[[{“value”:”
Irina Slav
International Author writing about energy, mining, and geopolitical issues. Bulgaria
David Blackmon
Principal at DB Energy Advisors, energy author, and podcast host.Principal at DB Energy Advisors, energy author, and podcast host.
Tammy Nemeth
Energy Consulting Specialist
Stuart Turley
President, and CEO, Sandstone Group, Podcast Host
Deindustrialization has consequences
David Blackmon [00:00:10] Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Energy Realities podcast. As, markets are crashing all over the world, we’re here to talk about energy.
Stuart Turley [00:00:20] I hey, but oil’s holding steady.
David Blackmon [00:00:23] We got a holding steady in the low 70s. Yeah. I mean, after a 15% collapse over the past two weeks in oil prices, we’ll we’ll see how steady it remains today. But here with me today, I’m David Blackmon. Of course. Your unprepared narrator today. And here with me are Doctor Tammy Nemeth, who is in the UK. Correct.
Tammy Nemeth [00:00:48] UK. Today. Yeah
David Blackmon [00:00:49] Hopefully staying out of the, looming civil war that’s developing over there and Irina Slav in Bulgaria. How are you today?
Irina Slav [00:00:57] Great. Thank you. David.
David Blackmon [00:00:59] No. No riots today in Bulgaria.
Irina Slav [00:01:02] No. No. No.
David Blackmon [00:01:02] Good. Good.
Irina Slav [00:01:04] Blackwater.
David Blackmon [00:01:08] Yeah. Okay. And up in Oklahoma, we have Mr. Stu Turley, the CEO of the Sandstone Group. How are you today, Stu?
Stuart Turley [00:01:15] It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood. I don’t have to worry about it right up here. Except for the squirrels and bears.
David Blackmon [00:01:21] Yeah, yeah. Well, that’s. I’m. I’m kind of in the same boat here in Texas. We’re not having riots yet, but if the Dow goes down another 3 or 4000 points, all bets are off. But today we are here to talk about deindustrialization and the consequences it has on the societies, mainly in the Western world who are experiencing it today. We’ve had stories. I mean, I just went out and got a few links to some stories here, some headlines that I read over the weekend, more German companies, more relocation due to high energy prices. That was it. Reuters. It’s all over. Tata Steel to end steelmaking in Britain by September. So there’s the deindustrialization of Britain that’s been ongoing for a while. At my own Substack, we had, Hertz ev far, far sail failure shows its net zero bloodbath is just getting started. That’s the first time I’ve used the terms fire, sale and bloodbath in a single headline on any story. And then, finally, there’s a story about Vineyard Wind. Federal regulators issue revised suspension order for Vineyard Vineyard Wind as more debris falls from the damaged turbine. This, of course, is America’s only offshore active offshore wind boondoggle with several more under development. And so here we go. With our glorious energy transition progressing exactly as we should have expected it to progress. Correct. Anybody disagree with that? I mean, I think we’ve all been expecting this day for for quite a while now. I, I don’t know, Tammy, what are you seeing in the way of deindustrialization in the UK or your second home in Canada?
Tammy Nemeth [00:03:13] That’s a good question. I think the interesting part about the Tata Steel, article is that they’re closing the blast furnace, but they’re looking for government money to have an electric furnace. So the blast furnace would be powered by coal or natural gas or whatever. And they’re they’re saying, well, we’ll keep some jobs and we’ll keep it open. If the government helps pay for the electric arc furnace. So that’s part of their sustainability transition. I don’t know when that’ll be finished. It’s one of these things like the Germans saying, well, we’re mulling. They’ve been mulling for some time to move their operations overseas. And usually when they’re saying they’re mulling, that means they’re talking to government to find some means of subsidy to stay open and jobs and that sort of thing. And one of the interesting aspects with the, forced transition to alternative vehicles like EVs or whatever, for example, in Canada, there were all these battery manufacturers, there’s line electric, which is has operations in both Illinois and in Quebec in Canada, and they build electric school busses. And there was an article this week that they’ve had to lay off another third of their employees. They got like tens of millions of dollars from both levels of government, provincial and federal and Canada. And apparently they’re going to give the money back. But I don’t see how. And they’re because they were paid to keep the employees going. So they’re tooling back and. So when you talk about deindustrialization, it’s it’s also this idea that they will have alternative means of employment and manufacturing. But in green jobs. But then these green jobs, they get all this money for them and then they disappear. Right. This is par for the course in every country, it seems, that tries to jump on this bandwagon. And in the UK, I mean, it’s complicated to some extent. Now we’ve got GB energy, which is one of the headlines I’m going to talk about later. But it’s all about shifting all that investment and subsidy money to supposedly keep green jobs. But my in a conversation I had this morning with someone, there’s a huge solar farm, solar array being built on farmland, and it’ll be built by Germans in the UK. So yay, green jobs. Just not for British. I guess.
