140 thoughts to “Open Thread Non-Petroleum September 19, 2024”

    1. OK, given your moniker I’ll ask the obvious question.

      Stock up on what exactly?

      1. And just to clarify since this type of communication can be tough to interpret tone, I meant this as a sincere question.

      2. Surprisingly, the LDS church (aka Mormons) puts heavy emphasis on disaster planning, so just go to their website and you’ll find lots of info.

        IIRC, water, flour, bread are tops.

  2. One for the cornucopians and EV believers.
    https://www.acea.auto/pc-registrations/new-car-registrations-18-3-in-august-2024-bev-market-share-down-by-almost-one-third/
    The EU new car sales continue to stall, led by declines in EV purchases, especially in the German market. YTD data for BEV’s is a market share of 12.6 % of new cars, against a target(mandate) of 22% for 2024, rising to 28% for 2025.

    Worse still is that 3 year old BEV vehicles with around 30 k miles are fetching around 30-35% of original pricing . High end marques are even worse affected.

    All the German brands are in deep doo-doo with BEV’s.( VW, BMW, Mecedes, Porsche). Meanwhile gasoline and diesel used car pricing remains firm to tight depending on the marque.

    Reasons given for fall in sales include,: cost(buying and operating), depreciation, charging infrastructure, range anxiety. Private buyers are particularly elusive for BEV’s.

    With BEV sales in the doldrums it is highly unlikely that gasoline demand is going to decline any time soon, short of a global recession which could happen, judging by what is going on in China.

    1. Join the parade. Pretend that oil supplies are an inexhaustible resource, and not subject to geopolitical supply disruption.

    2. What happened in Germany is that the government subsidized EVs using a fund that was originally set up for COVID, and the opposition sued and won in court, so demand went down. It’s about political games, not the technology.

      Meanwhile the Chinese market continues to grow while the US and EU are scrambling to block imports of cheap Chinese EVs with 100% tariffs.

      I remember when cell phones were laughed at as “yuppie toys”. Then the price crashed and everyone noticed how much cheaper telecommunication is without land lines. Now there are more cell phone lines than people on the planet. The expensive part of an EV is the battery, and the price fell by half this year alone.

      There’s no question that the car market is going electric. Your best counterargument seems to be childish name calling. That isn’t a great argument, but I guess it’s all you’ve got.

      The internal combustion engine is going the way of typewriters, eight track tape and cathode ray tubes. All wonderful technologies, but none of them competitive any more.

      1. “There’s no question the car market is going electric..” That there is growth in a segment of the light vehicle market does not mean that segment then becomes the entire market anymore than the growth in the light truck market over the last 30 yrs means all vehicles will be light trucks. Speaking of the US market there is no growth left. It’s a mature market where used vehicle sales are greater than new vehicles. While total sales are roughly flat and per capita sales are on a slow decline.
        Whatever your goal is for EV domination I don’t see it happening or being relevant to addressing the challenges that the nation will have with climate change or declining oil supply simply because it’ll be cheaper to drive less and buy what is economical on the used market than buy a more expensive vehicle to drive the same amount.

        1. LEEG —
          I didn’t say anything about climate change.

          I don’t really buy into your analogy with the pickup truck fad, because we’re talking about technical change not a fad, but I agree that there will be niches for combustion engines for a while.

          1. Ok how about this, the sunk cost in ICE infrastructure and used vehicle market make BEVs an expensive choice that limits its rate of adoption. Instead of the US car market going electric it’s going flat and eventually downhill.

            1. Yes, sunk costs are a issue. People think high gas prices will get people to switch to BEVs, but prices go up and down. The switch would only come if the is a long term expectation of change.

              If the price of gas doubles in America people won’t rush out and buy a new $50,000 car — they’ll wait until it falls again.

              That is one reason why BEVs are so popular in China — the government has made it clear that their policy is against importing oil and for EVs. In Europe it is mixed, and the American government has shown it won’t raise taxes on gas or make any other serious attempts to transition the economy. So change will be slow, leaving America stuck with older tech and overconsuming oil.

              Another issue is that most private vehicle owners aren’t very good at calculating total cost of ownership of vehicles. Fleet managers have much more experience and better data. So I expect fleet to switch first.

              What I see in America is that the crushing cost of poorly designed cities and lack of transportation options is slowly dawning on people. Electrification will probably accompany the rise of micro-mobility and public transportation as cities realign themselves to be more efficient.

      2. Ah, the usual suspects of Hickory and Alimbiquated engaging their mouth rather than their brains before reading the text. Both of you should know by now that I am deeply concerned about resource depletion and population overshoot and the impending approach of Peak Oil.

        The ICE has a short lived future, but then the BEV might be extinct sooner because it will, in your fairy tale world, will be utterly dependent on unreliables.

        1. BEV might be extinct sooner because it will, in your fairy tale world, will be utterly dependent on unreliables.

          LOL like Trump’s claim that electric planes will fall out of the sky when the sun sets.

          No, your electric vehicle won’t care where how the energy is generated. That’s not how electricity works.

          You’ve got two completely different concepts muddled up in your head.

    4. Cornucopia he says.
      When it comes to energy that implies abundant supplies coming from a wide range of sources.
      Like we have now in the US and much of the world.

      Going forward I am/have been concerned that the abundance part of the cornucopia equation is fragile and at risk, with fossil fuels at or approaching peak supplies…not to mention very poor geographic dispersion of remaining reserves.

      This makes the variety of energy source part of the equation all the more important. Non-fossil energy generation sources should be ramped up to the degree possible.

      Can the overall supply remain abundant?
      Yes in some places for awhile, and unlikely in others.
      Part of that depends on geography, on choices, on managing the cards that have been dealt, and on making changes. I suspect that it will be a massive battle, likely one of retreat.
      Some may disagree with me on that.

      Time will tell. Hands in the pockets is a rapid losing game.
      The ones who I see advocate a ‘hands in pocket’ stance come in two flavors. One group are those who feel poised to profit from the pending fossil fuel shortage scenario. The other group are those who have become a form of hardcore environmentalists, generally after many decades of being mass consumers of energy but now expect others to live differently (impoverished) from how they themselves have lived.

      I think that most regions will eventually work very hard to keep up with energy supplies from one source or another. Even if it means cutting down the last tree. Seriously…before the fossil fuel era most of Europe had been severely denuded of tree cover, and slavery or the near economic equivalent was the vast majority.

      1. “Hands in the pockets is a rapid losing game”

        Hands in the pockets is for sure a losing proposition. There are so many things that can be done both when it comes to supply and demand of energy… actually thousands of small or big impact decisions can be made. Hence, staying ahead of the game and anticipating future trends will help going forward. There are also still possibilities of developing technology to offer (even) more benefits for the same energy expenditure in some sectors of the economy.

        I suspect many good initiatives would be on the demand side with the aim of a budget variant of “almost the same experience” first, since these are the easiest pickings for some sort of austerity. The supply side is in a way harder “to fix”, because it involves heavy in front investments in what the initiators hope is the best application way ahead of the scenario painted. Renewable energy can be overbuilt, but only in the right areas with the right infrastructure and back up systems. The good old trusted solution to squeeze more out of fossil fuels will continue as well (for oil now in Namibia or maybe revitalising the Cantarell field in Mexico etc.).

        I have to end by mentioning that there are several ways to cope with “a squeeze” scenario defined as too little supply and too much demand going forward. OFM posts are usually on point when it comes to this. Examples could be: Strip down EVs to cover the essentials at a lower cost, standardise parts and make them durable, live comfortably in half the space, make trips look good and offer great experiences at half of the energy cost, if wanting to spend too much (and be able to afford it); do it less frequent or cheaper with 80-90% of the experience intact. And so on. I am sure those reading this get the point, since there are thousands of ways to innovate and bring balance to the system. The whole argument building is that a very sudden downturn in the economy will probably be short lived. And that the whole energy transition scenario would be a very long one.

      2. not to mention very poor geographic dispersion of remaining reserves.

        This raises a very important point: solar and wind are far more evenly distributed than FF ever was. Almost every country has solar resources, even if their intensity/insolation varies (just look at Germany, which has poor wind and solar resources, but they care more about energy independence than they do about minimizing cost, so they’re going to make domestic energy work!). Even wind power is more evenly distributed than FF.

        Given that wind and solar are as cheap as FF ever was, energy availability is at least as good now as ever. That still doesn’t guarantee countries will manage their energy properly, but the communications revolution has certainly made expertise more widely available than ever, so the chances are at least improving…

    5. I can only speak for myself, but let me say this: they are too darned expensive!

      The math doesn’t add up. It actually costs money to buy a car, you know. It’s not just what the car runs on.

      I can run my 2013 CR-V at 22 mpg till kingdom come and save money by never purchasing another car again unless I have to.

      1. That’s because you probably live in a country that has an established automobile manufacturing sector and has imposed high tariffs on the importation of Chinese vehicles. Where I live there is no such thing and new EVs attract customs duty of just 10%, the lowest duty for any motorized light vehicle with more than two wheels. As a result a brand new BYD Yuan Plus (Sold in some markets as the Atto 3) costs slightly less than a brand new Toyota RAV4 or Honda CRV.

