79 thoughts to “Open Thread Non-Petroleum, November 23, 2021”

    1. I looked at this.

      One factor they didn’t checked, but is the most important, is raw material usage. You can see how important this is at the rollout of electric cars – battery factories and mining for raw material are the bottlenecks.

      When the whole world would to the fast transition, you’ll crash your head at the copper wall.

      https://www.forbes.com/sites/rrapier/2021/09/17/will-the-copper-deficit-derail-the-renewable-revolution/?sh=6abee41f775f

      This will come to a point where you need to replace copper with Aluminium at several points – but this has technical problems delaying mass installations. And Aluminium production is tapped out at the moment, too.

      This is all time.

      Mass producing is a difficult thing, rolling out really big, too. If every country would try to go conventional atomic power now, we would have absolutely the same problems- not enough Uranium mining capacity for everyone. They would end with reactors with nothing in them.

      The green revolution needs much more copper (beside construction steel and concrete) than conventional electricity production. Much more cables, more big interconnections for load balancing. And a copper drain when electric cars get more common.

      This is all no problem while the installations are small to medium. But when every country now tries to go solar and wind and mass storage (even more copper for these installations), we’ll see a copper crisis.

      My take on the energy revolution: Build Solar and wind and storage facilities and nuclear and fusion and geothermic all at the same time – to avoid the bottlenecks of raw material shortage. Additional it gets more resilent. Wind can calm ( or freeze unprepared as in the Texas disaster last year), sun can get clowded, storages can run dry, interconnections can be destroyed by storms, accidents or terrorists, nuclear power plants can have long maintainances. And deliveries from far away can be canceled (See the current nat gas problems).

      1. When the headline is a question, the answer is almost always no.

        Also I question whether EVs use more copper than normal vehicles. Copper cable use can be reduced by replacing 12 V batteries with 48 V batteries, because you get the same power with lower amps.

        Also the Texas disaster was caused by gas plants, not wind turbines. That was just Republican lies.

        And good luck with your fusion plant.

        1. Forty eight volts instead of twelve volts reduces the necessary amps for the same power by a factor of FOUR.
          I’ve seen various references to the industry moving to forty eight volts for a long time.

          The apparent reason it hasn’t been done is that nobody knows ( at least not until very recently, IF this problem has been solved) how to economically manufacture the terminals needed to make forty eight work in cars. Higher voltage means everything has to be much better insulated to prevent current leakage and shorts, and it seems that forty eight volt switches and relays, etc, which will last twenty years or longer in cars are necessarily costly to manufacture.

          But technology marches on and I don’t see why forty eight volts can’t be the new standard.

          On the other hand, forty eight volts is not even remotely close to what’s needed to build economical and reliable electric motors and battery to motor cables, which is where the vast majority of copper used in electric automobiles is used.

          1. FYI, a few companies are doing it, calling it “mild hybrid”.
            https://www.greencarcongress.com/2020/05/20200527-5series.html
            https://www.ford.co.uk/cars/puma/features/performance-efficiency
            https://www.maserati.com/international/en/models/ghibli/hybrid

            However, I don’t know whether they also have a 12 V battery.

            Another advantage is more power for sci-fi features like electric valve activation instead of a camshaft, electric steering instead of power steering, and active suspension.

            1. To the best of my knowledge, right off the top of my head, such cars as you mention are still using twelve volt parts such as light bulbs and sound system parts, because the industry is standardized on twelve volts.

              Going to forty eight would mean you would have to go to the dealer for a light bulb. That wouldn’t go over too well with people who buy used cars, although a new car buyer probably wouldn’t give a hoot.

          2. Conductor losses are to the square of the current. I squared R. So saving can be 16 X.
            In Marine speak @ 12 volts. 12 watts max at 12 metets at 12 AWG.
            Spec gear with 8 to 57 volts DC in like Mikrotik network gear. Many LED luminaries are 12 to 60 volts in. Avoid devices requiring regulated voltage inputs.

        2. At the moment it’s round about 10 Kg for conventional cars and 40 Kg for electric cars. The power lines of electric cars are much thicker and more – a Tesla can pull 2.000 ampere out of a batterie when doing a quartermile race.

          Forbes does the usual trick – counting not yet build mines as a solution.
          Be warned, green government world wide will push electric everything much faster next years, increasing the demand for the according raw materials much faster.

      2. I’ve noticed a problem with this kind of analysis: the boundaries of the analysis. For FF and nuclear they doesn’t include fuel or upstream requirements, only the generator. So, the material requirements for coal generation don’t include the materials used for the coal mine!

        By the way, the Forbes article is behind a paywall. Here’s an alternate link:
        https://talkmarkets.com/content/commodities/will-the-copper-deficit-derail-the-renewable-revolution?post=328555

        If you read the article, it pretty much answers the headline question with “very unlikely”.

    2. Thanks Alim, brilliant. Summary: renewables (combined with batteries and P2X storage) are the cheapest, fastest way forward…

  2. [Tesla’s Model 3 is now the best-selling vehicle in both Europe and the UK.] “Not [just] electric. Flat out. If we’re going to succeed, we can’t ignore this competition anymore.”
    —Jim Farley, Ford’s CEO, to employees this month

    1. IIRC, California has seen that happen on sunny spring & fall Sundays, and of course they’ll get there on other days eventually. They’re starting to charge batteries during the daytime solar peak, and also exporting power.

      You can see nice charts on the CA ISO website, CAISO.com, as well as their IOS app (“ISO Today”).

      The system operators are a great resource. They’re generally thorough and professional in their planning. They analyze all the historical and operational data for the grid (including both consumption, and production by the generation sources), and prepare for contingencies.

      They’ve been doing it for a long time, and wind and solar isn’t really all that different: everything has it’s problems, and there are a lot of effective tools for dealing with them.

      In the US they’re called Independent System Operators. You can get a feeling for ISO planning and operations by looking at their planning documents on their web sites, and following their daily operations on their phone apps. You can start with the California ISO (CAISO), and the PJM ISO (mid N Atlantic). NY and ERCOT (Texas) are also very good.