David Blackmon [00:05:43] I don’t know, I suppose you should count yourself lucky that it’s not being built by Chinese companies.
Tammy Nemeth [00:05:50] Yeah. Which was an interesting story from I E.R., a couple days ago. These two for energy research, where they were talking about the number of Chinese solar manufacturers in America.
David Blackmon [00:06:07] Yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s quite.
Stuart Turley [00:06:09] Inflation Reduction Act has ruined our country.
David Blackmon [00:06:13] Yep. It’s, well. On the way
Tammy Nemeth [00:06:14] as it was intended.
David Blackmon [00:06:17] Irina. You had a wonderful story about EV batteries this morning at your Substack. I have to, you know, I finished reading.
Tammy Nemeth [00:06:24] Yeah, that was awesome.
David Blackmon [00:06:26] Thanks. It’s just something everyone needs to go out to Substack and do a search on Irina Slav at Substack. And it’s just a glorious story. Anyway, Irina, what are you seeing as the consequences of deindustrialization of the West?
Irina Slav [00:06:43] Right now? I’m I’m trying to process the fact that somebody is building solar in Britain, which is not the best location for solar. And, they’re building is on farmland. They’re not going to just stop with Britain, but it’s, it’s symptomatic of the utter cluelessness of the people leading this or, I don’t know, evil nature, depending on what your preferred explanation is of this. But we’re seeing and we have been talking about it, as you said, day, but we have been talking about it since, well, since there is an energy reality podcast. When we started with Amanda, what was it 2 or 3 years ago.
David Blackmon [00:07:23] two and a half years ago
Irina Slav [00:07:26] And we weren’t the only ones. A plenty of people who have been warning that this will be the consequence of this energy transition. First, because it could not work. It couldn’t work because of physical laws, the laws of physics, and literal constraints and limits to what wind and solar can do. They can not replace hydrocarbon energy. We are seeing it in Germany. And yet I love how the media told us that Germany surprisingly slipped into a recession in the second quarter.
David Blackmon [00:08:01] shocking.
Irina Slav [00:08:03] Shocking. Nobody could have seen this coming. The exodus of German companies from Germany to survive is just stunning, and the government can’t do much about it because they have no money, right? Sales it that I think I wrote about this few months ago. I can’t remember when it was, but they rolled back the subsidies, their EV subsidies, because they couldn’t keep them going. And even with subsidies. I had read an article today from, from Eurostat statistical data that even if we’re talking about just EVs, I like. Up my new percentage of all cars, even in the European Union. Yeah, and if Denmark has the highest percentage of EV cars of the total in Germany, it doesn’t. Why are we talking about the UK fell out of the top manufacturing countries in the world? That’s entirely because of the last few governments energy policies. So we have a growing number of examples. We have Germany, we have the UK, we have Canada, we have the US. The evidence is, you know, it’s piling up and yet they keep going in the same direction. They wouldn’t be satisfied. You know, it all breaks down and then they’ll wonder what happened. It wasn’t meant to happen this way.
David Blackmon [00:09:40] Right. And it’ll all be blamed on not spending quite enough. Right. And we’re not another round.
Irina Slav [00:09:45] Yeah. And China, because China dominates the raw material end of the whole supply chain. Yeah. Maybe I should have thought about that earlier before trying to start from scratch. When you’re catching up on, what is it, 20 or more years of development by China of this supply chain? They just all.
David Blackmon [00:10:06] Of which has been subsidized by those of us in the Western world, right? I mean, yeah, that Chinese development hasn’t been organic. I mean, it’s been heavily subsidized by corporations and governments in the West.
Irina Slav [00:10:18] Because it was easy to outsource all of this to China. Yeah. And now they’re waking up to some realities. Wait.
Stuart Turley [00:10:27] It. And the reality is the pollution goals. We see that New Zealand airline is not going to meet their net zero goals. Net zero is not going to happen because of AI. But let me read you a little bit at a Robert Stack Substack this week.
