12 thoughts to “Open Thread Non-Petroleum March 12, 2025”

  1. Some didn’t like my comment-
    “If people have more money they use more energy and energy derived products.
    More meat, more flying, more electronics, more square footage, etc.”

    Look at a graph of GDP/capita vs energy consumption…its a tight correlation-
    Energy use per person vs. GDP per capita, 2023
    [Energy refers to primary energy, measured in kilowatt-hours per person, using the substitution method. Gross domestic product (GDP) is adjusted for inflation and differences in living costs between countries.]
    https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-use-per-person-vs-gdp-per-capita

    Same thing applies when applied to any individual country over time, if it is in a growth phase.
    There are three ways to cut collective energy consumption-
    -decline in population,
    -decline in purchasing power,
    -decline in energy supplies.

    I suspect we will experiment with all three of these mechanisms.

    1. I think that the debt spiral into which both USA and Europe have entered will cause a new economic depression from which we will never recover as the best energy forms have already been used. So my guess is category 2 on your list

    2. Indeed, on a long enough timeline, all of those must occur.

      Otherwise, one argues for infinitely increasing population, infinitely increasing purchasing power, and infinitely increasing resources. All of which are absurd, and, thus, are the things that people believe in the most.

  2. Getting off fossil fuels, seems unlikely, at least on near term

    TRUMP’S ‘DRILL, BABY, DRILL’ AGENDA COULD KEEP THE WORLD HOOKED ON OIL AND GAS

    “Donald Trump’s repeated mantra of “drill, baby, drill” demands that more oil and gas be extracted in the United States, but the president has set his sights on an even broader goal: keeping the world hooked on planet-heating fossil fuels for as long as possible. In deals being formulated with countries such as Japan and Ukraine, Trump is using US leverage in tariffs and military aid to bolster the flow of oil and gas around the world. In Africa, his administration has even touted the resurrection of coal, the dirtiest of all fossil fuels, to bring energy to the continent.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/12/trump-fossil-fuels-oil-and-gas

    1. Meanwhile,

      Latest Daily CO2
      Mar. 10, 2025 = 430.19 ppm
      Mar. 10, 2024 = 425.10 ppm
      1 Year Change = 5.09 ppm (1.20%)

      1. The funniest part about these continual shitposts is that the computer resources needed to keep all your posts up on the internet forever contribute to increased CO2 in the atmosphere. Through your posts, you’ll be contributing to CO2 even after you are dead!

    2. By definition modern homosaps requires fossil fuels, no hooks or addiction description applies. The issue is how much and so far it’s as much as we can afford.

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