      2. SGP,

        Buy a used EV. Over the life of a vehicle an EV can save $20k*, which is more than the price of a used EV. Heck, sell the CR-V for $12k and buy a 2013 Tesla for $15k.

        *If gas is $3.30/gallon, then 22MPG means $.15 per mile. $.12 power and 4 miles per kWh is 3 cents per mile. The difference is $.12 per mile. Drive 167k miles and that gives $20k savings. When doing these numbers remember to use marginal power costs rather than average (you get the average by dividing the whole bill by the kWhs. The marginal cost ignores fixed costs, which utilities love to raise because it discourages efficiency and substitution).

          1. JT,

            That is a ridiculous report, most EV users charge their car at home rather than using a public charger. In the US the average electricity price is about 16 cents per kWh and the Tesla Model 3 gets about 4 miles per kWh (my average over 70k mile), so cost is about 4 cents per mile. Gasoline is about $3/gallon in US, a car that gets 35 miles per gallon (US gallon) which would be about 8.6 cents per mile, so roughly two times more expensive per mile.

            1. Dennis,

              A few datapoints: the average electricity price in the US is about 16 cents, but that’s an average which includes fixed costs (they take the total bill and divide it by the total kWhs). That’s misleading. What matters is the marginal cost per kWh, which is probably about 12 cents. It can be even lower: the Energy Act of 2005 requires the availability of time-of-day metering and pricing. That means that every consumer, if they pursue the matter a bit, should be able to charge their EV at night at a much lower price.

              Finally, the average price of gas right now is $3.20, it’s often higher, and the average MPG of the US light vehicle fleet is only 23 (divide total miles traveled from the FHWA by total gallons consumed from the EIA).

              So, 14 cents per gallon for existing ICEs, 3 cents for EV = 11 cents per mile. Over 150k miles savings of $16,500.

            2. Dennis,

              The zerohedge article even admits your point. It quietly states 2/3 of the way through the article: “Charging at home is much cheaper, costing less than a third of rapid chargers.”

              Lying through selective emphasis.

            3. Dennis
              Like it or not the article demonstrates that fast charging stations are not financially viable. And not everyone can charge at home. This will limit EV sales which are already declining.

            4. Many people charge at home for less than 10 cents/kwhr since many utilities allow you to select a time-of-use plan that has a lower consumption rate between 10p-7a.

              Most (or all?) EV’s have charging software that allows you to specify the time of charging. You plug it in anytime, and it won’t charge until the time you specify (after 10p).

              Routine operations.
              My wife’s actual EV per mile ‘fuel’ cost is less than 1/3rd of what it would be for gasoline. She puts on a lot of miles, but charges at public station maybe once a year…none last year.

            5. It’s worth saying again:

              In the US, the Energy Act of 2005 requires the availability of time-of-day metering and pricing. That means that every residential consumer, if they pursue the matter a bit, should be able to charge their EV at night at a much lower price.

              Many utilities bury their time-of-use plans because, of course, they’ll allow some people to save money. But: ALL UTILITIES HAVE TO OFFER THEM.

            6. I had a conversation with a guy I ran into at a local supermarket parking lot who owns a three year old Mini Cooper S electric. This particular model was Mini’s first foray into EVs and has a range of something like 120 miles. Despite that, this guy told us that in three years he had NEVER had to use a public charger. He charges at his office or at home and restricts the use of that car to journeys that are within it’s range. Having said that he said it was his preferred daily driver, was fun to drive and very economical to operate. The 2025 version of the same car has double the range!

            7. And the great news is that she never has to go to a gas station…not the nicest place to spend even a minute of your life.

    6. Meanwhile, In the largest market for new cars in the world, China NEV retail at 445,000 in Sept 1-15, up 12% from same period last month

      Retail sales of passenger new energy vehicles (NEVs) in China amounted to 445,000 units in the September 1-15 period, up 63 percent from the same period last year and up 12 percent from the same period last month, data released by the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA) today showed.

      So far this year, cumulative retail sales of passenger NEVs in China totaled 6.45 million units, up 37 percent from the same period last year.

      Wholesale sales of passenger NEVs from September 1-15 were 441,000 units, up 49 percent from the same period last year and up 29 percent from the same period last month, according to the CPCA.
      Join us on Telegram or Google News

      So far this year, China’s cumulative wholesale sales of passenger NEVs were 7.12 million units, up 32 percent from a year earlier.

      From September 1-15, China’s retail sales of all passenger vehicles were 828,000 units, up 18 percent from the same period last year and up 12 percent from the same period last month.

      So far this year, cumulative retail sales of all passenger vehicles in China totaled 14.29 million units, up 3 percent year-on-year.

      This means that China’s NEV penetration at retail stood at 53.74 percent in the September 1-15 period and 45.15 percent so far this year.

      The North Americans and European readers on this web site really should get themselves up to speed on what is happening in China. The Mexicans and Australians already are getting a feel for where the auto industry is going with 67 different pure EVs available for purchase in Australia , from the Fiat 500e to the Rolls Royce Spectre.

      Here’s more news from another Chinese Automotive news site:
      New Wuling Bingo SUV launched in China for 10,750 USD

      The new Wuling Bingo SUV with a 5-seat interior has entered the Chinese market with a starting price of 75,800 yuan (10,750 USD). The funky crossover from the SAIC-GM-Wuling joint venture offers up to 510 km of range and a peak power of 75 kW (100 hp)

      Here is more news about another low cost EV that is the top selling car (of any kind) in China:
      BYD’s $10,000 Seagull EV was the top-selling car in China last month

      BYD’s cheapest electric car, the Seagull, was the top-selling car in China last month, with nearly 41,000 models sold. Starting at under $10,000, the BYD Seagull even has US automakers worried.

      BYD’s Seagull was China’s top-selling vehicle in August

      BYD has been on a roll, launching lower-priced, updated models of its best-selling models. In March, BYD launched the Seagull EV Honor Edition with a “shocking price” starting at just 69,800 yuan, or less than $10,000.

      Just five months later, BYD launched the 2025 Seagull with the same starting price. The Seagull is already sitting atop the sales charts in China.

      After a record-breaking August, BYD topped one million EV sales in 2024. The company sold a record over 373,000 new energy vehicles (including PHEVs) in August. Of them, 148,470 were all-electric.

      BYD’s Seagull was the top-selling vehicle in China in August, with 40,949 models sold. The company said the Seagull is now China’s best-selling A00 class model and pure electric car for the sixth consecutive month.

      1. I’ve read on various occasions that most of the people running China are rather well educated technocrats…… people who understand basic physics, basic geology, etc.

        And it’s generally accepted that even though the commies have been in power for quite some time, they still think in terms of the long term…….. that’s the historical or traditional Chinese way.

        It follows that they’re dead serious about weaning their economy off of oil in particular and fossil fuel in general as quickly as they can, as a practical matter.

        Our political leaders are more or less compelled to run on policies supporting short term prosperity.
        So we won’t have higher gasoline taxes…… or any really serious legislation forcing a faster transition to electrified personal transportation.

        1. OFM,

          Better policy would help, but even without that EVs and plugin hybrids are likely to win over people as they become cheaper to own and operate than ICEVs over the next decade. Not too long in the future it will be harder to fuel a vehicle as gas stations shut down due to lack of profits than to find a charger for an EV, homeowners can easily install a level 2 charger at home and renters in suburbs will rent from landlords that install chargers at their apartment parking lot. The market can take care of lots of issues.

        2. OFM —
          I think China’s move to EVs is more a case of typical Chinese frugality. They don’t like importing fuel and they want to export EVs to get more money.

          1. I see it more as a keen awareness of vulnerability.
            All of their imported oil comes through sea corridors controlled by an economic and political adversary.
            They import 59% of oil consumption as of 2024, and only have about 5 years of annual consumption in untapped domestic oil reserves.
            They tend to look beyond a 4 year election cycle when making industrial policy.
            They have a long sense of history, and apparently a very good sense of the future.

    7. Back in May Hickory brought up the news that Ethiopia has banned the importation of vehicles with internal combustion engines. This is not a planned ban but is a ban that was enforced earlier this year. From this web site only Iran has lower residential electricity prices: https://www.globalpetrolprices.com/electricity_prices/ Ethiopia has set up policies to encourage vehicle assembly in Ethiopia. I suspect Ethiopia may eventually get factories that can carry out the complete vehicle manufacturing process, As it stands, they are importing unfinished vehicles and completing the assembly in Ethiopia.

      1. Islandboy

        I am happy that Ethiopia followed what was an opportunity a few years back. What to do with excess hydro power in particular. The best option being to electrify transport in central urban areas and also to support industry that primarily used electricty. It is for the better benefit that they cooperated with China to get the EVs. When it comes to infrastructure deals going on in Africa especially, I have no competence to comment on anything. But I am curious to anyone open to say something about them.

  3. Constellation Energy Expects Regulatory Review of Planned Relaunch at Three Mile Island Nuclear Reactor to Start Soon
    17:02:39 PM ET, 09/20/2024 – MT Newswires
    05:02 PM EDT, 09/20/2024 (MT Newswires) — Constellation Energy (CEG) expects to meet publicly with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission “within the next two to three weeks” to begin a review of the utility’s proposed restart of the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor in Pennsylvania, a company spokesperson said in a late Friday email to MT Newswires.