  4. India’s fertility rate is rapidly falling and is now below replacement level. Malthus was wrong because unlike animals, humans can voluntarily limit their fertility and invent technology to increase food production. The increase in food production (although it comes at the expense of nature) buys enough time to prevent mass starvation caused by overpopulation.

    https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/for-first-time-indias-fertility-rate-below-replacement-level/articleshow/87899133.cms

    1. I’ve been thinking about Malthus, and I think he’s misunderstood. In the context of his time, I think his primary argument was not about the future, but actually about the contemporary politics of inequality: he was arguing that government should do nothing to help the poor.

      His secondary, supporting argument was that poverty reduction was counterproductive because that would increase fertility and the poor would just reproduce themselves back into poverty. HIs third supporting argument for that was that contraception was immoral and unlimited child bearing would always outpace food production.

      Fortunately, we know now that all of these arguments were false.

      1. Malthus may have only been partially wrong. His central principle–the struggle of populations for subsistence–is now ensconced in Darwin’s theory of natural selection. Therefore, it’s incorrect to make the general statement that his arguments were false

        If that were the case, then Darwin was also wrong: wrong about “the inherited effects of the use and disuse of parts” (Lamarckian inheritance), and wrong about “pangenesis,” the idea that inheritance is powered by “gemmules” that effect the gametes. Oh, Darwin was dead wrong about these.

        But he was stupendously right about natural selection. And Malthus was stupendously right about the struggle for subsistence.

        1. His central principle–the struggle of populations for subsistence

          My argument above was that a struggle for subsistence is not his central principle. His central principle is that the poor should be left to die in poverty. His supporting, secondary arguments are simply variations on the age-old arguments made by the wealthy that there’s no point in sharing their money.

          is now ensconced in Darwin’s theory of natural selection.

          Subsistence living on the part of humans is a necessary part of of the theory of natural selection? That doesn’t make sense. Natural selection can operate in a number of ways. Heck, it could operate on the basis of parental selection of desirable genetic traits. Subsistence living is just one kind of environmental pressure that could influence selection – there could be many, some possibly “unnatural”.

          Think about how most Golden Retrievers in the US live. There’s nothing “subsistence” about it, or about their ancestors who were selected to create the breed.

          1. I’ll let Darwin speak for himself.

            “…I saw, on reading Malthus on Population, that natural selection was the inevitable result of the rapid increase of all organic beings…”

            1. So, Malthus’ work suggested to Darwin that population pressure would accelerate natural selection in general for “organic beings.” That makes sense.

              But Darwin is not a religious prophet, and there is no need to rely on him to be precisely correct in all things. In this case, it seems that he made a minor mistake, and both he and Malthus were incorrect about the behavior of human beings, especially modern human beings with education, alternatives to subsistence hunting & gathering/agriculture, and effective contraception.

      2. Nick, we disagree on a lot of points but I must say I think you keenly understand Malthus. You hit his philosophy nail on the head.

        2. This was certainly the official reason the English let the Irish starve in 1848.

          1. This supports that view:

            “In his excellent book Twelve Diseases that Changed Our World, professor Irwin Sherman writes:

            “According to Malthusian doctrine, any increase in the Irish population would be due to their carnal and vicious nature. Famine would control this population explosion, and in Malthusian terms this was deserved. The Irish, the British opined, were hopelessly inferior and incurably filled with vice and so they deserved the famine, which would exert control over their excessive breeding. In effect, the Malthusian theory was used to reinforce British prejudice against the Irish and to justify the British failure to provide relief.”

            The British didn’t just fail to provide relief. They actively undermined the Irish food supply through various laws meant to boost the power and wealth of absentee landlords. Such laws resulted in food being exported from Ireland to England while Irish peasants were literally starving to death. Did the British feel guilty about any of this? Not really. There were too many Irish people, and they deserved whatever happened to them.”

            https://www.acsh.org/news/2020/05/14/irish-potato-famine-how-belief-overpopulation-leads-human-evil-14792

            1. We did a similar thing in Bengal, east India in the second world war. Exported food to support the war effort as over 2 million of our colonial subjects starved to death.
              Somehow, I don’t think it will be the last time in history this occurs. China is rapidly taking on the mantel of colonial overlord in large parts of Africa and elsewhere. If wealth and education is such a strong inhibitor of population growth, why has the population of the USA nearly doubled in my lifetime?

            2. Ralph,
              You are right about the bengal famine. Churchill was as indifferent to Indian lives as Hitler was to the lives of those he considered non-Aryan.
              By the way the US population growth is mostly due to immigration.

            3. By the way the US population growth is mostly due to immigration.

              Yes. Right behind that is the demographic transition. The demographic transition is also the primary reason that world population continues to increase despite the decline in fertility.

              “In demography, demographic transition is a phenomenon and theory which refers to the historical shift from high birth rates and high death rates in societies with minimal technology, education (especially of women) and economic development, to low birth rates and low death rates in societies with advanced technology, education and economic development, as well as the stages between these two scenarios.

              In stage two, that of a developing country, the death rates drop quickly due to improvements in food supply and sanitation, which increase life expectancies and reduce disease. The improvements specific to food supply typically include selective breeding and crop rotation and farming techniques.[7] Numerous improvements in public health reduce mortality, especially childhood mortality.[7] Prior to the mid-20th century, these improvements in public health were primarily in the areas of food handling, water supply, sewage, and personal hygiene.[7] One of the variables often cited is the increase in female literacy combined with public health education programs which emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.[7] In Europe, the death rate decline started in the late 18th century in northwestern Europe and spread to the south and east over approximately the next 100 years.[7] Without a corresponding fall in birth rates this produces an imbalance, and the countries in this stage experience a large increase in population….In stage three, birth rates fall due to various fertility factors… Population growth begins to level off.

              During stage four there are both low birth rates and low death rates. Birth rates may drop to well below replacement level as has happened in countries like Germany, Italy, and Japan, leading to a shrinking population,”

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_transition

  5. The paragraph below appeared only in the second edition of Malthus’ Essay on the Principle of Population. The outcry was so great that it was removed from all future publications of the essay.