David Blackmon [00:10:44] Robert Bryce.
Stuart Turley [00:10:45] Robert Bryce, thank you. Yeah. I did go to Oklahoma State University, so I’m brilliant. Over the last three years, China has been adding roughly one Germany each year in terms of electricity demand. And this trend is expanded, is expected to continue. Listen to this. China dominates the global market for coal, a much greater degree than any other fuel, accounting for 58% of demand. Demand. Unbelievable. India just announced that they are signing up or they have now approved ten more coal plants. No, I mean not, I mean, mine’s excuse me. Mine’s not even the power plants, just mines. So they are going all in and I’m happy for them. More power to the people as my the way I look at it.
Tammy Nemeth [00:11:43] Yeah. I mean, China makes the argument that with the new technology, of the, the newer coal plants, there’s a way to have the, the particulate emissions down, put scrubbers in and all that kind of thing. And they assure everybody that’s what they’re doing. I hope India is doing the same thing. Otherwise, you know then that it creates all other kinds of, of issues. But as we’ve said before on the podcast, coal makes a lot of sense for, for strategic reasons as well as reliability regions. I mean, you can stockpile it. It’s pretty easy, pretty straightforward. If you have a pile, you use it up. If you have your own mines, like, for example, the one coal power plant that they’re really trying to shut down in Canada, which is in Saskatchewan, is built right beside a coal mine. So, you know, obviously it’s easier if you have the mine right there and you have a power plant right there. It makes it much more reliable and affordable, you know, much lower cost than if you’re having to import LNG or whatever, you know, uranium or whatever else from everywhere else. So from a security point, it makes a lot of sense.
David Blackmon [00:12:50] It totally does. And that’s why I think within five years, we’re going to be building new coal plants in the United States again, because we’re destroying our energy security right now, and we’re going to have to find a way to come back quickly from that. And the quickest way to do that will be to build more coal plants.
Tammy Nemeth [00:13:08] All of the above, like.
David Blackmon [00:13:10] Well, we can’t reopen the old ones to the extent they have modern equipment on them. Scrubber equipment, which, you know, advances all the time, just as it does in the oil and gas industry. And, it’ll just it’ll be an economic decision whether you reopen. Mothballed plants that you haven’t already destroyed, which some of the plants we’ve we’ve mothballed in the United States are just being taken down completely. Or you build a new one and it may be cheaper in many instances to build new ones. Oh I, Richard McLellan McLennan has a great comment here. Yeah, I love my cattle and chickens are doing really good. I’m glad to hear that Joseph. Just don’t sign a lease with a solar wind company and you’ll be fine. No, I mean, that’s reality, right? Well, I’m sorry I, interrupted you there.
Irina Slav [00:14:03] I know I wasn’t going to say anything.
David Blackmon [00:14:05] Oh, okay. Well, you know, we have in the United States another story I wanted to talk about here. You know, we talked about, companies going back on their net zero goals. And, of course, Hertz has done that. They’ve they’ve gone back on their promise to have 25% of their fleet all electric by the end of this year. And in fact, they’ve been trying to far sell a big portion of their existing fleet, at way below market prices for used electric vehicles. And they can’t sell them. Right. So they’re having the same problem as legacy carmakers are and Tesla dealers are, and selling used electric vehicles on the open market. This is possibly a potentially fatal flaw, I think, for the electric vehicle industry. Nobody wants to buy used electric vehicles for very good reasons. And a lot of the reasons again, in arena’s piece this morning on batteries, she details there is the unreliability and the high cost of replacing the batteries. And I just don’t I don’t know. I mean, do you see any of this, these alternatives, that we are being forced to adopt in the Western world being truly viable in the long run? I mean, the subsidies are about to run out. If we’re going into a global recession now, which it looks like we are. The subsidies are going to have to go away because otherwise your country is going to become bankrupt. And, I mean, I think that’s an alternative that’s, to destructive to contemplate, even for the idiots running our governments today. But I wonder what y’all think. Are any of these industries in any danger of becoming truly viable without the subsidies?