    Constellation expects to submit its initial documents to the regulator before the end of the year and begin to address more detailed portions of its plan for review starting in around four months, the spokesperson said. The regulatory review should be completed sometime in 2027. “We are very confident in that timing,” the company’s spokesperson added.

    Constellation plans to spend $1.6 billion restoring the facility, a company spokesperson told MT Newswires in a separate email earlier in the day. The plant is expected to be online in 2028 as part of a 20-year power purchase deal with Microsoft (MSFT), which is expecting to use the electricity to power some of its future data center needs, Constellation said in a statement.

    Constellation shares closed more than 22% on Friday trade after announcing the proposed restart at Three Mile Island.

    “It’s up to Constellation to lay out its rationale for justifying restart, so we’re prepared to engage with the company on next steps,” a spokesperson for the regulator said in an email to MT Newswires late Friday.

    1. Good interview.

      It is obvious for the observant that economic growth will ALWAYS take precedence over climate change.

      The question is when they will collide to the point of climate change REALLY affecting economic growth.

      1. What do you mean by ‘really’?
        How do we measure that…what indications?
        Its not very accurate to attribute one regions disastrous flooding event to global warming.
        How high does climate related insurance problems have to get before it is considered to be negatively affecting economic growth?…we will find out the hard way.
        And many in the world cannot afford much in the way of insurance. The rest of us are generally heavily under-insured.
        https://bettermarkets.org/newsroom/new-report-as-climate-disasters-pummel-the-country-regulators-must-address-the-unseen-banking-crisis-concealed-behind-the-climate-crisis/

        Like you said. Economic activity will always be valued higher than environmental concerns. Humans are short term planners and actors. We spend much time in our heads rather than in the actual world that we live in.

        1. When economic growth shudders to a stop, and turns negative, the focus will turn to minimizing the rate of shrinkage. That proverbial dented can will continue to be kicked down the road. Personal motorized transport will become increasingly unaffordable to the general public ( along with accomodation, food, and other nice to have things.

          1. Global warming really hitting economic performance will happen (is happening) in small pockets for example where a crop comes in poor, flooding destroys infrastructure like rail/roadways/electrical/grid facilities, or dry watersheds with diminished hydroelectric output and riverine cargo navigation. You also do and will see climate destabilization contributing to failed state status in places like Sudan and Syria due to drought, or poor performance in places like Pakistan and Bangladesh due to flooding.
            All of this is very hard to attribute with accuracy, and comes in localized episodes that can be be devastating to the local population (and local GDP).

            If the question is when does global warming ‘really’ affect global economic growth to the point that it is clearly noticeable and acknowledged by those living in favored and prosperous zones…who knows. It will be long after the affects have actually been accumulating.

            1. It will become “noticeable and acknowledged” when those in surrounding countries see that those in “favored and prosperous” zones have stuff worth pursuing at any cost. I think that a slightly different version of that is already taking place in Europe and the US.
              Broad awareness of the big difference in living conditions over ever longer geographic distances will encourage mass migration of unprecedented magnitude. Given the increasing awareness that not-yet industrialized countries are suffering more from climate change that the industrialized countries, there will be a legitimate sense that “they owe us”.

            2. Good point. Migration pressure, and resistance, will be a key aspect to keep a watch on. And bankruptcies related to under-insured property loss. And food prices.

            3. Panama Canal is/was looking kinda pooched there for a bit, perhaps due to El Niño. Suez Canal isn’t doing much better, but for different reasons. That’ll take a bite out of pockets if it doesn’t improve. Collapse just kinda creeps up on you; death by 1000 cuts; political fragmentation; turmoil in the choke points and channeling terrain; unregulated mass migration; regional/multi-regional famine; more failed states; perceptions of objective scarcity. Welcome to the downward spiral.

              “It occurs first very slowly, then all at once” ~ Hemingway

              Pack a lunch!

            4. Yep. An example happened in one of the big exporting breadbaskets a couple years back. The Parana river was low for along time. Had trouble shipping grain downriver.
              “The Paraná River Basin has suffered an unprecedented drought since 2021, affecting hydropower generation, river-borne food shipments, and freshwater supplies for 40 million people across Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay.Dec 14, 2022”
              https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-58408791

    1. Hey Islandboy,

      My typical assumption is that most media reports of PV or wind power capacity additions refer to nameplate capacity. Does that match your experience?

      Also, when reading these articles I usually mentally discount these number by a factor of 75% to 90% to get a capacity equivalent to the larger existing system.

      Make sense?

      1. T Hill, your 90% discount would be about right for Solar PV here in the UK. Offshore wind however is reportedly at a 47% capacity factor (and improving) so a discount of 53% from nameplate capacity.

        1. John Norris–
          That 53% is based on the assumption that the rest of the industry runs at 100% capacity, which is nowhere near true. UK gas runs at about half capacity.

          1. Alim

            You are looking at electricity supply just as you would water supply which is not the right way to view it.
            If we have a lot of rain this can be stored very easily in large reservoirs to be used in the weeks and months to come. These reservoirs are relatively cheap when you consider how many billions of gallons they store for all the people and industries.
            This stored water can be piped to whoever needs it exactly when they need it.
            Wind and solar are utterly useless in supplying electricity when industries and people need it. There are times when solar and wind produce far more then is needed and they get shut down which is bad enough. Germany where wind and solar installed capacity is double it’s peak demand the haphazard delivery is only too obvious.
            Wind can be relied on to deliver 5% of it’s installed capacity that is why after 20 years of building wind and solar Germany coal and gas capacity is still over 100% and they need it.

            1. Using your rain analogy, what we need is affordable ways of storing electrical energy. Scientist and researchers all over the world are busy working on improving options for storing electricity. Right now the facilities for storing excess electricity production from wind and solar are inadequate in the extreme. So we are seeing a scenario similar to what happens in the case of extreme floods where water overflows dams and cannot be harnessed for useful purposes like irrigation or electricity generation .

            2. Actually, batteries work quite well.

              Look at the California ISO app called “ISO Today”, go to the Supply tab, and look at the “supply trend” and “Batteries trend”.

      2. Yes that makes sense. So for example when I read articles like World now has five times more PV than nuclear power I understand that to mean that the electricity generated by solar farms is approaching the amount generated by the world’s fleet of nuclear reactors,. In other words, in regions with good solar resources it will take four or five times the capacity for solar PV to generate the same as a typical nuclear plant. Looking at it that way, the world is on track to install enough solar in 2024 to match the electricity generated by about 100 nuclear reactors!

        1. Following on from my previous comment, this article France records 1 GW of new solar for Q2

          Grid operator Enedis said last week that France installed 1,013 MW of new PV systems in the second quarter alone. If the current growth rate continues in the second half, the country could install record capacity in 2024.

          This suggests that for 2024 France might install enough solar PV to generate about one tenth of a nuclear plant of similar capacity using a 10% capacity factor for PV and 100% for nuclear.

          The most recent nuclear plant to be built in France is the Flamanville facility.that started construction in 2007 and is yet to be commissioned into service, making it 12 years behind schedule. It will be able to generate up to 1,600 MW and cost four times as much as it’s originally budgeted cost of US$3.65 billion. The final amount used to build this plant could have built 16.5 GW of utility scale PV using 2019 cost for the installation of utility scale PV in France. (See How much does it cost to build a solar power plant in France). That is enough capacity to generate a similar amount of electricity as the Flamanville plant. Considering that PV system and utility scale battery costs are likely going to continue to decline, things are not looking good for nuclear.

        2. Well, solar can reach 28% capacity factor fairly easily in areas with good insolation, and the world average for nuclear plants is 84%, so that’s a ratio of 3 to one*.

          https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=39832

          *France, which relies heavily on nuclear, is 67%. The U.S., on the other hand, has only 20% of power from nuclear, so plants can run full out and achieve 92%.

          1. France nuclear poor performance in recent years has not been due to intentional curtailment, rather due to issues of decay and drought. The drought resulted in shortage of water for cooling and turbine operation. The French fleet is old. So is the US fleet. Both will have to keep running hard just to stay in place.

            Since people are talking about nuclear there is an excellent annual status report that gets published. Great info. here is the link to the 2024 report-
            https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/IMG/pdf/wnisr2024-v2.pdf

            1. France nuclear poor performance in recent years has not been due to intentional curtailment, rather due to issues of decay and drought…French fleet is old. So is the US fleet

              Have you seen a good discussion/analysis of this? I’ve seen some debate over time on the extent of France’s nuclear load following, and i do have the impression that the French are becoming disillusioned with nuclear…

            3. NICK G
              The problem with nuclear is something like the problem with the Deacon’s one-hoss shay.

              All the plants were built at roughly the same time and have the same life expectancy, so someday they will all die at the same time, and have to be replaced at huge cost in a short period.

              Of course it isn’t just nuclear that suffers from this. Any big widespread infrastructure project has the same problem. Highways are good example.

            4. “All the plants were built at roughly the same time and…have to be replaced at huge cost in a short period.“

              I agree.

