Full Speed In Reverse

                                                                                      written 12 October, 2025

                                                                                  published 19 October, 2025

            For the last two centuries, modern civilization has been built on the availability of abundant affordable energy from stored fossil fuels, deposited millions of years previously.  But these resources are finite, and humanity is now dealing with a peak in global production: a point of maximum extraction prior to an inevitable decline.  This was forecast decades ago, but ignored by true believers who deny any limits to reality.

            Domestic oil production helped the US lead the world after WW2, changing everything, making America a powerhouse on the planet.  But domestic oil production peaked in 1972, initiating a decade of uncontrolled inflation, and shifted the balance of power to the middle east.  An eventual agreement to denominate all global oil sales in US dollars brought a measure of stability for a while.  But consumption kept increasing, and global production eventually peaked in the early 2000's, amplifying the 2007 economic crash of an over extended housing market.  Since then, diesel has become more expensive than gasoline, adversely affecting the entire transportation economy.

            In 2005, new forms of oil production were developed, designated as unconventional oil.  This oil was more expensive to produce, increasing the cost of everything.  The most productive sources were deep sea ocean and tight rock (fracking).  Fracking extracts thin layers of oil from rock that must be fractured open under high pressure.  The reserves are small and the wells deplete in just a few years, requiring constant drilling of new wells.  Exploiting these expensive unconventional sources, the US has again become a leading oil producer.

            However, the oil industry now acknowledges US fracking resources have peaked.  All global production from any source is now flat or in decline, with an estimated $500B investment needed annually to make up the decline, let alone power any new growth. 

            Discovery of new global oil reserves peaked half a century ago.  While there are still oil resources to extract, these are smaller, more difficult to produce, increasing prices and driving inflation.  Without even discussing the adverse climate impact, the economics of our finite fossil fuel resources threaten the stability of our fragile, highly leveraged financial system.

            Our economy is further destabilized by the erratic application of tariffs, which increase prices, and the authoritarian activities of the government, causing an increase in gold prices, and a down grading of US debt.  Efforts to avoid the dollar in global trade are growing, and concerns of an economic crash are increasing.

            Rather than seeing what is coming and embracing effective changes, US leadership is incoherent, moving full speed in reverse.  They kill technologies that can help, and instead push further fossil fuel development and a resurgence of nuclear power.  But oil production is unprofitable for the corporations at low prices, and unaffordable for the consumers at high prices.  The nuclear buzz, expected to power the growing AI frenzy, is attracting billions in investment, in part due to massive taxpayer subsidies.  But the reality of supply chain limitations, finite fuel sources, and unproven designs means this may be just a financial bubble, which could pop with a single messy accident, resulting from hasty construction.

            Though the US refuses to take action, the rest of the world is beginning to respond, slowly shifting to renewable energy, collecting free power from the sun and wind.  China is leading the way, producing most of the global supply of solar panels, batteries, and affordable EV's, while installing half of all the wind power last year.  But the push in on everywhere.  Globally, a gigawatt of solar is installed every day, and the pace is increasing.  

            Even though the sun only shines for part of the day, a gigawatt array collects about the same amount of power as a modest Small Modular Reactor (SMR) operating full time.  But the solar arrays being installed today cost $1.2B, while reactor salesmen suggest a SMR will cost between $3-$7B.  However, nobody knows what a SMR will really cost, since none exist yet in the real world.

            The Post Carbon Institute suggests oil depletion shows our current industrial civilization is unstable, incapable of endless growth in the way we use energy and resources.  Depletion demands we begin prioritizing those social features we really need.  We must start to live with the planet, not in spite of it.  It calls for us to imagine a more localized energy future, and start adapting now, while we still have some opportunities.

  

 

A Fool In Charge

                                                                                        written 5 October, 2025

                                                                                  published 12 October, 2025

    

            Once upon a time, a king demanded the tide stop coming in.  But this was not a foolish act, for the king was actually trying to show his foolish advisors the limits to power.  Unfortunately, our self-proclaimed king not only has foolish advisors, but is foolish himself, believing whatever he says must be reality.

            He foolishly believes the climate crisis is a hoax, so he props up aging fossil fueled plants and destroys efforts to address, or even monitor, climate changes already happening.  Coal, a 19th century energy source, is expected to power 21st century AI data centers.  Operating a coal fired plant costs more than building new wind/solar with storage.  The Big Beautiful Bill cancels funding for wind and solar, mostly in Democratic-led states, unsettling the financial underpinnings of the entire U.S. energy industry.  Without even considering the adverse climate impact, consumers will annually pay an extra $3 billion power bills.  Electricity rates increased by nearly 7 percent in the last year, with more rate increases on the horizon.   

            After the mindless DOGE staffing purge, the Energy Department doesn’t have enough lawyers left to carry out the project cancellations ordered by the White House, and will instead have to spend millions on outside counsel. 

            There have been no major domestic nuclear accidents since Three Mile Island, partially due to Nuclear Regulatory Commission oversight.  Now, hundreds of people have been fired from the agency and only three of the five NRC commissioner positions are filled, making the recent push for more nuclear power increasingly risky.

            Our king foolishly believes raising tariffs and excluding workers will make the country richer.  As a result, the economy is suffering the highest tariffs in a century and consumers pay higher prices.  John Deere, producer of machinery for many American farms, says sales are down, with higher tariffs increasing costs by $600 million.  Tariffs on steel and aluminum led to losses of thousands of manufacturing job.  Instead of reducing drug prices, tariffs have increased prices on almost 700 prescription drugs so far this year.

