The Climate Change Discussion Thread

[Hackslack]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/most...-pbo-1.4796511

"The finding, which comes nearly four months after the majority of Canadian voters cast their ballots for parties that favoured some form of carbon tax, appears to bolster the Liberal government's argument that Canadians will not be negatively affected by the tax."


I mean we can listen to our elected officials, or we can get our alternative facts from the fat cats running the oil companies. We know who the Conservative's listen to.

What fat cats running oil companies do you speak of? I believe the oil companies are actually the largest investors reducing carbon footprints and clean, emmisionless technologies.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/most...-pbo-1.4796511

"The finding, which comes nearly four months after the majority of Canadian voters cast their ballots for parties that favoured some form of carbon tax, appears to bolster the Liberal government's argument that Canadians will not be negatively affected by the tax."


I mean we can listen to our elected officials, or we can get our alternative facts from the fat cats running the oil companies. We know who the Conservative's listen to.

You don't have to sully real news with a silly, wrong, narrative. It's not the "fat cats" that are arguing against carbon pricing, it's conservative politicians and their followers. Big oil companies are generally pro carbon pricing because they actually understand numbers and know it's the cheapest way for them to reduce emissions.

[Truenorth00]

Cross post from another thread.....

What's entertaining now is to see how many climate activists also don't understand S-curves and spend years campaigning for regulation that will achieve a fraction of what economics will in the next few years. I would add, "Listen to the economists!" to Greta's cry of "Listen to the scientists!".

We have companies that have already announced they are not investing in any further R&D on internal combustion engines. Here's Volkswagen and Daimler:

https://cleantechnica.com/2019/09/20...s-but-not-bmw/

And VW now claims that they can source batteries at $100/kWh, about where Tesla is. Nobody really grasps what this means. This is the equivalent of the large battery in a Tesla Model S going from $80 000-90 000 at launch down to under $10 000 in less than a decade. There's some lag between battery and car prices. But there's no way existing engine makers can drop their prices fast enough to compete. This is why we're seeing the panic and shift from the OEMs. Bloomberg says the whole sector's average will be at $94/kWh by 2024 down from $156/kWh last year.






It's entertaining to see how much old farts get riled up about Greta Thunberg. She's the sideshow. What is coming is a much bigger deal. The car companies are coming for the oil companies. Their own survival depends on it. And they will do far more damage than Greta or some aboriginal activists ever will.

[Truenorth00]

I'm not worried about emissions or regulation. Economics is taking care of the problem. Every doubling of battery capacity knock 18% off the price of Li-Ion batteries. And we've seen three doublings in the last 5 years. There's more on the way. And that's before Sodium Ion batteries take off.

I used to be a skeptic of the thesis that science and tech would solve climate change. Not any more. Took a while for it to really start. But it's been like a freight train slowly picking up speed. I think people are going to be shocked at how quickly this comes on stream.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

I'm not worried about emissions or regulation. Economics is taking care of the problem. Every doubling of battery capacity knock 18% off the price of Li-Ion batteries. And we've seen three doublings in the last 5 years. There's more on the way. And that's before Sodium Ion batteries take off.

I used to be a skeptic of the thesis that science and tech would solve climate change. Not any more. Took a while for it to really start. But it's been like a freight train slowly picking up speed. I think people are going to be shocked at how quickly this comes on stream.

I agree, and I was also a skeptic on science/tech "solving" climate change (and specifically the economic argument).

At what level do battery prices start to replace peaker natural gas plants as a viable source of peak power? It seems like that is somewhere under $100/kWh too.

I like Hydro as a source of power that is somewhat "storable", but the time and cost to build a dam is unbelievable.

[jawagord]

New paper contradicts global warming is bad for the economy. Basically, as the globe warms it warms asymmetrically - by less cooling off at night and in winter, we will use less energy to heat our homes and buildings which is a savings that more than offsets the negatives associated with global warming. We already know this is true for Canada from last years Moody study, new study shows this is also likely for the US and most of the world. CO2 good for plants, good for the economy!

This paper tests the validity of the FUND model’s energy impact functions, and the hypothesis that global warming of 2 °C or more above pre-industrial times would negatively impact the global economy.

If this paper’s findings from the empirical energy consumption data are correct, and if the impact functions for the non-energy sectors are correct, then the overall economic impact of global warming would be beneficial.