              I suspect the lowest cost replacement won’t be nuclear. More likely solar with storage – it’s worth noting that nuclear needs storage almost as much as solar/wind: see the pumped storage that was needed to allow nuclear to follow load: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludington_Pumped_Storage_Power_Plant

              A related problem is that designs are standard for a whole class of plant: the discovery of a design flaw can lead to a need to shut them all down simultaneously, as we’ve seen in Japan and, arguably, Germany.

      3. T Hill. Yes nameplate capacity is what is listed for any power plant, be it nuclear, PV or whatever.
        To get a close approximation of actual annual electricity output you have to use the capacity factor CF of a specific plant . For solar or wind that is highly dependent on the site of deployment.
        We have plenty of data on actual CF for various installations in parts of the world, and for national averages.
        In the US utility scale nuclear has been averaging about 92% in the past decade (very good performance compared to France btw).
        For utility scale PV- “The US utility-scale solar generation fleet averaged a 24.2% capacity factor from January through December 2022”. This may slowly trend down a bit if more PV is deployed in cloudier areas, on average.
        For wind energy “Capacity factor of land based wind in the U.S. ranges from 21% to 52% and averages 35%.” Current offshore wind projects in Europe and Asia have been routinely achieving CF’s in the 40’s.

        For rough comparisons I use CF of 90 for nuclear, 20 for PV, 30 for onshore wind and 35 for offshore wind.

        Consider that CF’s for particular plants can also be heavily affected curtailments enforced by utilities when they have more juice than they can take in. This doesn’t affect nuclear much but certainly affects coal, solar, wind and nat gas plants at times.
        A nuclear plant gets taken offline for about 6 weeks every 18 months for refueling. And longer if things need retooling/repair. A hail storm can surely mess up the CF of a particular PV installation.

        Cool interactive map of US plants…you can click to see generation data and CF’s
        https://synapse.maps.arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/201fc98c0d74482d8b3acb0c4cc47f16

        UK offshore wind CF have been measured at 42.2 as of 2022! The CF’s of offshore have been growing from about 30 with bigger towers reaching up to higher wind resource.
        https://energynumbers.info/uk-offshore-wind-capacity-factors

  7. White, College+: 59-38% Harris
    White, no degree: 61-33% Trump

    Obvious, but still—-

    2. The fact that close to forty percent of college educated white people support trump doesn’t say much for overall quality of our colleges and universities, does it?

      1. This might be a case of correlation/causation not matching in the way it appears at first glance.
        I’ve held for a long time that the political strains in the US are not about intelligence but values. There are plenty of really smart people supporting Trump. They just have lousy values.

  8. Hadn’t seen this quote by Paul Ryan ( Republican former Speaker of the House).

    https://www.newsweek.com/stephen-king-uses-republican-paul-ryans-words-against-donald-trump-1957466

    X post by Stephen King:

    Republican Paul Ryan, former Speaker of the House, says he won’t be voting for Donald Trump. “Character means too much to me.”

    Original X post below

    https://x.com/StephenKing/status/1837648203048423838?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1837648203048423838%7Ctwgr%5E8cfd8f833dc7f52e41b58d661d8a7f4c3959ebc9%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newsweek.com%2Fstephen-king-uses-republican-paul-ryans-words-against-donald-trump-1957466

  10. Tough times are built in, no question. Given the still growing population, depletion of one time gift of nature resources, and forced climate change, it’s just about impossible to argue otherwise.

    But there’s some reason to believe we can and will come up with some solutions, or at least partial solutions, depending on how fast things change. We aren’t going to be burning oil by the millions of barrels per day to run personal vehicles twenty years down the road.

    And it may well be that we won’t have enough raw materials to manufacture millions of electric cars and light trucks similar to the ones we use today . But if we have no choice other than go to electric micro mini cars that won’t go more than a hundred miles, or even less, on a charge, that’s what we will do……. If we have time enough to do so.

    We’re not about to give up suburbia and the countryside here in the USA if there’s any conceivable way to avoid doing so. Building five or six two seater fore and aft short range minicars using the battery materials needed for one three hundred mile mid size modern car won’t be any problem at all. People will get used to driving such cars just as they have gotten accustomed to dealing with bumper to bumper traffic…… they’ll hardly even think about it, after a while.

    And it won’t be all that big a deal to convert today’s mcmansions into duplexes or triplexes, once it’s the obvious way to solve a big chunk of the housing problem.

    A lot of people in a lot of places are going to be in a hell of a lot of trouble, because the climate is just about sure to deteriorate to the point raising enough food locally or regionally will be tough to impossible. But in a country as thinly populated as the USA, we probably have a good or at least fair shot at maintaining food production… especially if give up eating so much meat and substitute more grains and vegetables.

    We might even put a few million acres under glass…….. which sounds like a gigantic job, but if we’re building few or no new roads or shopping centers, or sports stadiums or air ports, and not many houses, maybe we can do it.

    And we can definitely build out enough wind and solar infrastructure to keep any really critical industry up and running for quite some time into the future… simply by maintaining some gas fired generating capacity setting aside gas enough to keep the wheels turning as necessary.

    There’s no doubt at all that we can give up our use it one or twice and throw it away addiction to junk products from clothing to furniture….. once we have to.

    The economy might hold up better than expected, for longer than expected, if we’re lucky.

    1. OFM
      While not claiming any expertise in the subject I’ve thought a lot about how personal transportation might change in a lower energy consumption environment.
      I don’t like tandem cars, I don’t like three wheeled vehicles and I don’t think very many people will find either acceptable. But I do think that 100 mile two or three passenger EVs will prevail in the not-too-distant future. If you have ever had a commute of any distance, particularly with stop and go traffic, it becomes pretty obvious that most passenger miles are accrued with a single occupant. That kind of reality will hit when energy prices become dominant in people’s thinking about transportation. Commuting or grocery shopping in four ton SUVs will not have a place in that future.
      I now drive a Chevy Volt with a 40-50 mile range on a charge. I can easily charge the car overnight with the included 120 volt charger. Most of the commutes I have had (5 to 15 miles each way) would have worked fine with this arrangement and it is a comfortable 5 passenger car. A 100 mile range should work for every non-insane commute. Even then many employers will consider including daytime charging as an employee benefit.
      I don’t think that 20 years from now people will even consider owning a vehicle capable of 300 mile trips and only using it for one or two trips of that distance each year. Traveling in Europe in the 1960s I once drove my car onto a train to ride through an Alpen tunnel from Switzerland to Italy. That would be a perfect method to take your own car from, say, Boston to New York or San Francisco to Los Angeles.

  11. Big Data (AI/Cloud) needs big energy inputs. Just wait until autopilot/copilot operations comes to transportation and military/law enforcement, business and financial operations of the world.

    Get ready for stories like this-
    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/three-mile-island-microsoft-nuclear-power/
    or
    https://www.ans.org/news/article-5842/amazon-buys-nuclearpowered-data-center-from-talen/

    Good luck competing with big data/AI for local residential/commercial/industrial electrical supplies.

    1. Hickory:
      Somehow the first word that came to mind reading that scenario was “fragile”.
      Having gigantic nuclear plants supporting gigantic server farms supporting gigantic networks of self-driving cars and automated factories looks like perfect opportunities monopoly control of the economy and for sabotage by foreign actors and local nutcases.

      1. Yes…fragile system we are deep into.
        When you said monopoly/nut/control the first 3 words that come to mind are Elon, Elon and Musk.

    2. The Three Mile Island deal is characteristic of nuclear: it will take 3 years just to get permits!

      The Amazon deal is a bit illusory: the plant in question is 40 years old, and so this deal doesn’t mean any new low-carbon power, just that Amazon is reserving some of its output for itself. That, of course, means someone else uses the same amount of other kinds of power…

      1. Three years?
        Many years ago I worked for a nuclear steam supply vendor ( we built reactors). There were two main safety documents required by the NRC, a Preliminary Safety Analysis Report (PSAR) and a Final Safety Analysis Report (FSAR). Each one filled a shelf about four feet wide.
        My responsibility for several years was the design of the reactor control rods. I spent countless hours, in addition to designing and testing functionality, analyzing the myriad ways that the rods could fail and working with the different individuals that were responsible for the interacting components (actuating mechanisms, fuel components, etc.) and those responsible for backup mechanisms in case of control rod failure (too weird to explain).
        Crazy as it seems today, the amount of interaction required to design all of these components to work together and then satisfy our own QA staff certainly involved years of work. At the time there were over 800 engineers at the task, each tasked with design and safety responsibilities that fed into the reports. The PSAF was then sent to the NRC for review. While they were at it design changes occurred for various reasons requiring revision of the PSAF, review in-house and then final review by the NRC. Even after all that here’s a near catastrophic accident that actually happened:
        1. Utility accepts completed power plant. Small number of vendor engineers remain on site for training and support.
        2. . During hand over to utility an over enthusiastic janitor paints the exhaust manifold on an emergency diesel generator that a careless architect has installed immediately below control room ventilation intake air duct.
        3. While performing routine testing during full power operation, an uncoordinated electrical engineer short circuits control rod wire causing reactor to scram (emergency shutdown).
        4. Emergency generator starts, setting exhaust manifold paint on fire.
        5. Smoke from fire enters control room ventilation obscuring vision and frightening the operators who, fearing for their lives, run out of the building.
        6. Vendor engineers enter the control room wearing gas masks and manage the shutdown.
        No. Nothing like that was envisioned in the PSAR or the FSAR. The utility just got lucky that someone that knew what to do cared enough to do it.
        Maybe three years isn’t long enough for licensing a nuclear power plant.