            Farmers face a slump in crop prices and worsening credit conditions.  Corn prices are down 50%, and soybean prices are down 40%, as overseas markets for crops are lost due to tariffs.  With the massive assault on undocumented workers, farmers are caught in the middle of a 155,000-worker shortfall across the national agricultural sector, which means lower supply and higher prices.

            Tariffs have weakened consumer spending, as jobs are evaporating, with sharp drops in home construction.  One indication is a 9 percent decline in containerboard-production capacity in eight months, twice the capacity that was lost during the recession in 2009.  

            Nearly 30 countries have suspended postal services of packages to U.S. over import tariffs, including Australia, Japan, India, and Europe.  After September 21, no H-1B worker will be allowed to enter the US unless the sponsoring employer pays a $100,000 fee.  These are workers with specialized knowledge that no one local can fill.

            Employment fell by 13,000 jobs in June, marking the first net loss since December 2020, with another 32,000 jobs lost in September.  Last month, jobless claims surged in one week, when 263,000 new people filing for unemployment insurance, 10 percent higher than the previous week.  Unemployment rate is 4.3 percent, the highest level since the pandemic.  Rising unemployment and higher prices threaten economic stability.  But instead of dealing with what they created, the administration fired the record keepers.  

            Billionaires benefit from tax cuts, while MAGA voters are bearing the brunt.  A majority of Republicans now think he's on the wrong track when it comes to the economy and tariffs.  He promised tariffs would fill the U.S. Treasury, create millions of manufacturing jobs, and be paid by foreign countries.  He insisted he could impose these tariffs without an act of Congress, and he would complete trade deals with 200 countries.  He promised to end the war in Ukraine on Day 1, that Putin really wants to make a deal, and would soon stop attacking.  He promised to reduce prices on Day 1.  

            None of this happened.

            It doesn't really matter whether the president knows he is lying, or is just delusional, believing whatever passes through his mind in any given moment.  He is acting like a fool.  What is more disturbing is the entire leadership of the Republican party seems willing to go along with this.  It won't end well.

 

 

The Nuclear Stampede

                                                                                  written 28 September, 2025

                                                                                    published 5 October, 2025

 

            In the rush to build more nuclear power, billions are being poured into advanced reactors, and billions more into expanding the nuclear fuel chain.  The published reason is the massive power demanded by data centers and artificial intelligence (AI).  Disregarding the social risks of AI, the real attraction is the money to be made, as nuclear power is some of the most expensive on the grid.  Nuclear is the perfect capitalist power source.  The price tag is huge, significant taxpayer subsidies are involved (corporate welfare), monopoly power guarantees return on investment, liability is limited, power is centralized, and a few dozen corporations control the industry.  This isn't about affordable electricity, it is about maximizing return on investment.

            Even before Fukushima, nuclear development hadn't been robust for years, as they are economically unaffordable in the face of cheaper renewable power.  Among other delusions, our president believes the climate crisis is a hoax, so renewable energy must be squashed.  Consequently, the nuclear rush is based on fiction, like all the financial bubbles throughout history.

            It is fiction nuclear is clean energy.  During normal operations, a nuclear plant emits no carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.  However, plant construction and nuclear fuel production have a significant carbon footprint, even without considering disposal of nuclear waste and decommissioning aged reactors.  

            It is fiction nuclear can deal with climate change, which has been ignored for so long that only rapid change will be sufficient.  Reactor construction takes twice as long as projected, so building traditional reactors can't happen fast enough to be relevant.  

            The new hope is small modular reactors (SMR), which are promised to be cheaper, faster to construct, and safer than current reactors.  These promises are fiction, unsupported in reality, since no SMR is in operation today.  Though SMR construction has begun in several locations, none of the designs are complete, nor approved.  

            The president is pushing the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is tasked with nuclear safety, to rubber stamp these designs to make things happen faster.  But there is a reason for safety concerns.  Nuclear reactors are complex, and the consequences of failure are impactful and expensive.  All the reactors in operation today evolved from a few basic designs that have been updated over decades as new concerns came to light.  Even then, the unknown unknown can show still show up a fatal weakness.  SMR's are a new design, with no track record and no guarantee safety will be anything like what is promised. 

            Safety is expensive, and cutting corners saves money in the short term.  The US military has a long history of nuclear safety in the navy, because cost savings were never a priority over safety.  This is not the case in commercial nuclear power.  At Chernobyl, the Russian design was thought to be so safe a containment structure was considered an unnecessary cost.  That failure was felt over 1,000 miles away, and the exclusion zone is still hazardous to life 40 years later.  At Fukushima, General Electric saved money placing the emergency backup pumps close to sea level, despite evidence of large tsunamis in the past.  That failure was a trillion dollar disaster they said could never happen.  Safety will be sacrificed in the current rush for profit as well.

            The economics of nuclear power are constrained by the scale of manufacturing.  No matter how many SMR's are built, the total quantity can't compete with the scale of creating solar panels, where improved manufacturing over the last 50 years has reduced the cost per kilowatt hour by a factor of 1,000, while reactor costs keep getting more expensive.

            Nuclear power consumes uranium, a finite fuel source, which is mostly imported.  But it competes with renewables, which collect free energy.  Some of the SMR designs expect to use High Assay Low Enriched Uranium (HALEU): uranium enriched to 20 percent, much closer to weapons grade.  Domestic facilities for this level of enrichment do not yet exist.  Other SMR designs intend to reuse existing spent nuclear fuel, which will have to be reprocessed before being useful, creating even more radioactive waste in the process.

            Nuclear power produces radioactive waste on a good day, and radioactive contamination on a bad day, neither of which have ever been successfully dealt with since the beginning of the atomic age.  The driving force is making money, not affordable energy.  The public pays for nuclear mistakes and electric bills keep increasing.