This guy is really hoping renewables will be more expensive than energy is currently, which is not what current trends indicate. Because if energy becomes cheaper his entire point collapses and he knows it. And it's a bit disingenuous to argue against the current system because real wages haven't gone up in decades and then advocating for an agrarian system... where real wages would be much smaller than they are today. Like most Collapse focused stuff, it seems like wishful thinking more than anything else.
this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2024
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Collapse
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This is the place for discussing the potential collapse of modern civilization and the environment.
Collapse, in this context, refers to the significant loss of an established level or complexity towards a much simpler state. It can occur differently within many areas, orderly or chaotically, and be willing or unwilling. It does not necessarily imply human extinction or a singular, global event. Although, the longer the duration, the more it resembles a ‘decline’ instead of collapse.
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There is no longer any cheap and abundant energy source available. Fossil extraction is trapped in the narrowing triangle of doom of being too cheap for producers and too expensive for consumers. Current renewable is a multiplier of fossil and is not cheap if you require storage for dispatchability. It is slowly getting cheaper, with the caveat of necessary mineral resource extraction. There is no energy transition in the sense that there is no substitution, only addition. Fossil extraction is about to start falling rapidly even in terms of volume (the actually relevant metric is net energy, especially per capita) since most of it is now tight resources. It easy to see where this is going.
I disagree. Several countries are preemptively shutting down fossil fuel electrical generation in order to switch to low carbon sources. That is a transition, not an addition. 90% of my energy consumption today will be low carbon. On days I have to go somewhere by public transit I can take a natural gas bus just as easily as an electric bus, so I really don't care if fossil fuel extraction dips, my energy needs are met just fine (and getting cheaper every year).
If you look at the global primary energy use https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/global-primary-energy , then the only transition you see is from coal and oil to natural gas.
If you think the bulk of your energy consumption is low-carbon you're sadly mistaken. If the fossil energy extraction dips significantly, billions of people will starve.
The LCOE of renewables has been decreasing so fast that they are now cheaper than fossil fuels. You might very well see that graph change drastically over the coming decades. The LCOE of fossil fuels has been decreasing as well, and contrary to what you said production has been increasing since the pandemic, despite the horrors it will do to the climate.
I really don't see why people would starve... Electricity is getting cheaper to produce independently of whichever method you use, more things are being electrified, and the current price of oil is a historical average when adjusted for inflation.
If your point is that soon it won't be profitable to extract oil, then I have a graph for you too: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/oil-proved-reserves?tab=chart , when that graph decreases by at least half we can talk. Until then, I'd say 200B tonnes of economically extractable oil is more than enough, and we should be more worried about the climate change that oil will cause than with it not being enough.
You choose to see horrors present in a convoluted and esoteric set of cherry picked data. I choose to see the wonders like the GERD dam, which is giving people in Ethiopia access to cheaper, cleaner electricity. Higher quality of life without the constant need to extract more and more oil. A dam that will last generations.
The overall problem being the paranoia that is generated daily, not only to make people defensive, but also offensive. Here comes an argument in the form of a Joycian fever dream that collapses into cynicism! Woo!
Computer technology gives an edge in regards to productivity and this is also reflected in the military. Whereas Guerilla warfare can be very effective, in todays landscape we see drones and long range weapons which are both augmented by computers to be the real edge, as it makes annexation that much harder.
Now if everyone would just put down their arms, and not rev up any military industrial complex, then we'd all be good... except for that one bastard over there. I heard he doesn't like you. In fact, I heard he hates you - vehemently.
But don't worry, us here at Larry's Sharp Stick Emporium have got you covered. That tribe next door won't know what hit em. Now excuse me while I head over there and do an IPO for the aerodynamic sharp stick, now with speed lines.
Yes, it's a man's life working in marketing for war machines. You get all the cocaine and dead hooker insurance you can shake at a sharp stick at. In essence what we do is emotionally and intellectually manipulate you to give us your money, because at the end of the day, we want your money.
And so it was that money and fear kissed under the bleachers, totally skipping class and giving the finger to the teachers, checking out each other's bodily features. But wait, who was that? It was Mr Politician, who was kind of hot, maybe? Per chance... a ménage à trois? And the whole world got fucked. Fade to credits.
Directed by Humans, Produced by Animals, Executive Directors: Avarice, Narcicism, Executive Producers: Greed, Gluttony, Staring, You as sucker, me as sucker, the elites as suckers, and Likeable Sucker as the US President,
The end...
(...to be continued?)
No, the world literally ends. I hope you like eating protein paste out of a tube on some distant planet, because we'll be learning what it means to live on a generational ship. Please eject me into the sun on the way out. Tnx.