  12. About the use of electric motors in the construction sector.

    Construction is stationary, meaning there are possibilities to electrify the process if there are possibilities to supply electricity in the right quantities through cables. I literally have one example in my backyard, with a gigant construction crane promoting its virtue with a sign saying “using only electricity”

    In remote locations fossil fuels will always be the most practical means of energy. But in very condensed urban areas, electrical power can be used for construction if the electrical network supports it and there are enough renewable electricity supply sources to support it (otherwise, what is the point?). There is an example with a new copper mine in the north of Norway that will be processed with equipment using as much electricity as possible overall, which is also a stationary target. That is not unusual, but many places around the world it would be unpractical.
    A long way into the future using electrical construction devices in combination with using materials that are easy to produce from the energy cost perspective or even reused/recycled/refurbished ones can potentially reduce the overall cost substantially. I would guess primarily in condensed cities with good infrastructure.

    Example:
    https://nordiccrane.com/en/equipment/electric-cranes/

    1. In remote locations fossil fuels will always be the most practical means of energy.

      Substitute “liquid*” for “fossil”, and “sometimes**” for “always”, and you’ve got something.

      *Includes methanol, liquid H2, ammonia, syn-diesel.

      **Examples include solar powered pumps in oil wells, solar-powered irrigation, wind-powered water pumps, wind-assisted cargo ships, etc.

  13. China is cutting every interest they can find. Talking of setting up a facility that allows borrowing from their central bank to buy stocks.

    My guess is within a few months they’ll be cutting every interest rate they can find again.

    Their M1 money supply has fallen off a cliff. Monetary stimulus doesn’t work unless you have an expanding energy supply. You can drop interest rates all you want. The energy has to be there in order for loans to be made into the actual economy.

    Interest rates cuts are a huge sign that not enough borrowing is taking place. The lower rates go the tighter monetary conditions are. When an economy is booming lots loans are being made and interest rates are higher as monetary conditions are loose.

    1. “The lower rates go the tighter monetary conditions are”

      “interest rates are higher as monetary conditions are loose”

      Wrong again HHH

      Loose monetary conditions, also known as easy monetary policy or accommodative monetary policy, occur when a central bank lowers interest rates and increases the money supply to stimulate the economy. This is the opposite of tight monetary policy, which aims to slow down an economy by raising interest rates and reducing the money supply.

      “Tight monetary policy aims to slow down an overheated economy by increasing interest rates. Conversely, loose monetary policy aims to stimulate an economy by lowering interest rates.”

      https://www.reuters.com/plus/tight-or-loose-where-does-monetary-policy-stand

      Sept 24 (Reuters) – The Dow and S&P 500 reached new highs on Tuesday, overcoming weak consumer confidence data, with mining stocks driving gains after China unveiled a sweeping stimulus package.

      The indexes initially trimmed gains after a report from the Conference Board revealed an unexpected decline in U.S. consumer confidence in September, driven by growing concerns about the labor market’s health.

      “Today’s price action is predominantly about what happened overnight with the policy announcements from China, direct support for their equity market and pledges to cut interest rates in the future, has caused a really sharp move in international stocks in general,” said Zachary Hill, head of portfolio management at Horizon Investments in Charlotte, North Carolina.

      “That’s feeding through into parts of the U.S. market, where you see some more China-sensitive, more cyclical industries like metals and mining materials sector outperforming.”

      1. It doesn’t matter how many times they or you say lower interest rates are stimulus. The facts on the ground are the market sets interest rates lower due to growth and inflation expectations heading lower. It’s a tightening of credit conditions that lead to lower rates. And central banks follow what the market does.

        The 2 year heads lower the Fed cuts. It’s not stimulus no matter how many times it’s repeated. In theory it sounds like lower rates are stimulus but in reality lower rates are tightening of monetary conditions therefore rates fall and the Fed follows.

        Lots of credit creation, borrowing, and higher interest rates equals easy money. You’ve been conditioned to believe something that just isn’t true.

        Easy money was sending out checks to everyone so they could spend money well beyond their means. It equaled higher interest rates and economic activity. Artificial of course. Now reality is setting in.

        Oil prices are heading lower because growth and inflation expectations are heading lower. Because monetary conditions are tightening. Money isn’t easy.

        1. HHH
          Good points it’s counter intuitive to traditional training. But too many people think the Fed has some control but actually doesn’t. The stimulus checks led to inflation because the supply is constrained. It’s not inflation but rather a supply side shock. China is fighting deflation which is a no confidence call at the bank. So money has to be created and if the private sector can’t do it the public sector will.
          I think we’re in a similar situation as the late 1920s the primary energy source coal derived from coal peaked in 1927 and crashed the global economy. As the price of coal fell because of loss of critical mass the system sank deeper and deeper into a depression. The only thing that saved it was the transition to oil that inflated the economy by allowing exponential growth to continue.
          Since then there have been three economic shocks to the oil based economy. First was the 1970s US conventional oil peak. This led the western world into recession into the 1980s . Then the peak in global conventional oil in 2005 that resulted in the GFC of 2008. And now the final crisis that is the result of the 2018 global peak of all oily stuff. Since we’re allowed to call anything a barrel of oil now a days.
          Seems to me we should expect a very similar situation to 1929 market crash and depression. The manufacturer to the world then was the US. Today the manufacturer to the world is China. The British Pound was the reserve currency and today it’s the US Dollar.
          The problem is there is no next energy system to grow the economy at an exponential rate if at all. So this time debt defaults can’t be resolved with new lending.
          China has refineries going bankrupt builders going bankrupt steel mills going bankrupt. Germany is losing VW etc etc It’s really a global depression being propped up by unsustainable debt growth. Something has to snap very soon.

          1. JT
            I haven’t seen the world wide economic collapses of the past century described as primarily energy related but it is an interesting concept.
            If we are entering the same political environment as the late 1920s then does the rise of Hitler, Stalin and Tojo at that time foretell a Trump victory in 2024? (although I think of Trump as more like Mussolini than Hitler or Stalin)

            1. Jjhman
              I won’t argue that point because charisma is an important factor. The vast majority are presently seeing declining material prosperity. They real don’t care about headlines particularly Wall Street which isn’t reflective of the real economy. Unfortunately it really is irrelevant as HHH shows the system is in a nose dive.

            2. JT
              I’m still trying to understand how anyone could think that Trump has charisma. I know there are devotees, I know some of them aren’t complete idiots.
              To me he is just a self involved con man selling simple answers and quick fixes to long term complex problems.

          2. coal peaked in 1927 and crashed the global economy.

            That’s an interesting idea. Do you have a source for that?

  14. Larry Ellision, the owner of ORACLE….(A goliath in Tech….This site may be an ORACLE database…probably a free one like MySQL or PostGres)

    Admits that his databases are recording even when the surveillance is turned off. Or your camera is turned off….blah blah

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9QELUrB894

    He now say he wants them used in Bathrooms and other formerly private areas….

    African Apes we’re not designed to be recorded 24×7 IMO.

    We will all look like idiots under these conditions!

    1. That’s a good reminder – I’ve been a little lax about covering cameras on my devices…

    1. JT

      While I respect the opinions of Arthur Berman, it is not “game over”.

      The conclusion is “electric vehicles and renewable energy are a distraction from the hard realities we face.”

      Electric motors are very good at converting electricity to mechanical energy without too much resistance and heat loss. The battery is and has been for a number of years the obstacle for using electricity for propulsion in transportation. But it keeps improving all the time, making the proposition better every year. With the battery not involved historically, the electrical trams and after a while locomotives came to life despite cheap hydrocarbons. The existence of electricity lines overhead to supply what was needed at a reasonable cost was a main driver.

      Likewise renewables are profitable to set up in the right scenarios. But they have been invested into even at a low payback in a few/some cases (I really don’t know how many), primarily because a 2-1 payback ratio is much better than resources being otherwise squandered into no payback whatsoever.

      Other than that, a lot of sense in the post.

      1. From the Berman paper:
        “The only real solution to our environmental crises—climate change being just one part—is a dramatic reduction in energy consumption. No amount of renewables or technological innovation will get around this hard truth: we have to use far less energy, period.”
        I would go even farther (channeling OFM), we can’t keep growing population or energy consumption for much longer. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be investing in EVs or renewables. For whatever population is going to survive the coming bottleneck sources of energy, including for transportation, are going to be required if any elements of a modern lifestyle is to remain. I seriously doubt that anything except renewables will be viable 50 years from now.

        1. The only real solution to our environmental crises—climate change being just one part—is a dramatic reduction in energy consumption.
          EV cut primary energy consumption in vehicles by about 80%. So it doesn’t make much sense o say they don’t dramatically reduce energy consumption.

          1. Energy is currently plentiful and dirt cheap, so it is wasted at an insane rate. Renewables are inherently low profit because any business with high initial costs and near zero marginal costs tends towards cutthroat pricing to win market share at all costs.