    The Feast of Malthus

    A man who is born into a world already possessed, if he cannot get subsistence from his parents on whom he has a just demand, and if the society do not want his labour, has no claim of right to the smallest portion of food, and, in fact, has no business to be where he is. At nature’s mighty feast there is no vacant cover for him. She tells him to be gone, and will quickly execute her own orders, if he does not work upon the compassion of some of her guests. If these guests get up and make room for him, other intruders immediately appear demanding the same favour. The report of a provision for all that come, fills the hall with numerous claimants. The order and harmony of the feast is disturbed, the plenty that before reigned is changed into scarcity; and the happiness of the guests is destroyed by the spectacle of misery and dependence in every part of the hall, and by the clamorous importunity of those, who are justly enraged at not finding the provision which they had been taught to expect. The guests learn too late their error, in counter-acting those strict orders to all intruders, issued by the great mistress of the feast, who, wishing that all guests should have plenty, and knowing she could not provide for unlimited numbers, humanely refused to admit fresh comers when her table was already full.

    1. Ah, it’s the grain of truth in the passage that hurts us: some of us are cursed at birth to bear this struggle.

      The “polished savages in England,” as Darwin called them, knew the score.

    2. It’s not worthwhile or even relevant to any serious discussion of the future of humanity to debate morality, or the lack thereof, on the part of Malthus. Irrelevant.

      He simply applied what is even today accepted as perfectly orthodox basic biological science to reproduction of humans.

      Animals of countless kinds, eat themselves out of “house and home” meaning their local niche is depleted of food, and they starve to death, on a daily basis.

      This is partly because the animals CAN and DO reproduce faster than their prey or plant food species sometimes, and OTHER times it’s because the prey or plant food supply fails for any of various reasons such as flood, drought, frost, or disease.

      It’s easy as pie to type in pictures of starving wild animals into any search engine, if anybody doubts what I’m saying here, and see for yourself.

      Birth control wasn’t much of a THING, back then, in European society, and even well to do women had a LOT of children.

      Faulting Malthus on the basis of his reasoning and understanding of the way the world worked IN HIS TIME is an intellectually chicken shit proposition.

      There’s no way he could be reasonably expected to predict the changes that took place in later generations.

      His work stands on it’s merits. People even today still have lots of kids in some places, and sometimes a hell of a lot of them starve to death, because the number of people outruns the available food supply, especially if the crops fail for any reason.

      IF anybody doubts this, they can google pictures of starving kids. At least a million or so die every year, including this year, even including years when the crops are among the best.

      https://www.theworldcounts.com › challenges › story
      Poor nutrition and hunger is responsible for the death of 3.1 million children a year. That’s nearly half of all deaths in children under the age of 5.

      It REALLY bugs me when people either consciously or unconsciously take up virtue signaling and ignore such obvious truths.

      I can’t remember any body here accusing Hubbert of being stupid because he’s been proven PARTIALLY wrong about peak oil, lol.

      For what it’s worth, I went back and took out all the cuss words before I hit post, lol.

      1. It’s not worthwhile or even relevant to any serious discussion of the future of humanity to debate morality, or the lack thereof, on the part of Malthus. Irrelevant.

        Mac, did you think I was commenting on the morality of Malthus. If so, you are sorely mistaken. I was quoting him, nothing more.

        Malthus is not the point. The point Malthus was trying to make is the point. The article I linked to was written by Garrett Harding. The article definitely is about morality, just not the morality of Malthus.

      2. Mac, I’m not commenting on the morality of Malthus, either. I agree that’s counterproductive.

        The fact is that Malthus was wrong on every point: it is in fact a good idea to keep income inequality under control and reduce poverty; contraception is not immoral and women generally discard religious injunctions against it as quickly as they are allowed; people generally reduce their fertility when child mortality is reduced; old age poverty is reduced, women are free to get education & career; etc..

        It is useful to enquire why Malthus was incorrect. An important factor was that he was not a disinterested researcher: he was looking for reasons to justify the status quo of great inequality and poverty.

        1. Hi Nick,

          I’ve seen Malthus mentioned hundreds of times in books, on television, in various well respected magazines, in textbooks out the ying yang, etc.

          It’s VERY rare that the discussion of his work gets beyond ( even when it’s the work of a fucking professor, OTHER than a biology or agriculture professor) SAYING HE WAS WRONG about population and food supplies coming into balance in terms of not only animals BUT ALSO humans.
          NOTHING could be farther from the truth. I posted links not because the members of this forum didn’t know about starvation on the grand scale happening today in some places…… but to REMIND them it’s happening.

          So he’s DISMISSED, out of hand, as if he’s fucking IRRELEVANT, because he didn’t foresee the implications of things not yet obvious to anybody living at his time.

          Maybe half the people in this forum don’t seem to realize that they’re saying he’s going to get the last laugh in the end…… that half being the half that believe we’re well past the point our population overshoot can end anyway other than in a disaster of epic proportions.

          It’s essential that scientists, speaking AS scientists, maintain a clear sharp line between what’s science, and what’s opinion or morality.

          This is MY point.

          Ag professors, as an aside, are almost invariably well trained in the basics of biology, given that the field is the APPLICATION of biology to the art and science of producing food and fiber. ( A few are trained mostly in economics or some other field such as physics, and working at the cutting edge in a university lab on genetics, etc. )

          One of my favorite ones was prone to saying other academics should get their heads out of their asses when discussing such matters, and keep the science separate from the moralizing.

  6. Just over three months ago I engaged in a very contentious back and forth with several people here on the subject of the efficacy of early treatments for covid-19 (vitamin d, vitamin c, ivermectin etc.) versus vaccines. Doug Leighton wrote:
    “among other things, your ongoing medical conspiracy bullshit is highly insulting to the hundreds of thousands of doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers who are working themselves to exhaustion (and putting their lives at risk) keeping unvaccinated Covid victims alive.’
    I responded:
    “Good! As a general rule I have no use for doctors. I see most of them as drug industry pimps, pushing the products of big pharma. I liked the late Dr. Robert F. Cathcart and there are a few others but the doctors I like are frowned upon by mainstream doctors. Dr. Paul Marik is a good example.”
    I was called “a disgusting human being” for making that statement. As a result of other information presented, I was also ridiculed for not “following the science” and it was suggested that I lack knowledge of how science works. In general, I felt abused for expressing opinions that were contrary to the prevailing narrative.

