“Every molecule of fossil fuel produced worldwide will be burned by somebody somewhere, and local efforts to restrict consumption merely relocate the enjoyment of that privilege.”
Prior to the widespread proliferation of the steam engine, mining for coal was back-breaking work. The industry relied on human and animal strength, with laborers using primitive tools, to extract the stuff from hand-dug mineshafts. The work was as dangerous as it was dirty, and fatalities were commonplace. Then, a revolution unfolded. A step-change improvement to existing steam engine design, engineered by James Watt, allowed miners to leverage machinery such as pumps, hoists, and ventilation systems to alleviate significant portions of direct human effort. Pumps that used Watt’s engines were particularly effective at draining water from deep mineshafts, making vast and previously inaccessible coal reserves economically viable. The genius of his invention was in delivering far more work per quanta of fuel.
What did these advances in energy efficiency do to the demand for coal? Did society limit itself to doing the same amount of work as it had done before, just more economically so? Quite the contrary.
This is a good one, worth sharing around. More discussion here.
Ireland to ban cows.
Well, they have banned Christianity pretty much and imported thousands of Muslims.
They stupidly detest Jews and Israel while kowtowing to the “Palestinians.”
No wonder there are 5 million low IQ Irish in Ireland where 90% of the population dislike Donald Trump while there are 31.5 million Americans of Irish descent who have IQ’s 50 points higher. How do I know that? Well, the majority of Irish Americans voted for Trump.
Moral of Story: Irish should move to American and get an immediate IQ boost.
My children are Irish Americans and they voted for Trump. See!!
I was curious so I looked it up ( https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/average-iq-by-country). The average IQ in Ireland is indeed 2% lower than that of the US which is 2% below that of Canada. That pretty much disproves your hypothesis (if serious) of IQ being related to Trump support. Some of the most evil people on the planet have high IQs.
I don’t believe your “…that of the US which is 2% below that of Canada.” Americans elected Trump – Canadians despise him, admittedly because Canadians believe everything the CBC tells them, including all the CBC says about Trump – which sure as @*#&@%!!! doesn’t speak volumes for Canadians’ intelligence!
{ – For those of you curious about Watt’s great improvement to the steam engine over what came before, a fascinating very-early steam site is the steam house at Cruquius – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrb7dybIPcM&t=232s – which is billed as “the world’s largest steam engine”. It’s dreadfully inefficient, but was a marvel for its day.
Likewise, the Newcomen steam engine, the precursor to Watt’s. The Newcomen worked by using steam to push a piston up a cylinder; the cylinder was then cooled and the steam condensed, creating a vacuum that sucked the piston back down the cylinder. Watt reasoned that was a massive waste of the heat in the steam, because the next steam fed-into the cylinder would have to warm the cylinder back up again. So Watt put a separate chamber off to one side that was kept cool; and the steam would condense in the chamber, rather than the cylinder which would remain hot. This doubled the efficiency of the steam engine on the spot, including halving the amount of coal its boiler consumed.
There were several more BIG improvements to come for the steam engine, but Watt’s improvement put it on the map and made him quite rich. Win-win! – }
You will eat your bugs while freezing in the dark and like it!
1st we’ll have to grow a gizzards in our necks!
I’m already working on it. Wattle I do!
“…your standard of living is a proxy for how much energy you get to consume.”
That should be tattooed on the forehead of every Green Party member. Cursive would be fine…but I’m good with Helvetica.
The leaders of the Green movement are well aware of that fact which is why they want to lower YOUR standard of living.
They’re anti human. Full stop.
“Why should white Westerners live so comfortably, while the majority of the world suffers?”
This is what the eco-Marxists preach. And sadly, all the “compassionate” suburban moms have bought into it. But what the moms don’t know is that the eco-left is not going to IMPROVE the 3rd world’s standard of living … but rather destroy ours. Everyone should have an equal playing field, they say … equal misery.
Because, of course, it’s our fault and not the fault of their cultural preferences.
Marxist preaching, indeed. I had an über-Marxist TA at university. He is now on the Sunshine List. Enough said.
Embossed or chiseled would be more impressive.
From my experience I was one of the first in Canada to have a diesel smart car and rather than saving fuel I and many others took the opportunity to drive more to the dismay of the environmentalists that frequented the smart car forums at the time. I went to California and others crossed Canada for the fun of it and the Watermelon’s all the time complained we are killing the planet. Today I drive a plugin hybrid that allows me to heat or cool the car without remote starting the engine. No more burning skin on the hot leather seat on a hot summer day for me. Life is good with getting more convenience out of the same or slightly more energy consumed.
What I find fascinating is that the Industrial Revolution took off using machines of remarkably low efficiency, with early steam engines being only about 1% efficient. That means that 99% of the coal dug did essentially nothing. It gets even worse when adding in the energy used to dig and transport the coal to the end user. Yet, at even 1% efficient, the steam engine advanced civilization to heights never seen before by modern man. Today, any increases in efficiency are gravy. Perhaps the best recent example is efficient LED lighting. Prior to that, decorative lighting was far less common, and electronic outdoor billboards were impossible. Now they are about as common here as old fashioned ones, which use zero electricity in the day, and not much at night.
From Matt Ridley’s book How Innovation Works. In 1880 one minute of work could buy you four minutes of light from a kerosine lamp. In 1950 one minute of work could buy you 7 hours of light from an incandescent lamp. In 2000 120 hours.
Which means over 500 hours if you use an LED lamp today.
None of the 3 are top ten in IQ.
US spends more per student every year, IIRC. Not much return on that. If Canada is 2% better, I’m not noticing much return there, either.
Don’t know where it stands now, but 15 – 20 years ago, the US had 75% of the world’s engineers and scientists.
Losing that demographic will lower a national IQ.
But really, how many of those people took an IQ test?
Stats can be cooked. Or simply made up, as we have seen.
When all gas and oil are eliminated and we are all electric what tax will the government dream up to replace the cash cow they are currently getting from oil and gas.
Has anyone ever talked about that ? No
Is the carbon scam going to be the replacement? And just go up and up. It’s going to have to take a massive jump to replace the current taxes.
When there is no gas and oil there will be nothing else and that includes governments.
“Irish farmers are rebelling against a proposal to cull tens of thousands of cattle a year to help Ireland meet its climate change targets. The Irish government wants to reduce emissions from farming by a quarter by 2030. Media reports last week suggested that one option being considered was to reduce the national dairy herd by 10 per cent – meaning a cull of 65,000 cows a year for three years, at a cost of €200 million (£170 million) annually.”
Cull 65,000 dairy cows per year to reduce greenhouse emissions? Thinking outside the box:
How many bureaucrats would they have to similarly reduce to achieve the same result? Probably not as many, as you never hear about dairy cows flying cross country or to another continent for a conference or important meeting. Also bureaucrats have longer careers and create more greenhouse pollution over their lifetimes.
Every molecule … produced … will be burned
Hence Trudeau actively destroying the oil and gas industry in Canada. He wants to keep it buried. That is why importing Saudi oil makes sense to the Liberals. Its intentional.