            All industries exist to make money for the supply side. We produce much more energy than we need because suppliers make a killing and the demand side doesn’t really care.

            Some think renewables will always be too expensive. Some think that they will be so cheap we will start using much more energy than we used to. Some think renewables will replace fossil fuels and it will be BAU.

            Another point is the renewables may well reduce consumption. Renewable electricity will be so low profit that it kills other generation, but not grow much itself, because nobody’s making money at it. In this scenario indifferent consumers choose energy conservation over waste.

  16. Once again it seems that we’re missing the message. Renewables or whatever we want to call them are dependent on the fossil fuel system which is the mainstay of our present industrial economy. It has never been demonstrated and never will be demonstrated how solar and wind can be built and deployed absent of an oil based system. We can read as many comic books as we like but it won’t change the fact that absent oil renewables tumble.

    Presently we are on the cusp of a catastrophic export crisis. Jeffrey Browns Export Land Model has never been challenged because it’s an observable fact.

    https://chasingthesquirrel.com/public/text/peakoil.pdf

    If 150+ importing nations get cut off from diesel imports I really don’t think they’ll be appealing to the UN for electric trucks and fast charging stations and a few Nukes to power them.

    1. “It has never been demonstrated and never will be demonstrated how solar and wind can be built and deployed absent of an oil based system”
      Once again, not an issue anytime soon. This isn’t an all or none issue. Comprendo?
      Industrial processes consume only a small percentage of global oil currently.
      Once scarcity of oil begins to be apparent, the supplies will be more effectively shunted to important use rather than being used for trivial (air travel) or easily replaced (light vehicle transport) use like the majority of it is now.
      Industrial processes like energy production infrastructure and food production will be prioritized and well supplied for a long time, in many countries.
      Yes, I think it all will be more expensive as time goes on. Maybe just too expensive for many, with the trend toward longterm stagflation.
      I think we are in for a big downsizing, with oil being only one of the forcing factors. Thats what happens in mass overshoot, eventually.

      1. Define soon. Without oil imports many countries domestic oil supply will last less than 10 years.

        Let’s just say oil stopped flowing into China. Due to oil exports from the big three exporting countries going to zero.

        How much and how fast could they get the remaining 35 years of coal reserves out of the ground without the oil imports?

        Would China really be producing solar panels and EV’s under such a scenario?

        What about all the things China supplies to the rest of the world? Would they still be able to do that?

        Keep in mind China has a debt base economy just like everyone else. If you can’t grow the debt due to lack of energy supply then all debts become unplayable/unserviceable.

        1. ‘Define soon’…
          Excellent request/point. As you know when it comes to predictions of trend the timing is by far the most critical component of accuracy, whether we are talking about oil depletion or interest rates changes, onset of recessions or currency exchange rates or bond yields.

          As far as the specific timing on when oil supplies become a limiting factor for important industrial activities…I have no crystal ball. I am sure it will happen sooner for some countries than others. Part of that distinction will depend on how much and from where they import oil from, how much capital they can spend out-competing other purchasers, and who their geo-political partners are, and how much control the central authorities exert over domestic sector consumption of oil products. To this last point- do they let the wealthiest citizens to use oil for luxurious living as if it was infinite in supply while the base economy is on starvation rations?

          Lastly, another big factor on timing is just how much of the domestic energy system runs on non-oil processes, sparing the residual oil for difficult to replace functions. A country that is accomplishing all of its light vehicle transport via electricity will have more oil products available for industrial processes than a similar country that has not made a brisk effort to upgrade transport.

    2. It has never been demonstrated and never will be demonstrated how solar and wind can be built and deployed absent of an oil based system.

      Horses built the oil age. Of course oil will build wind, solar, electrification, etc.

      Then one day oil will be a museum piece, like the Pony Express, and the teams of horses that powered the first oil drills and moved the first oil barrels.

      ——————————————————-

      If net-zero was impossible wouldn’t ExxonMobil say so, quite loudly? Instead the company has made net zero a corporate goal. Doesn’t that say it all?

  17. One thing I’ve learned over my limited lifetime is that what the majority think isn’t necessarily true. Actually historically it’s been the minority that find truth. Like Copernicus and Galileo. As a general rule if the masses adopt a certain direction it’s probably not a good one. HHH made a very interesting observation on how money flows that is counter to the main stream belief and he’s right. However very few have the courage to challenge their beliefs.
    Unfortunately it has to do with how we process information. Our minds observe events primarily as images. But we process the information through narrative. So for example if we were to watch the events of 9/11 with no audio what would we believe happened? However the constant drum of narrative by the MSM has created our belief in what happened that day. True or not. Once we accept a narrative it is practically impossible to change our belief. No matter how many facts are presented.
    Why this is pertinent here is because some think prosperity is a function of will not a function of circumstance. Meaning that somehow voting for AorB makes a material difference. It doesn’t. If the founding fathers came up with their brilliant democratic ideals in Botswana we wouldn’t even know their names. But they did it in the untapped resources of North America.
    The biggest single resource in North America has been and remains oil. No other country on earth has had this advantage. Whether we like it our not our prosperity depends on it and it’s going away. If anyone thinks a few silicone wafers and digital etching will replace it I’m sorry for you. How will you explain to lobsterman off the coast of Maine or lumberjacks in Washington that they’ll have to row and swing an axe now.
    The prosperity of a nation is built on the personal productivity of its citizens. That productivity is a direct result of per capita energy. Plane and simple. If you don’t believe it try building a house without power tools. How long will it take and how much will you make.
    No matter how loud the MSM presents an alternative narrative we’re past peak and collapsing.

    1. JT,

      You have created a narrative which you believe. The fact is that World real GDP per capita is increasing whicle World Energy use per capita decreases. Energy intensity continues to decrease, also a fact. There are many different narratives which can be created. It is kind of funny that you are convinced by HHH’s narrative (we are still waiting in his prediction of oil at $25 per barrel, he will claim it is right around the corner) and believe that the minority tends to get things right. On occasion this is true when there is a leap in scientific understanding. Current understanding is that the Earth is not flat and the Earth follows and ellipitical orbit around the star named Sol, those who believe otherwise are in the minority, especially among those with at least a Bachelor’s degree in a natural science field or engineering.

      1. Dennis,

        Yields on the 2 year have fallen 140 bps while yields on the 10 year have falling 70 bps. It took two years for the yield curve to finally un-invert.

        Yields are falling and will continue falling because monetary conditions are tightening. Which is exactly why oil prices are heading lower.

        Rate cuts mean lower oil prices. The more yields drop the more oil prices will drop. Because of why yields are falling.

        I think yields will be back at zero right around the time oil hits $25

        1. “monetary conditions are tightening” because the Fed is winning the battle against inflation which turned the short term rate restrictive because of lower inflation. Currently the Fed policy is loosing monetary policy by lowering rates.

          If inflation is at 9% and the short term rate is at 5%. This would be considered accommodating policy by the Fed. On the other hand, if inflation was at 2% and the short term rates are at 5%. This would be considered restrictive. Neutral is considered to be short term rates to be about 2% above inflation. This would mean a real return of about 2%.

          My opinion, 2022 inflation was either transitory, Covid related, Russian war led or some of all three. Had it been imbeded inflation similar to the 70’s. The Fed would have needed to rise short term rates much higher than 5% to fight 2022 9% inflation.

          HHH reminds me of Trump. He doesn’t understand the financial industry in any historical manner or intelligence, yet posts his ignorance day after day proudly. He also continues to express in financial terms that black is white and white is black. All of his nonsense and inference of American failure fits the disinformation campaign currently being imploded by Trump and Putin in America.

          Either HHH, JT, Hideaway and a couple others here are adversaries to America like Russia or ignorant followers. When Harris wins the election and they disappear from POB. We will know their true intentions.

          1. Yeah you probably want to censor me for what you think is disinformation. 🤣

            Personally I don’t care who wins the election. But there are a number of people who regularly comment on this blog that will come down with an extreme case of Trump derangement syndrome if Harris doesn’t win.

            There are many use to be readers of this blog that don’t read it anymore. Why? Because people like HB are rude as fuck to people who don’t share their views.

            1. When you walk, sound and look like a duck. Your most likely a duck.

              Just calling balls and strikes.

              If Harris doesn’t win the election, it will be the end of democracy in America and most of the world. You state you don’t care who wins. Just more Ignorance. The wealthy in Germany in the 30’s stood in ruins after the WWll. Don’t think it can’t happen to America today.

              You can keep posting ignorance and I’m just going to keep calling out your BS.

            2. That’s exactly what Trump derangement syndrome looks like.

              End of the world! End of democracy!

              You can’t vote in prosperity. You have to prosper regardless of who is voted in. Which is why I don’t care.

              Heck the is a reason why two failed attempts to take out the former president have taken place. Idiots like you running around screaming it’s the end of democracy. It’s the end of the world!!!!

              I’d tell you to grow the fuck up but everybody here knows that just isn’t going to happen.

            4. “You can’t vote in prosperity”

              Like I said, black is white and white is black. More Ignorance.

              What next, FDR is Hitler and Hitler is FDR.