    We are now three months further into the pandemic and what does the data show? The chart below from Our World in Data shows the 7 day rolling average of the daily new cases per million for seven low income countries plus Japan compared to Germany. Of the countries with less than 10 new daily cases per million, only Japan has fully vaccinated more than 75% of it’s population (76.8%). Next is India with 56.2% of the population having received at least one dose and 30.3% fully vaccinated. At the other end of the scale, only 3% of the population of Nigeria has received at leat one dose and in Madagascar the figure is less than 2%.

    News reports suggest that scientists and experts are “baffled” and “mystified” by the low case counts in Japan and much of Africa. If instead of dismissing the studies that suggest early treatment including ivermectin is effective at both treating as well as reducing transmission (prophylactic) as “poorly conducted”, one were to accept the results, it would explain why the numbers are the way they are. There would be no mystery and the “scientists and experts” would not be baffled. This pandemic has distorted “science”, made some science “good” and some science “bad”. Time is revealing the truth. See chart below.

      1. i read the article, from beginning to end and still have some questions, the main one being, if not ivermectin then what? Looking at the data, it appears that there is a significant difference in infection rates between Africa and Europe. What accounts for this? Why is Japan faring so much better than Europe? In India, why is the state of Kerala accounting for the vast majority of new cases and deaths despite only representing less than 3% of the population? Why do low income countries appear to be doing so much better than high income countries (chart below)?

        2. Certainly a lot of unknowns in a very complex puzzle.

          1. You don’t think his idea of worms has no merit?
          (but see #4) Could be either way: killing the worms allows people to fight off covid-19 better, OR chronic infection with worms raises immune response but tempers it, OR some of both.

          2a. Poor nations have less infrastructure for doing anything approaching accurate statistics.
          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undercounting_of_COVID-19_pandemic_deaths_by_country
          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistics_of_the_COVID-19_pandemic_in_India#Issues

          2b. Then there’s greedy bureaucrats saving some bucks (or Rupees) when no mention of covid is made on parents death certificates:
          Children Orphaned by Covid Face New Nightmare in MP, Miss Out on Aid Due to Death Certificates
          https://www.news18.com/news/india/children-orphaned-by-covid-face-new-nightmare-in-mp-due-to-lack-of-covid-death-certificates-3799829.html

          3. Also, high infant mortality in low income countries culls people with low or excessive immune systems before covid comes along.

          4. Some people have looked at things like tuberculosis and malaria exposure providing protection.
          Influence of malaria endemicity and tuberculosis prevalence on COVID-19 mortality
          https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0033350621000767?via%3Dihub

          5. Demographics plays a big role, lots of young people in Africa, more old people in the wealthier world. Young people die at far lower rates from covid-19 than older people.
          The Conundrum of Low COVID-19 Mortality Burden in sub-Saharan Africa: Myth or Reality?
          https://www.ghspjournal.org/content/9/3/433

          6. Also, look at the co-morbidities associated with covid-19.
          https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/clinical-care/underlyingconditions.html
          If you’re in a poor nation, not many people can afford to be out of shape, overweight, diabetic, have organ transplants, get advanced cancer treatments, etc.; or
          will survive chronic lung/liver/heart disease long enough to have lived into the time of covid.

          This ought to motivate high income world people to get some exercise…
          Physical inactivity is associated with a higher risk for severe COVID-19 outcomes: a study in 48 440 adult patients
          https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/55/19/1099

          1. 1. Yes, I think the idea has merit but, it seems to me that people are contorting themselves like pretzels to try and find reasons other than the “covid medicine kits” (containing zinc, vitamin C, vitamin D and ivermectin) for declines in case in Uttar Pradesh as an example. Madagascar claimed to have developed their own homegrown treatment based on artemesia annua (sweet wormwood) and reports suggest that it was used in combination with ivermectin. Whatever they did in Madagascar, it appears to have worked very well.

            All other points are well taken with a note on point 6. As I believe is the case in North America poor people in my neck of the woods often end up obese. It can be prohibitively expensive to eat a proper diet as opposed to a diet high in carbohydrates, sugar, fats and oils. Fruits and vegetables are relatively expensive when compared to wheat, corn, sugar and root crops like potatoes or yams. A large proportion of what passes for food in shops is made with just carbohydrates, sugar, salt and oils so it is relatively easy to gain weight on a tight budget. To confirm what I suspected from casual observation of the people I see every day, a quick search brought up this from globalnutritionreport.org :

            Jamaica has shown limited progress towards achieving the diet-related non-communicable disease (NCD) targets. The country has shown no progress towards achieving the target for obesity, with an estimated 33.4% of adult (aged 18 years and over) women and 15.3% of adult men living with obesity.

            My casual observation was that there are a lot of obese people in Jamaica. I might see it more because I live in the capital city but, I definitely notice that most people just keep gaining weight as they grow older and my casual observation was that the phenomenon is more noticeable among women. The statistics quoted above suggest that more than twice as many women are obese.

            I look at things like a comparison between South Korea and Japan, separated by 180 km (112 miles) across the Korean Strait. Both highly vaccinated but, daily new cases low and declining in Japan while surging in South Korea.

            There’s also the curious case of Indonesia, the Philippines and Malaysia. Malaysia with the highest vaccination rate is struggling with more new daily cases while Indonesia has “that familiar curve” and the Philippines is somewhere in between but, doing a lot better than Malaysia.

            I am suspicious of Israel. The sudden precipitous decline will probably be attributed to the fact that 44% of the population has received booster shots but, is that really plausible when slightly more than 30% are yet to receive a single dose? The shape of the curve looks a lot like Japan, Uttar Pradesh, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Namibia, Zambia etc. One of the most outspoken advocates for the use of Ivermectin in the treatment of COVID-19 has been one Prof. Eli Schwartz, Director of the Center for Geographic Medicine at Sheba Medical Center in Tel-Hashomer Israel.

