Miscellaneous News

[Temstar]

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Lol
Seriously though I speak from experience that Aussies are for whatever reason hypersensitive to Asian powers and always dreaming about being invaded. Shilao said he's personally been asked by Australians on how likely North Korea will invade Australia back when they started their nuclear testing.

Again, I bring up this example of animation for a movie called "Tomorrow, when the War Began", based on a book that Australian kids study during high school about a theoretical invasion by unspecified Asian power and a group of Australian kids waging guerilla war against the invaders:

Notice the canard-less J-10?

 

[9dashline]

I'm not him but, if I understand your comment correctly, you believe solar energy is the solution to EROEI?

Hm, well probably not. This is because while the Sun is, as you've correctly stated, basically sending us energy for free, we can't put that energy to use without spending energy. That is, we need to make solar panels, and therefore we need to create and/or mine the materials that go into solar panels, and that all takes energy. Indeed, shipping that material to a factor and then shipping those panels to a solar farm costs energy. Its very complex to calculate.... which is why we just use EROEI instead.

Solar panels don't last forever, either. Which is why we can say there is a set cost over its lifetime and not just, "basically infinite." As much as I wish solar panels could last forever, they only last 30 years or so. (This is increasing. EROEI of solar panels could go up as their lifetimes increase, provided the materials don't become harder to find.)

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This is an article that is a refutation of a previous article (that article calculated EROEI for solar voltaic panels as about 0.8), finding that its about 7-8 (or about 10, honestly. Thats the number I would use)

For context, a civilization requires about EROEI of about 3 or more to progress. The industrial revolution, characterized by very easily attainable coal, saw about EROEI of... hundreds. It was ridiculous. The oil and gas that characterized the 60's, 70's and 80's was at about 40. We today still using oil and gas see EROEI of about 20.

And its a big thing to note, EROEI is not constant across the world! Efficiency of industrial processes play a huge, huge, huge part in all of it. Not to mention availability of fuels. China, for example, has never even sniffed anything like an EROEI of 100 to 1. (Er... historically. Theres actually very good news on this front) The west has. (China's coal peaked at like 40. That was peak EROEI for China)

That said, its not like we're going to run EROEI to zero. Wood, for example, has an EROEI of anywhere between 20 and 60. Its not that wood is particularly energy dense or that burning wood is efficient, its just that wood is trivially cheap for many countries. (Not China, for many reasons. China has bamboo instead.) There are processes that make wood more energy dense but have a lower EROEI, and of course just cutting and burning wood will have a very high EROEI but is incredibly polluting, and so on....

And of course, we see that EROEI is not the driving factor for why we use one source of fuel over another...

The big EROEI savior we have in the future is probably nuclear energy. Its at like, what 100 EROEI? Hey, China's nuclear power development is literally reversing EROEI decline as we speak! (Which is also why its not doom and gloom. We have power sources that are much better. I haven't even talked about wind yet! (order of 50 EROEI... but its just hard to get consistent power from it.))

Also EROEI is very hard to calculate. Gives me a headache.

Yup.. money was invented as a proxy for energy because ERoEI was too complex to fathom.

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"In the year 2015 the economist Robert Samuelson wrote an editorial entitled, “Productivity mysteriously goes bust” for the Washington Post. He starts by saying,

What’s surprising about the disappointing slowdown in productivity is that, by all outward signs, it ought to be booming. What’s especially baffling is that, superficially, outside forces seem to favor faster productivity growth.
The outside forces that he alludes to include the internet, activist investors and globalization.

All of these forces should have resulted in improved productivity, but they didn’t. He concludes by saying, "The productivity bust is a big story. It’s also a bit of a mystery."

Being an economist, Samuelson sees the economy as being to do with money. Yet money is merely a token that allows us to purchase goods and services. And all of those goods and services — there are no exceptions — require an energy input. If we are having to use ever increasing amounts of our available energy to find and develop new sources of energy then productivity is bound to fall. Such a fall is not to do with money, a failure to use computer technology or the willingness of people to work. The fall in productivity is caused by declining ERoEI."

 

[Fedupwithlies]

Yup.. money was invented as a proxy for energy because ERoEI was too complex to fathom.

View attachment 96113

I greatly doubt your numbers on this chart when it comes to nuclear. Everything I've seen for nuclear say its significantly higher.

Also your source no longer exists, unfortunately.

As to your edits: I mean... yea? Theres no question that EROEI has fallen with respect to fossil fuels, and there's no question that money matters in terms of energy. The question isn't whether our current EROEI is declining, its whether we can come up with replacement sources with high EROEI.

 

[Abominable]

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South Korea broke its own record for the world’s lowest total fertility rate last year, census data showed on Wednesday, and experts project it will drop even further this year, adding to concerns about the country’s shrinking and aging population.

After declining steadily from 4.53 in 1970, the first year the government started compiling such data, the total fertility rate began to sink more quickly in the 2000s during the financial crises, dropping below 1.0 in 2018 as housing, child care and education costs rose, jobs became scarcer and young people grew more anxious about their future.

Sub 1 fertility rates are extinction level. When they get that low for a prolonged period it becomes very difficult to reverse. A very large elderly population and few young means pro-natal policies will be very difficult to enact.

In a 50 or so years North Korea will be able to walk into South Korea unopposed.

 

[siegecrossbow]

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South Korea broke its own record for the world’s lowest total fertility rate last year, census data showed on Wednesday, and experts project it will drop even further this year, adding to concerns about the country’s shrinking and aging population.

After declining steadily from 4.53 in 1970, the first year the government started compiling such data, the total fertility rate began to sink more quickly in the 2000s during the financial crises, dropping below 1.0 in 2018 as housing, child care and education costs rose, jobs became scarcer and young people grew more anxious about their future.

Seems this is the inevitable path for East Asian states…

 

[9dashline]

I greatly doubt your numbers on this chart when it comes to nuclear. Everything I've seen for nuclear say its significantly higher.

Also your source no longer exists, unfortunately.

As to your edits: I mean... yea? Theres no question that EROEI has fallen with respect to fossil fuels, and there's no question that money matters in terms of energy. The question isn't whether our current EROEI is declining, its whether we can come up with replacement sources with high EROEI.

I also linked to Energy Trap site which makes the arguement that its already too little too late to make the transition

 

[Strangelove]

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Oh dear they said the quiet part out loud

"Democracy dies" when you buy Russian oil...

 

[Peas]

Generous America，donated 3 billion dollars to Ukraine

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[Abominable]

Seems this is the inevitable path for East Asian states…

East Asia is is a better position than most of Europe as their fertility rate drop occurred much later. The reason the drop is lower is because of the lack of immigration. If you look at the native populations of most European countries much lower than the national rate.

The concerning thing is I've not seen a single country implement anything that could be considered potentially successful. It's all things that were implemented and failed before.

The way I'm increasingly seeing it is natural selection. If a society needs to implement draconian measures to keep its people reproducing it doesn't deserve to exist. I wonder how many tribes in prehistorical times went extinct because they didn't bother learning to cultivate fire, save up enough food for winter, etc.

 

[Fedupwithlies]

I also linked to Energy Trap site which makes the arguement that its already too little too late to make the transition

An article from 2011. And I also believe that source is biased.

While maybe some countries have done too little to make the transition, I believe humanity in general is doing just fine.