              Prosperity for who ? Rich white men or women and people of color. Try explaining that BS to African-Americans set free by Lincoln.

            5. HHH, are the motives of the respective would be Trump assassins even known? The one thing that does seem clear is that they both have a history of mental illness. To assert that it was particular rhetoric that set them off seems completely speculative.

            6. On January 6, 2021, the United States Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., was attacked by a mob[39][40][41] of supporters of then–U.S. President Donald Trump in an attempted self-coup d’état[42] two months after his defeat in the 2020 presidential election. They sought to keep him in power by occupying the Capitol and preventing a joint session of Congress from counting the Electoral College votes to formalize the victory of President-elect Joe Biden. The attack was ultimately unsuccessful in preventing the certification of the election results. According to the bipartisan House select committee that investigated the incident, the attack was the culmination of a seven-part plan by Trump to overturn the election.[43][44] Within 36 hours, five people died: one was shot by Capitol Police, another died of a drug overdose, and three died of natural causes, including a police officer.[c][33][45] Many people were injured, including 174 police officers. Four officers who responded to the attack killed themselves within seven months.[34] Damage caused by attackers exceeded $2.7 million.

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/January_6_United_States_Capitol_attack#:~:text=On%20January%206%2C%202021%2C%20the,in%20the%202020%20presidential%20election.

            7. the is a reason why two failed attempts to take out the former president have taken place. Idiots like you running around screaming it’s the end of democracy. It’s the end of the world!!!!

              That’s a Trump talking point. It’s also an inversion of reality, in that Trump has been the source of an enormous amount of violent and incendiary language intended to scare and anger his followers.

              Do you really want to repeat propaganda like that?

            8. Huntington Beach, before you give my opinion for me, just let me state for the record, that Trump should be in jail for inciting the riots that cost peoples lives on Jan 6, yet the US legal system is so weak and dominated by the rich, that they are leaving the ‘trials’ until after the election, (he’ll not doubt give himself and everyone else involved a pardon while president if he wins).

              If Trump had been a poor colored person from the backstreets that did exactly the same thing, at a rally, that led to exactly the same result, he would have been thrown in jail years ago, with zero voice.

              Whether Trump is president or Harris wins, will make no difference in the overall prosperity of the world, but is likely to make the environment worse off by allowing mining and drilling in environmentally sensitive areas, plus certain people will be better off (short term) while others will be worse off.

              In the long term going for an acceleration of renewables and Electric everything, just increases the use of fossil fuels, just like it has for the last few decades. All the minerals mined for it to happen continue to have lower ore grades on average, requiring increasing use of energy to gain the same quantities of materials, let alone an increasing quantity.

              None of you cornucopians ever address this point, except for the hand wave of ‘recycle’, ignoring the fossil fuel inputs necessary for this to happen. Never, ever, any actual numbers on energy use needed, nor the economics of it.

              The very reason we are headed into collapse is that no-one wants to work out the exact requirements, energy wise that are needed to run a modern economy/civilization off renewables only, to see if it’s close to possible (it isn’t). The continued full steam ahead plan of building a larger system requiring more energy, based on increased mining, with many more materials, guarantees a bad outcome for the remaining natural world, a vastly changed climate due to all the CO2 and methane released, to build the new renewable order.

              You are all so busy in looking at how we run modernity without thinking of the important part that has to come first, building it. 50 years after fossil fuels are no longer used due to depletion or whatever other reasons, there wont be any of the modern renewables in use either, as they all have short limited lifespans and require fossil fuels in every stage of their production, just like nuclear power.

              The renewables we will have, are sun growing plants, perhaps water wheels, and sailing ships, if we have left any trees standing, during the collapse, to gain the appropriate timber from.

            9. Hideaway,

              “no difference in the overall prosperity of the world”

              “make the environment worse off by allowing mining and drilling in environmentally sensitive areas”

              I don’t need to brand you because you only have one message and repeat it constantly like an alzheimer’s patient. Which is nothing can be done to save humanity. But your two quotes above are contradictory to your forever constant postings. You make it clear there are different ways to the same productivity. One that destroys the environment and one that doesn’t.

              “certain people will be better off (short term) while others will be worse off”

              “Prosperity for who ? Rich white men or women and people of color.

              It’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey. Hideaway, you don’t have an ETA for the end of humanity. Life is the time between DOB and DOD. You just want to convince us that what we do doesn’t matter. That just BS.

              I’m voting to save the environment and equality, not for the want to be dictator. Who is all about himself and staying out of jail.

            10. Huntingtonbeach …. “Hideaway, you don’t have an ETA for the end of humanity. ”

              I have an event that leads to the end of civilization as we know it, during an accelerating decline in oil production, because oil makes all other forms of energy available.

              Do I know when? No no-one does and many that have tried to predict a date have all been wrong because they didn’t have enough information about the reserves, resources and technologies that could be used to access more oil.

              I also do not have that information, but do know on a finite planet that the point of peak oil use must be reached at some point, and the mere fact we have to frack the resource rock to get ‘enough’ tells me the point of contracting supplies is getting close.

              Neither of your candidates running for president will save the environment, they just have different ways of making the situation worse. One will open a lot more places to drill for oil and curb environmental restraints, while the other will push for more renewables and EVs, meaning more burning of fossil fuels to build it all, probably ‘elsewhere’ in the world.
              Both paths lead to more species extinctions, more pollution and more global warming, more endocrine disruptors, a worse, more depleted natural world.

              They both are in favor of ‘build MORE’ which is not sustainable on a finite planet. You are not voting to save the environment as neither candidate proposes degrowth. you are trying to convince your conscience that more mining for metals using more fossil fuels is better than the alternative of just using more fossil fuels.

              The natural world is only better off by using less fossil fuels and having less mining, and less habitat destruction, less endocrine disruptors, basically a lot less people, with a simple natural lifestyle. It’s a lifestyle and number that no-one will vote for, so we go headfirst into collapse sometime in the near future..

              BTW, no it doesn’t matter what you do, as what needs to be done is too radical because we are so deep in overshoot.

            11. Hideaway, like I said, you only have one message and that’s whatever humanity does will not make a difference. That’s just BS. Your a quitter who is just looking to justify your selfish existence.

              Anyone can call the end of humanity someday. It takes educated gray matter to improve it.

            12. HB,

              There are some oil industry people who argue that only oil can power an economy. This is, of course, highly unrealistic. Again, if net-zero was impossible wouldn’t ExxonMobil say so, quite loudly? Instead the company has made net zero a corporate goal. Doesn’t that say it all?

              One does wonder why they make this argument. Are they insincere, and arguing for drill, baby, drill because it would help their industry? Are they trying to throw out FUD to delay a transition away from their industry, knowing that change threatens their careers?

              Are they sincere, because they’ve lived their career inside the industry and simply can’t imagine anything else, like GM employees who couldn’t imagine that GM, once the biggest car company in the world, could go bankrupt? Do they simply confuse their industry with the whole world, and imagine that if their industry collapses then certainly it will be The End Of The World As We Know It?

              Inquiring minds want to know…

        2. HHH,

          Oil prices are falling because there is more oil produced at current prices than is being consumed at that price, when market particpants believe the reverse of this, prices will rise. Money supply is tighter than before the Fed raised rates and now money supply is growing again in the US.

          I see you are getting a little shy about predicting $25/b prices, maybe you mean real oil prices in 1983$, if we use that as our measure we are under $25/bo now.

      2. Dennis

        You simply do not understand how energy and economy work.
        https://www.inscc.utah.edu/~tgarrett/economics.html

        The real economy requires energy growth to grow. The financial economy doesn’t it can print money to oblivion and call inflation growth which is what you’re referring to.

        The real economy is collapsing VW is shuttering plants Stellarus is as well. Auto sales are tanking loans are defaulting. Malls are empty commercial real estate is collapsing. Wait till we receive the revised GDP data which is still cooked.
        You can not separate energy from economy it’s not possible in a material world but perhaps you’re not living in the material world. Perhaps you believe that stocks at 50pe are a good investment and public debt at $100,000.00 per man woman and child in a nation that doesn’t have $400.00 per household in the bank is sustainable.
        Like HHH it doesn’t matter who’s elected it makes no material difference. The monetary system is breaking because the real economy is contracting because the energy needed for growth is flatlining.
        So if anyone here is a flat earther is you who believe that there are not limits on a finite planet.

        https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/solar-panel-maker-meyer-burgers-ceo-cfo-leave-company-2024-09-18/

        https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/french-auto-supplier-association-warns-sector-risks-losing-half-its-jobs-2024-09-18/

        1. The real economy requires energy for the money supply to grow via loans into the economy. No growth in energy supply no growth in money supply.

          All debt has an interest expense that can only be paid via expansion of the money supply.

          Even if interest rates are negative there is still an interest expense attached to the loan. Who pays the interest expense changes when interest rates go negative.

          Money locked up in stock shares isn’t chasing good or service in the real economy.

          The higher valuations go the more money it takes to push stocks higher. $50 billion in stock buybacks doesn’t move the needle like it use to.