            Israeli scientist says COVID-19 could be treated for under $1/day

            It will be really interesting to see how things continue to unfold. What I really look forward to is the success of Uttar Pradesh , Madagascar and Japan being repeated across the globe!

    2. Is this completely wrong?

      Vaccinated English adults under 60 are dying at twice the rate of unvaccinated people the same age

      https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/vaccinated-english-adults-under-60

      Peter Schirmacher with the University of Heidelberg in Germany reports that his group has studied 40 people who have died within two weeks of vaccination; he concluded that around 30% to 40% of the total did truly die from the vaccine.

      https://trialsitenews.com/in-germany-some-groups-suspect-covid-19-vaccination-deaths-are-undercounted-but-not-the-majority/

      Is Schirmacher a fraud, and are the English mortality results fabricated by deniers?

      1. Is Schirmacher a fraud, and are the English mortality results fabricated by deniers?

        You left out most of the article, including the headline:
        In Germany, Some Groups Suspect COVID-19 Vaccination Deaths are Undercounted but Not the Majority The term “Some Groups” is a dead giveaway. These groups are the anti-vaxxer groups.

        And your second link, produced by an anti-vaxxer group called “Unreported Truths” is total bullshit. I went to their British Government page: Deaths by vaccination status, England and downloaded their XLSX data. Deaths per 100,000 for the unvaccinated was 41.6. For the vaccinated it was 6. Their graph is nothing but a goddamn lie. Go to the Excel page yourself and do the averages.

        The data was from this table:
        Table 3: Weekly age-specific mortality rates by vaccination status for deaths involving COVID-19, per 100,000 people, England, deaths occurring between 2 January 2021 and 24 September 2021

        Rows where the deaths came out to 0 they just inserted a : (colon). I replaced the colon with a 0.

        1. The claim made from inspecting the ONS statististics was not that the vaccine failed to reduce chances of death from Covid:
          picking the 24/sept/2021 and the (very broad) age range 10-59 we find
          28/7,167,322 deaths amongst unvaxed …
          and 29/17,924,346 fully vaxed –
          so it appears to be working (though vaccine uptake is lower amongst minority communities with greater susceptibility due to BMI, Vit D and other variables).

          The claim made was that overall, death from **all causes** was higher amongst the fully vaccinated; for the same sample date:
          68/7,167.322 unvaxed = 9.5 per million
          400/17,924,346 fully vaxed = 22.316 per million
          (Table 4 in the excel spreadsheet)
          So at least there is prima facie evidence that being fully vaccinated does not reduce overall chance of death in this specific age group in England at the moment, for whatever reason.
          Perhaps you were just looking at covid related deaths within 28 days of a positive test?
          I have not plotted out the entire all cause 10-59 mortality calendar , but the spot check seems OK?

          For anyone interested, here is a link to the office of national statistics spreadsheet:
          https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/deathsbyvaccinationstatusengland

          I normally lurk, but have heard second hand tales of people suddenly dying at quite young ages, and I know you guys love to thrash statistics, especially on LTO.

          That German pathologist did appear quite qualified, though he is now in disgrace.

          1. If you are looking at all deaths in people under 60 by vaccination status, you need to look at the age profile of the vaccinated and unvaccinated cohorts. Vaccination rate of 60 y/o is about 85% in the UK, vaccination rate of 20yo is much younger. The average age of the vaccinated cohort will be decades higher than that of the unvaccinated. The difference is more than enough to explain the higher deaths by all causes.
            Anybody with any statistical understanding of the data that does not mention this is lying by omission.

            1. The other stuff is the lockdown indirect damage.

              Many people have stopped exercising ( not everyone is a jogger, the only sport still allowed ), got fat, started drinking or smoking pot, and last but not least got depressed (better smoking pot than this fate).

              Some young colleagues at work have been in a terrible shape – this is wide spread. An actor I know committed suicide – he was a stage hog in a corona lockdown.

              I think this indirect damage is the highest of all – at least for all under 50, and under 30 especially.

            2. Hi Ralph, do you have more accurate ONS data that you would be willing to share to prove that this is an artifact caused by differences in Vax acceptance filtering for age?. I suppose just looking at the same data in 2019 pre-Vax for that (ridiculously wide) age cohort should show any untoward change, but I cant find the matching data set. All sorts of other stuff on the site, including deaths by helium inhalation, which I didnt know was a thing.

              edit: I found this:
              https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/adhocs/13787deathsfromallcausesbysexfiveyearagegroupandyeardeathsregisteredinweek19toweek38of2015to2019englandandwales

              and by toting up the deaths one can work out the annualised death rate for the 10-59 cohort, it is 109 283 503 655 938 1312 1890 3115 4718 6409
              per annum – or 383 per week. The population has not changed that much, 400 per week in the ONS data for all cause fully vaxed still looks high, especially for a week in late summer for a smaller population sample (since the partially vaxed and unvaxed are excluded)
              from this
              https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/uk-population-by-ethnicity/demographics/age-groups/latest#main-facts-and-figures
              I get the total population 10-59 to be 36820k
              (3259 2079 5267 3836 3684 3732 4099 4100 3601 3163)k
              so the fully vaxed are 17924/36820 of the population, and should have accounted for that fraction of pre covid annualised deaths. 383*(17924/36820) = 186 expected deaths, not 400.
              I thought a greater proportion of the population was fully vaxed, so there is probably an error somewhere – perhaps this is because the population & pre covid death statistics includes Wales, and the covid related stats are for England only. Wales has 3million people, England 53 million, so not really enough to explain it. Oh well.

            3. A statistician from Queen Mary College London has analysed the same ONS all cause mortality data and concluded that (almost)nothing can be deduced for it due to the wide age ranges, that the proportion of vaccinated seems wrong, and that delayed reporting of deaths can produce bizarre anomalies.
              So yes, the all cause mortality plots for 10-59 are very misleading.
              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6umArFc-fdc
              The ONS really should do better.

