees D; Public Parks D; Ports B-; Rail B; Roads D; Schools D; Solid Waste C; Stormwater D; Transit D-; Wastewater D…”

    Lost City Sidewalks

    Help support our commentary by placing an ad! Competitive rates!

    Semi-retired Florida condo developer with a C- average but a positive-thinking, glass-half-full, learn-as-he-goes, get-'er-done kind of attitude seeks new clients.
    —
    Designer Magic Underwear for sale. Worn only once (during a car accident). Price negotiable. Will throw in a crashed self-driving electric vehicle for parts at no extra charge.

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