          1. Hhh
            I agree high stock valuations are in a way a safety valve in my mind absorbing excess currency preventing it from circulating in the general public which would create hyperinflation. The monetary value of these assets can never be realized because the real economy can’t absorb them.
            3000years ago it was written “The wealth of the rich is his fortified city; It is like a protective wall in his imagination.” Prov 18:11

            1. The thing about these stock buybacks is they are being done on margin or with borrowed money.

              If for any reason the banks decided not to roll these loans. These companies would have to sell to meet debt obligations.

              It would be a forced sell. Banks that become balanced sheet constrained and unable to roll the debt would be the catalyst.

              Valuations would vanish in the wind. As money would be straight up destroyed. Disappearing like a fart in the wind.

        2. The real economy requires energy growth to grow

          Probably true in the long run. But energy consumption is growing!

          The real economy doesn’t need growth in fossil fuels: “energy” does not equal “fossil fuel”.

          1. Do you see the use of fossil fuels globally going down? Maybe in some places. For certain reasons but globally we’re using more fossil fuels than ever.

            Probably true in the long run? Tell me what real process in the real world not financial world doesn’t require some sort of use of energy?

            In the real world it takes energy not only to generate economic activity to service debt but economic activity to issue debt.

            As net energy available to economy falls even government fiscal stimulus will not work to pull economy forward.

            There is no getting around having to power down.

            And before anyone else tries to brand me politically I don’t give a fuck about your political views, beliefs. That is why I never mention politics. I don’t care about the politics.

            1. “globally we’re using more fossil fuels than ever.”

              I agree. FF is still growing, albeit slowly. Solar & wind are growing much more quickly: they’re the very large majority of new generation.

              “Tell me what real process in the real world not financial world doesn’t require some sort of use of energy?”

              I agree. That’s not the point. My point was in reply to a comment about growth. And growth depends how energy is used. For instance, if trucking grows by 2% per year, but truck efficiency grows by 3%, energy consumption will fall by 1%. That can go on for a very long time.

              “As net energy available to economy falls even government fiscal stimulus will not work to pull economy forward.”

              But there’s no reason to believe that net energy will fall. Wind and solar are very nicely scalable. Heck, the solar resource is about 100,000 terawatts 24×7, while human energy consumption is very roughly 15 TW.

              “There is no getting around having to power down.”

              Only if you work in the FF industry.

        3. JT,

          No claim has been made that there are no limits, so let’s set that aside. Population will peak and then decline and economic growth will also decline eventually as population decline accelerates as total fertility level falls below the replacement level.

          For now real GDP in the World is growing, this is just a brute fact. Energy use is also increasing in the World, but most of the increase for the past 5 years is non-fossil fuel energy (57% of the increase in energy consumption for the World from 2018 to 2023 was from non-fossil fuel energy).

          So get your facts in order and try again.

          I have an undergraduate degree in Physics and an advanced degree in Economics, so I understand well how both the economy and energy work.

  18. Huntington
    I’m sorry to break the news to you the US was never a democracy it’s a republic. The two party system is a 4year cycle of hate and optimism so the general public think they are involved in government. The political class are merely pawns of the corporate elite. Government including the military has the sole task of making the world safe for corporate interests not democracy. Why do you think Russia is the enemy? Simply because they’ve refused to allow multinational corporations pillage their resources. As has been stated and rightly so. “Democracy is the pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.”

    Mark Dice does a nice job exposing this very fact.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=O9_zGFHQVT4

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rhDONWaF_8M

    1. Yes, if it was a true democracy we wouldn’t have the minority leading the country at times and Trump would have never been president. There is still work to do to become a more perfect union. Trump and his Republican party want to go back in time.

      “Make America great again”. What does that mean? Taking away the female vote? Enslaving African Americans? End Social Security? The Republican party is definitely lead and made up of mostly white men.

      Trump is the pathetic excuse of a wise individual.

      1. Huntington
        You’re still not listening it doesn’t matter. It’s the system collapsing that is stirring up society. It’s like a colony of rats that lose their food supply like NYC when all the restaurants closed. They turned on one another. Per capita energy is declining diminishing personal productivity increasing cost of living making everyone very angry. Just like the 1930s
        Trump and Kamala are just the current crop of useful idiots designed to distract. They do not have the power to change anything.

        1. Bullshit

          I’ve heard this energy collapsing crap for over 50 years. Same shit at TOD and TOD collapsed. There is no current outstanding energy crisis. Your just spreading fear. The world has always had poverty. It’s people like you and Trump spreading fear and dispare. It’s the idiots who home school, don’t get an education, give their money to religious conmen, spend thousands inking themselves up, think they are entitled and vote for rich conmen that are angry. They have no one to blame but their selves. There is plenty of opportunities and money out there. Their just lucky they weren’t born in a “real” poverty country. But on the other hand, they would have learned a “real” work ethic in another country.

        2. JT,

          Energy use per capita is declining due to greater efficiency in the use of energy, real GDP per capita is rising, this is an imperfect measure of human welfare, other metrics of human welfare are also rising at the World level, such as the HDI.

          Data for chart below from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/human-development-index?tab=chart&country=~OWID_WRL

          This is a per capita measure by definition, it decreased during the pandemic due to higher mortality during that period.

    2. US was never a democracy it’s a republic.

      Oh, my goodness. You’ve been listening to right wing propaganda, or Russian propaganda (hard to tell the difference these days).

      Of course the US is a democracy. It’s a representative democracy, which all democracies are: you can’t run any organization by direct vote of all the members. “Republic” just means there’s no monarch. Secondary characteristics include a constitution, and representatives, but basically it’s just no kings or queens.

      And yes, Russia is a big problem. Sure, they’ve been used as a bogeyman in US politics at times, but invading Ukraine? Come on!

      1. “you can’t run any organization by direct vote of all the members. “

        And that’s because?????

        1. Because any organization larger than 10 people can’t make a lot of routine decisions routinely.

          First, direct democracy means that all decisions are made by the group. Well, in any large organization there are 10 substantive decisions and a 1,000 minor ones made by various levels of management every single day. Can we do 1,000 polls or referenda a day? Even one? The whole populace would do nothing but research issues and place votes: no time to farm, manufacture, take care of kids, eat…

          Second, decisions mean communication. Think about it: the number of relationships between members of an organization is the factorial of the membership number. So, if there’s 100 people, then person a could potentially relate to 99 other people. The second person could relate to 98 people, the third 97 people: the total is roughly 100 squared divided by two (5,000 relationships).

          A true direct democracy operates by consensus, which means an enormous amount of communication, even if everyone is completely rational and cooperate. If you have one mean old crank, the whole thing comes to a halt. If you have one person bribed by an outsider, it comes to a halt: that’s how the Polish experiment with consensus representative democracy crashed several hundred years ago: outsiders from Germany and Russia bribed members of parliament and made it nonfunctional.

          A complex modern society needs specialization: the average person can’t possibly understand the details of every issue: they need to choose representatives that they trust (and the reps need to have a fairly extensive staff – think CBO). It also needs majority rule, not consensus, with constitutional safeguards for minorities.

          US democracy is a bit weak: the Electoral college was designed to protect wealthy slave owners, as were some of the election procedures in the constitution. Heck, the bicameral structure had the same purpose: the Senate was kind of the US version of the House of Lords.

          But even a weak democracy is better than an autocracy. Good governance in an autocracy is a matter of massive luck – even China’s luck in that regard seems to be running out. Democracy can certainly create snafus and fubars, but it happens less often and is easier to fix, because things are more transparent and decision making is more widely dispersed.

          ————————–
          Way too many people think that dictatorships are more “efficient”. Decision making seems faster.

          What they don’t realize is that broad sharing of decision making and transparency reduces risks of mistakes, and improves the quality of decision making.

          A classic example is the US and Vietnam: the quality of planning and decision making was abysmal because it was kept to a very small circle and the process was secret, as documented in the Pentagon Papers.

          This has been true of US foreign policy in general: oil wars, ME invasions, overthrowing democracies…all counterproductive.
          —
          A pure autocracy (aka dictatorship) is inferior to even the worst of democracy: at worst, a democracy at minimum forces would-be autocrats to go through the effort of propagandizing gullible voters who at least get to vote on whether to be cannon fodder.

          At best a democracy involves a substantial informed professional class, which brings a wide set of knowledge and real expertise.

          “Democracy is the worst governing method…except for all the others.”

      2. Hi Nick,
        Nate Hagen’s the great simplification podcasts discussion with Jeffrey Sachs has an Interesting perspective on US foreign policy, how that played out after the USSR collapsed, and how that has contributed to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
        cheers phil

        1. Jeffrey Sachs is an extremely biased, partisan and not well educated talker on this subject. Very strange person for Hagens to select to interview. It would be like interviewing a pro-nazi on European politics in 1936. Hagens exhibits poor judgement on this.

          Both of these guys take the view that the rest of the world should simply tolerate Russian/Putin expansionism and neighborhood bullying. Kind of like how many looked at Germany in the 1930’s. Thats a choice. It would indeed be easier to just watch Russia take what they want and learn to live with a world that is more dominated by autocrats. Eventually yourself may very well fall into that category.

          1. ” Hagens exhibits poor judgement on this.”

            Yes. Sadly, Hagens generally exhibits poor judgement. He’ s just not a good source.

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