    3. Seven doctors contract Covid after attending Florida anti-vaccine summit

      Seven anti-vaccine doctors fell sick after gathering earlier this month for a Florida “summit” at which alternative treatments for Covid-19 were discussed.

      A worker puts bags of sweet potatoes in a container in the warehouse of the Alameda County Community Food Bank in Oakland, Calif., on Nov. 5, 2021. U.S. food banks dealing with increased demand from families sidelined by the pandemic now face a new challenge – surging food prices and supply chain issues. As holidays approach, some food banks worry they won’t have enough turkeys, stuffing and cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving and Christmas. (AP Photo/Terry Chea)
      US asks court to immediately lift stay on workplace vaccine rule
      Read more
      “I have been on ivermectin for 16 months, my wife and I,” Dr Bruce Boros told the audience at the event held at the World Equestrian Center in Ocala, adding: “I have never felt healthier in my life.”

      The 71-year-old cardiologist and staunch anti-vaccine advocate contracted Covid-19 two days later, according to the head event organizer, Dr John Littell.

      Littell, an Ocala family physician, also told the Daily Beast six other doctors among 800 to 900 participants at the event also tested positive or developed Covid-19 symptoms “within days of the conference”.

      Littell raised the suggestion the conference was therefore a super-spreader event but rejected it, vehemently saying: “No.

      Those doctors should get the Darwinian award. Anti-vaxxers are dying at a much higher rate than those who follow the science. But the below link is proof of that if proof ever existed. Bold mine.

      Deadly partisan divide: Gap between COVID deaths in red vs. blue counties larger than ever

      October saw the largest difference to date, with three times as many residents dying of COVID-19 in counties where at least 60% voted for Trump than in counties that supported Biden.

      When it comes to the percentage of vaccinated people in these communities the numbers are reversed, with increasingly more Biden supporters getting vaccinated than Trump supporters.

      A poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 90% of adult Democrats said they had received at least one dose of the vaccine, compared to roughly 60% of Republicans.

      There is just no doubt about it. Vaccinations save lives and horse dewormers and other such bullshit remedies cause deaths.

      1. Me being me I watched the recording of the entire Ocala event. While seven doctors contracted covid, how many have had to go to hospital? Pierre Kory got infected even though he was taking ivermectin but he seems fine and he is obese.

        Looking at the data from my neck of the woods, I compared daily new cases per million form Barbados, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago. Barbados has the highest rate of vaccinations (53%,47%) and the highest (but declining) daily new cases. Trinidad an Tobago has a slightly lower vaccination rate (46%,45%) than Barbados but, daily new cases are rising sharply. Jamaica has the lowest vaccination rate (22%, 17%) and the lowest number of daily new cases. Barbados has the highest literacy rate and Jamaica has the lowest. Trinidad and Tobago has the lowest electricity and fuel prices and the highest per capita GDP ($15,384). The GDP of Barbados is only slightly lower ($15,191). The GDP of Jamaica is less than a third of the other two ($4,665).

        Either there is something out there that is more effective at controlling the spread of this virus or there is massive manipulation of the data being carried out. i just don’t see how it all adds up. The data as I see it does not make sense.

        1. There has been much discussion about epidemiologists regarding the unpredictable nature of the Covid spread. I first heard a discussion of a county in the US with a high rate of new cases, and the expectation that it would quickly spread to adjacent counties. But it didn’t.

          I had the impression that social distancing and masks has a big effect on covid spread, and this was demonstrated repeatedly in US states where some counties had mask mandates and adjacent counties didn’t.

          Vaccination rates seem to be more important in controlling the severity of the spread.

          Where i live, there’s more than 90% vaccination, and no shortage of people who point out that the new cases are more closely divided than 90/10. On some days new cases are split 50/50 between vaccinated and non-vaccinated. But those people who leap on this as signs of a conspiracy focus on numbers and not ‘rates’, and aren’t doing the basic math which shows that the new case ‘rate’ is much higher among non-vaccinated.

      2. There has been a mysterious increase in UK heart attacks in recent months:

        https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/mystery-rise-in-heart-attacks-from-blocked-arteries-m253drrnf
        scientists say this could be down to the increased consumption of fried breakfasts etc:
        https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rise-in-heart-attacks-attributed-to-pandemic-stress-and-poor-diet-gdpn5bcgd

        However, this has not stopped some crank cardiologist from publishing this:
        https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/circ.144.suppl_1.10712
        Mrna COVID Vaccines Dramatically Increase Endothelial Inflammatory Markers and ACS Risk as Measured by the PULS Cardiac Test: a Warning
        Steven R Gundry
        Notice that ‘Dr’ Gundy is sole author, he obviously had collaborators, why are they not named so that disciplinary action can also be taken against them?. Apparently this guy has conducted heart surgery on children in the past!. He wont be conducting cardiology for much longer when his management team find out about his vax denialism!.

    1. Yes, the simple fact is that Europe is grossly overpopulated in terms of energy supply.
      Grossly.
      Rapid downsizing should have commenced in the last century.
      Most of the countries are so far behind the situation.
      They will have to scramble.
      Please, please avoid ethnic cleansing this time.
      I am truly sorry for the situation.

      Same scenario with the rest of the world to variable degrees.

      btw- I am an advocate of rapid wind and solar deployment. But not in places that are cloudy or calm.
      Europe is cloudy north of the Alps.
      https://globalsolaratlas.info/map?c=39.12793,-1.499634,8

      1. Would not nuclear power be a better solution to Europe’s energy problem , rather than your humane cull?.
        If it were not for mass migration, western Europe would be in quite a steep population decline.

        1. In my way of thinking, each country must make their own decision about the issue of
          -immigration, euthanasia, birth control, and overall population goals
          All I am saying is that most of Europe has grown far beyond their resource base (primarily by expropriating resources from every other continent over the past 500 years)
          -Nuclear Power. It is not for me to say what Ukraine or Germany should decide on this. It may be their best shot at maintaining some baseload power to compliment the other sources they have. But take note that it must be done flawlessly, and is very expensive, and takes a long time to build out. Their choice.