Contrary to the FUND energy projection for the period 2000–2100, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) [14,15] empirical data appear to indicate that global warming would reduce US energy expenditure and, therefore, contribute positive economic impacts for the USA. The paper infers that the impacts of global warming on the US economy may be indicative of the impacts on the global economy.

https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/18/3575/htm

Assuming a one-degree rise, Moody's forecasts a Canadian economy that's about the same in 2048 as it would otherwise be. If the impact is 1.9 degrees, the GDP impact inches up to 0.16 per cent. At 2.4 degrees, it's 0.1 per cent. And if the temperature rises by four degrees in the next three decades, Canada's economy is projected to be 0.3 per cent greater than it would otherwise have been.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/cli...dy-s-1.5199652

[WarrenC12]

I don't think a little less heat use in the winter is our biggest concern. What about floods? Coastal cities? Agriculture? Hurricanes? Insurance? Mass migration?

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

I don't think a little less heat use in the winter is our biggest concern. What about floods? Coastal cities? Agriculture? Hurricanes? Insurance? Mass migration?

Meh. At this point I don't even get riled up. The tech is coming. They can't stop it. And, however much they screech the world has moved past all the denialism and FUD. Companies are making decisions to cut their footprint because it's their business interest. CEOs and CFOs don't give a shit about anybody's feelings. Least of all non-shareholders.

Investors are starting to see large footprints as a liability. And oil is quickly becoming the new tobacco. The FUDsters can swim against the current all they want. But eventually the wave will come that will wipe them out.

Don't waste your time to responding to denialism. Just think of them as the crazy old man and pray you don't end up that crazy at that age. History is full of old fools who mocked the latest and greatest and then got left behind. This will be no different.

“The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty — a fad.” - Banker advising Henry Ford's lawyer not to invest. That lawyer, Horace Rackham, saw his $5000 investment turn into $12.5 million.

[Chadillaccc]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Don't waste your time to responding to denialism. Just think of them as the crazy old man and pray you don't end up that crazy at that age. History is full of old fools who mocked the latest and greatest and then got left behind. This will be no different.

“The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty — a fad.” - Banker advising Henry Ford's lawyer not to invest. That lawyer, Horace Rackham, saw his $5000 investment turn into $12.5 million.

Exactly.

[Truenorth00]

Like I've said, this won't happen because of regulation. This will happen because of economics. Like investors pulling out:

A tipping point for the future of fossil fuels may have been reached this year as financial markets massively down-rated traditional energy companies, with their slumping share prices destroying “staggering” amounts of shareholder wealth.

https://ieefa.org/ieefa-update-tippi...to-renewables/

Those of us with enough scar tissue to remember the 2005 to 2007 cleantech bubble will recall company after company saying they would go carbon-neutral. That was driven by marketing departments trying to jump on the green bandwagon; this time, decisions are being made by the CEO; and the CFO is not just in the room, often he or she is leading discussions.

https://about.bnef.com/blog/peak-emi...and-heres-why/


I'm all for approving all the projects the West wants. I think they will have a tougher and tougher time finding investors with every year that goes by.

[Dengler Avenue]

There’s a locust crisis in East Africa right now, triggered by the drought there. Some say that if they aren’t brought under control (which is likely the case), they will go everywhere, possibly triggering a global food crisis...

[Truenorth00]

This is what I'm talking about:

https://youtu.be/fBAPJg_FAfI

Divestment ended apartheid. It's going to end fossil fuels. Not with much noise and fanfare. Just the quiet clicking of pens as find managers divest. The next Big Short is oil.

[jawagord]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

This is what I'm talking about:

https://youtu.be/fBAPJg_FAfI

Divestment ended apartheid. It's going to end fossil fuels. Not with much noise and fanfare. Just the quiet clicking of pens as find managers divest. The next Big Short is oil.

Jim Kramer is the guy you are taking advice from? This Jim Kramer?? For every seller there is a buyer, fossil fuels are not tobacco.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RkqzRs95Sc

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Divestment ended apartheid. It's going to end fossil fuels. Not with much noise and fanfare. Just the quiet clicking of pens as find managers divest. The next Big Short is oil.

But most of the biggest oil and natural gas companies are already state-owned or state-controlled because energy is so strategically important.

If worst comes to worst, they just get financed by their government owners, and most likely snap up the remaining non-government majors if they become cheap.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by jawagord

Jim Kramer is the guy you are taking advice from? This Jim Kramer?? For every seller there is a buyer, fossil fuels are not tobacco.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RkqzRs95Sc

You dug deep for that one.

https://350.org/press-release/global...ivestment-11t/
$11T. T for Trillion.

Tobacco is actually a far better business than oil. The costs are cheap and the product is plentiful. Customers are declining, sure, but prices aren't.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by accord1999

But most of the biggest oil and natural gas companies are already state-owned or state-controlled because energy is so strategically important.

If worst comes to worst, they just get financed by their government owners, and most likely snap up the remaining non-government majors if they become cheap.

All but irrelevant, if so much money is flowing into substitutable technologies/products. I fully expect the Middle East, Russia, Venezuela, etc. to erupt in the next decade. If they raise oil prices, they only hasten the inevitable. And if they don't, they can't afford to keep their countries stable.