          1. Nuclear power has to be the answer IMO. And for nuclear to work a solution must be found to the long lived transuranic waste problem. One solution is to burn these actinides for energy, leaving short lived fission products and fuel pin husks, an excellent presentation on burning Candu waste is here:
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEQLSsfrqXw
            Fast neutron reactors were developed to address a perceived uranium shortage.
            The US had a world lead in fast reactor technology with the ‘Integral’ reactor project, this had onsite reprocessing and had very high burnup. A book was written on the technology and management of this great American success story:
            http://www.thesciencecouncil.com/pdfs/PlentifulEnergy.pdf&clen=7332697&chunk=true
            The reactor was demonstrated to be walk away station blackout safe.
            John Kerry aborted the project as unnecessary, though it seems unlikely this was due to big carbon political lobbying, I find it hard to understand.
            Fast reactors use liquid salt or metal as coolant, this can be used in demand dips to heat massive reserves of liquid salt (typically sodium nitrate, I believe), just as with thermal solar plants. This could be used to enable the plant to load follow, and not be forced to sell at negative prices when renewables are over producing at their guaranteed tariff.
            Bill Gates and Warren buffet are funding just such a reactor scheme (sodium cooled IIRC), and the Moltex reactor project is similar but using salt as primary coolant.
            Like vaccines, however, no company could afford to insure their product against losses should something go wrong, the government needs to underwrite it. And so politics comes in to play.
            To leave future populations in the dark with vast quantities of radioactive waste seems immoral.

            1. “John Kerry aborted the project as unnecessary”

              Absolute bullshit narrative. Kerry was against the funding in 1994. He was a senator.
              The funding could have been brought forward twice a year since.
              If it was such a good and viable idea there has been 27 years since for the US government, other world governments, or private or public industry from any country in the world to fund the project.

    2. Need more storage. With iron air and liquid metal batteries storage should get really cheap.

      1. Many times less costly to use energy directly than use stored echem energy. The minimum we plan for for off grid is 80% directl use. A 80 gal Hot Water Tank stores kWh of 2 powerwalls.

    3. Every kilowatt hour produced by wind and solar in Germany is one less that they have to produce with imported gas from Russia, lol.

      I can assure you that while a lot of younger Germans seldom if ever think about WWII, a lot of them DO, especialy older ones, and you can bet that since Russia is controlled by a mafia rather than a more typical government, the Russians haven’t forgotten either………. at least not the ones that might just shut off the gas and oil one day.

      One month would be long enough to put Western Europe in the poor house.

      The Germans are leading the western world in terms of going renewable, considering their geography and climate.

      I like Down Under, for sure…. but they have a climate that’s IDEAL for solar power, so comparing these two countries isn’t relevant in terms of effort and bang for the money invested.

      And as far as electricity prices in Germany go….. they’re not really that bad, compared to the rest of Europe, or even the USA, after accounting for the fact that Germany subsidizes heavy industry, plus the renewable energy program, at the expense of German householders.

      But millions of Germans make their living in those heavy industries, and they’re the source of almost all the foreign exchange Germany needs to import raw materials, due to exports of cars and machinery.

      Germans seem to be living as well as typical Americans, for about the same money in terms of hours actually worked to pay for electricity, because they make a lot, and because they use very efficient appliances as well.
      If you take out the use of electricity for air conditioning in the USA, and allow for high efficiency German appliances, they’re actually paying about the same as we Yankees.

      ( Of course they luck out on the AC thing, while losing on the sun and wind resource. )
      Annual net salary 31’005.00 € 34’744.20 USD 26’024.05 GBP
      Monthly net salary 2’583.75 € 2’895.35 USD 2’168.67 GBP
      .

      https://ru-geld.de/en/salary/average.html#salary-in-germany

      Weekly net salary 645.94 € 723.84 USD 542.17 GBP

      View all
      In the first half of 2021, the monthly electricity bill for an average German household consisting of three people with a combined annual consumption of 3,500 kWh was 93.17 euros, the BDEW said.Oct 15, 202

      SO…… the average household electricity bill is less than four percent of the average take home pay per month.

      As Twain said, there are lies, damned lies and statistics.

      1. About German electricity prices, it’s worth noting that the government does not make any serious attempt to reduce prices. For example there is an electricity tax of €20.50 per megawatt hour to households.

        Solar contracts last 20 years with a guaranteed feed-in tariff, so people who got a very favorable rate 19 years ago are still cashing in. But The most expensive contracts are starting to run out now so the price will probably start falling next year.

        Of course the Greens are back in government (since yesterday), and they may push to jack up the prices again.

  8. PV should be distributed. Wind is mostly centralized due to scale and the 20h rule. So Rooftop PV is NOT subjected to the return on someone else’s capital utility scam. So one pays many times the energy cost if you don’t own it.

    1. But most of those “capital utility scam” prices consist of taxes and wages paid to the people who run the utility, fuel to run it, etc.

      And solar farms are now producing and SELLING ON long term contracts at as little as three cents per kilowatt hour, or even less, in nice sunny climates.

      I’m all in favor of distributed solar, but we need solar farms too.

      That’s where the real bang for the people’s dollar is biggest. We’re always going to have to have the grid ANYWAY, there’s no doing away with it, so we should be feeding as much fuel free cheap juice into it as possible.

      It’s hard to come by good numbers on how much we save by getting ten percent plus of our electricity from wind and solar power now, but it is obvious that this cuts into the sale price, as well as the quantity of coal used to generate power.

      And as storage technologies mature and are scaled up, it will eventually cut into the amount of gas needed, and the price of gas, by displacing gas from the heating market as people and businesses move to heat pumps, etc.

      1. “I’m all in favor of distributed solar, but we need solar farms too.”
        Absolutely.

        1. Many will not be able to afford the premium and complexity of centralized gen. Look what they done to Health Care. Energy dereg 100x fiasco. Net metering will be history soon. Who owns the sun? CB’s cant print electrons like they did shale investments. Power company CEO’s get it and build their own standalone power and bunkers.
          https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/43259/bunker-talk-lets-talk-about-what-we-did-and-didnt-cover-this-week?utm_source=spotim&utm_medium=spotim_recirculation

          Lucky the shareholders of NEE in last decade. Massive transfer of wealth from the Energy challenged.

      2. Heat pumps are a big problem here in my opinion. They are best for countries with mild winters.

        Here are often in winter 2 bad situations:
        – as last week and now ending, low wind, clowdy and foggy, and low temperature around freezing point
        – Or a siberian high – there is sun in the few sun hours, but often foggy – and very cold, up to -20 Celsius. This is, as a summer high, combined with very low wind

        In both scenarios, wind is low and solar zero / good for winter to mediocre.

        And heat pumps get lower efficience with low temeratures – electricity usage will go sky high when everyone would be using a heat pump (the government wants this!).

        So backup power has to kick in at high rates. Burning gas in high rates, now NG later on perhaps hydrogen. There has to be a HUGE storage system for this, since these conditions can last 3 weeks , then 1 or 2 good windy weeks and then 3 again. The current NG cavern system is sized for some NG direct heating and some electricity peaker usage – and is supported by the russian pipeline running full power in the winter, too.

        So a hydrogen backup system has to be a lot bigger than the current system. It’ll take some time to build this, and I think a trillion € (together with all this surplus capacity to fill it). Until now, not even a blueprint exists and envirmental climate groups are canceling gas pipelines – which are needed for this.

        Or as I say, combine it with nuclear and geothermie, then the storage problem will be much smaller and more easy to handle. And faster to build several medium sized installations the same time than one big monosized.

        1. In a prior home (Seattle WA) we added a heat pump to an existing gas furnace setup.
          Our Nat Gas consumption plummeted, and our overall energy bill dropped by over 30%.
          Also the heat pump provides outstanding (very efficient) cooling during heat waves.

          The newer generations of heat pumps are far better than those of prior decades.
          Preconceived notions on advancing technologies can make ones opinions obsolete.

          1. With an average low temp of 7C, Seattle would seemingly fall comfortably within the category of ‘countries with mild winters’.

            1. True, but people much further north are using the heat pumps more and more.
              During the times when temps are below 25 degrees many systems use nat gas or resistive electric heating elements to augment the heat pumps function.

              Minnesota-
              “The heat pump keeps his home warm until temperatures drop below 25 degrees Fahrenheit, when the propane furnace starts up. His propane fuel consumption dropped annually from 1,200 gallons to 500 gallons. The electricity rate and lower propane use save $300 to $400 yearly and the new system runs quieter, saves money and provides as much comfort, “if not more,” he said, than the old system.”

              Maine-
              “Since 2013, the state’s efficiency utility, Efficiency Maine… for more than 60,000 heat pumps”

            2. Like most of Europe. The big population centers in Western Europe do not experience cold winters.

            3. Hickory,

              Was the Seattle heat pump air-based? When was it installed? As you note, air-based systems are getting better: I think some handle temps down to 0F.

            4. Yes Nick- it was air-based heat pump,as are the vast majority. The ground source heat pumps are much more efficient, but require the additional cost and space of drilling the heat exchange loops.
              I would definitely go with ground source if able.

              And the heat pump was older- 2010 vintage.
              Improvements have been coming, and coming.

  10. The new “omnicron” covid variant has now been identified in Hong Kong, Israel, Belgium, Germany, Czech Republic, UK and almost certainly Netherlands. It is clearly highly infectious and there are anecdotal reports from South Africa that it causes serious disease in many unvaccinated people under the age of 40. It is not known yet if it causes serious disease in more vaccinated people than other variants, but at least 3 of the cases identified so far were fully vaccinated. Fauci is reporting it has likely already arrived in the US.
    The world’s governments have a choice now, today. Act cautiously and re-introduce mask mandates, social distancing, working from home, etc., or do not and hope that this variant is less deadly than Delta. Tomorrow will be too late to decide.

    1. There’s no way we’re going back to any tyrannical mandates here in the US. That’s political suicide. Even in areas where people once happily masked up and got vaxxed as soon as possible, people are getting tired of all this BS.

      1. “Even in areas where people once happily masked up and got vaxxed as soon as possible, people are getting tired”

        I live in one of those areas where people are heavily tilted (over 70%) in favor of public health measures, like masks and vaccinations, and they expect the government to take very strong measures to help protect the public health, the medical system workers, and the economy.
        Sure everyone is really tired of the pandemic, and here the majority are extremely tired of the selfish ignorance of those who have stood in the way of the national attempt to gain some control over the pandemic.
        This isn’t some juvenile partisan game, as about 30% of the populace seem to be engaged in.

      2. Here in Toronto, we still have a mask mandate despite an extremely high vaccination rate.

        And with the advent of Omicrom, we look at each other and say “Dodged a bullet.”

        And then we look south and say “What a scary bunch of morons”.

  11. About heat pumps and places with really cold winters…….
    The best ones now work well down to -20 C, and even lower.

    But maybe the more important aspect of having heat pumps is that they can and do lower the total amount of gas or coal needed over the course of a year, both necessarily imported in many countries.

    A heat pump may not be a good deal in January or February, but it could more than pay its way by overperforming in the fall and spring.

    This would mean big savings in foreign exchange, greater national security, and so forth.

    So….. is economical storage possible, such that enough gas can be kept on hand to provide the necessary backup during the coldest weather when the sun is weakest and the wind takes the day off?

    I’m thinking that the long term solution is going to involve super energy efficient housing to an ever greater extent.

    How about a small fully automated natural gas engine, fully enclosed, nice and quiet, built so well it’s SAFE to use indoors, with the power shaft running thru a wall to the heat pump’s outside unit?

    It would easily possible to capture up to ninety percent or more of the otherwise wasted heat of combustion of the fuel, using it to warm the house.

    The engine could also be coupled to a generator, and the juice used to run appliances as well as charge up a storage battery.

    This would be substantially more efficient than getting electricity from the grid.

    The salvaged heat could be stored in a tank of water, or AS domestic hot water, allowing efficient use of the engine and generator for a few hours here and there when the need for heat is low or even absent…. say mid afternoon, when it’s warm. That heat would be valuable as it gets colder thru the night.

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