Oh they try soooo hard to get oil prices above $70/bbl. But they can't. That, in and of itself is telling.

And for every one of those petrostates, there are countries that need to develop that don't have oil and will happily leapfrog to electric. India comes to mind. They basically skipped landlines and went to cellphones. They'll do the same on electrics. They don't have high electric car sales. But they are quietly electrifying all those rickshaws on the road.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/22/t...-rickshaw.html

They have a million of those on the road. Nobody knows how many two-wheelers there are over there. And you won't read about it in any stat on EVs because it's not a "car". Electrified transport is a god send to every developing nation being held hostage by OPEC.

[Calgarian]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

There’s a locust crisis in East Africa right now, triggered by the drought there. Some say that if they aren’t brought under control (which is likely the case), they will go everywhere, possibly triggering a global food crisis...

I don't think locusts are going to cross any oceans any time soon.

We are probably due for some grasshopper plagues here, it's been about 20 years since I remember them being an issue. BC burning up every summer is our bigger threat here though.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

All but irrelevant, if so much money is flowing into substitutable technologies/products. I fully expect the Middle East, Russia, Venezuela, etc. to erupt in the next decade.

Except it's not that much money, or at least not that much energy. Only equivalent to growth of about 1% of annual world electricity generation. I do expect as solar and wind penetration increases to see the collapse of a number of European electricity grids when many of their aging reliable generators retire and they are unable to handle high demand situations in the winter.

They have a million of those on the road. Nobody knows how many two-wheelers there are over there. And you won't read about it in any stat on EVs because it's not a "car".

40 years ago, Chinese roads were filled by bicycles. Now they're filled with cars. As Indians grow richer, will they be satisfied with:

Safety remains a concern. E-rickshaws, with their slow speed and rickety design, are prone to accidents. Drivers are supposed to avoid major roads but many do not.

And how much of cost savings comes from theft?

Utility companies complain about charging lots stealing power using illegal connections.

Electrified transport is a god send to every developing nation being held hostage by OPEC.

And still India has already grown into the third largest oil consuming country in the world, at around 5 million barrels/day after a decade of continuous growth.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by accord1999

Except it's not that much money, or at least not that much energy. Only equivalent to growth of about 1% of annual world electricity generation.

S-curve. You still don't get it.....

But it's not just renewables. Storage is coming online now too. If you're this in to energy, surely you've read about Lazard's LCOE and LCOS findings.

https://www.lazard.com/perspective/lcoe2019

Originally Posted by accord1999

I do expect as solar and wind penetration increases to see the collapse of a number of European electricity grids when many of their aging reliable generators retire and they are unable to handle high demand situations in the winter.

You're about 3 years behind on your crocodile tears.... Grid storage (battery, flywheels, molten salt), demand-management, etc. makes those problems increasingly manageable going forward.

Also, I don't buy the fantasy of all that solar and wind going on roofs and in backyards. Far easier to do all this at grid-scale where it can be managed. Cheaper too.

Originally Posted by accord1999

40 years ago, Chinese roads were filled by bicycles. Now they're filled with cars. As Indians grow richer, will they be satisfied with:

Ever been to India? Rickshaws are the only things that can get around in a lot of those cities. If you take your car, you'll get across just in time to leave work and get home just in time to go to bed. Middle class families don't own rickshaws. They use them as cheap taxis. In effect, last mile public transport in many cases. Many have cars. And will still use rickshaws as part of their commute or quick trip across town. Which is why electrifying rickshaws is a big deal.

Also last I checked, car sales are down over there. Despite economic growth surpassing China.

Originally Posted by accord1999

And how much of cost savings comes from theft?

You should read up about gas theft in those parts of the world....

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by accord1999

And still India has already grown into the third largest oil consuming country in the world, at around 5 million barrels/day after a decade of continuous growth.

Yep. And it'll be growing until they get to the price point on electrification that works and then you'll see electrification take off and substitution grow rapidly over the next decade.

And the price point for electrification in India is very different than the developed world. They don't have to go as far, or as fast or need fancy automation. They've already got the price down to levels their middle class can afford:

https://inc42.com/buzz/worlds-cheape...dia-this-year/

Their largest challenge is their grid. But they are starting to address that. They've just created an interconnected national power grid a few years ago. And are now investing in fixing that up.

I don't think you fully comprehend how much of a priority electrification is for countries that don't have oil. Trying to develop without oil resources is extremely difficult. And adds risks of balance of payments crises. Yes, they'll consume more oil as they grow. But nobody is more determined to reduce the oil intensity of their GDP and to adopt electrification as much as developing countries without oil. And unlike oil, they can get all kinds of industrialization and jobs out of electrification as companies set up plants there.