Irina Slav [00:16:02] Of course, now they’ve proven that they can not be viable without the subsidies. And the latest piece of evidence was, in the UK when when the government agreed to increase the money, the minimum guaranteed price for offshore wind by 50%. Just like that? Yeah. What’s another half billion between friends? Yeah. You know, and the only reason it had to do that is because offshore wind or any wind really is completely and utterly unviable on its own. It cannot turn in a profit on its own. Hence the minimum guaranteed price. But you pros very good question, David, about a global recession. What happens when we all slip into a recession? And you know what I’m afraid of, that those idiots in government will try to double down on their so-called green agenda. Yes. And they won’t stop before they really run out of all money or before they get ousted in a. In a forceful way.
Stuart Turley [00:17:13] New York is a perfect example of that. The man Manhattan Contrarian put out over the weekend. An excellent article. The great cut green economy is failing as caused to hammer consumers and businesses. But, one of the great lines in here is New York expected to ramp up renewable energy production in the years, but is unlikely to meet any climate goals. Yeah, they’re just killing. They’re killing their economy in New York and destroying the grid.
David Blackmon [00:17:48] Yeah. And the two Irinas point doubling down on failure and disaster is the model these left wing politicians follow. They never admit they’re wrong about anything. Their response is always to double down on failure. And, until they’re thrown out of office. So, you know, we see, Great Britain now having just elected a new government already with riots all over the country, in revolt to the new government’s policies. And yet, you know, they don’t really have to hold another election for five years, right?
Tammy Nemeth [00:18:26] Five years of this. Yeah.
Stuart Turley [00:18:27] Oh my gosh.
Irina Slav [00:18:28] In my .
Tammy Nemeth [00:18:30] The people aren’t revolting against all the policies. It’s the immigration issue. Right. And the thousands of people who arrive on the shores in dinghies. A lot of it, you know, pushed forward by authorities in Europe, you know, who are waiting for the new government to be elected before they sent the boats over. And they’re being put up in hotels at cost to taxpayers. And, yeah, puts a lot of strain on housing like we’re seeing in every Western country. So, you know, the solution then is to keep bringing people in and then force housebuilding on agricultural land, on green space. So for a government that claims to be so environmental, it wants to take up the green space of existing communities and fill it with, really, you know, packed and condensed housing. So
Irina Slav [00:19:21] how do the jobs of these people. Sorry. Sorry for interrupting you.
Tammy Nemeth [00:19:26] Well, exactly. I mean, what jobs? Because they end up being on benefits forever. They don’t necessarily like the one guy this Egyptian guy was found guilty of robbing someone of a $25,000 watch in London somewhere. I can’t believe but watch it that much. But anyway, wasn’t put in jail and not given community service or anything because he didn’t speak English.
Stuart Turley [00:19:51] Let him go. Wow.
Irina Slav [00:19:52] Oh, that’s. That’s nice.
Tammy Nemeth [00:19:54] And this is one of the reasons why people are upset. Because one of the first moves the the new government did was release 6000 prisoners from jail, saying, you know, they don’t need to be there anymore. We’re just going to let them go. Is like, well, okay, how do we know that a lot of the unrest, the violence that is happening isn’t being generated by some of these people who were let out. We don’t know. I mean, part of it is you can see their their people are in masks and they’re doing stuff and, and whatever. So so, you know, I don’t doubt that. Like, I think Stu has a clip here where it is part of the the people who are protesting encountered the police and there’s an issue and they yesterday they were trying to attack a hotel where the these illegal migrants are staying. And, you know, these people are clearly upset, but there’s been other violence that it’s unclear if it’s those actual protesters who are doing the violence. Maybe it’s some of these 6000 people who were let out, I don’t know.
Stuart Turley [00:20:56] And and we are about to see it in the United States. I’m going to go on record right now to say, buckle up. It is about to hit the United States. Now, make sure if you go out and protest that you know who you’re protesting with and for, let me show you this one clip.
Tammy Nemeth [00:21:17] It’s in the UK.
Stuart Turley [00:21:19] Here we. Are. Watch the guy on the right. Boom! In the chest, in the head. He gets hit in the head, and then. Oh! Right here like an elbow. oh my Godness,
Stuart Turley [00:21:34] Well If you’re in a riot, make sure you know if you ask your people that you’re riding with. Do you know how to throw a rock?
Irina Slav [00:21:47] It’s not funny. It’s not funny at all.
David Blackmon [00:21:50] No it’s not.
Stuart Turley [00:21:50] It didn’t hurt a bit. I mean, holy smokes. No. And I. And on a serious note, I think it’s going to get ugly in the United States. I’ve got, some contacts that I’ve been talking to. And, if you’re in a big city, get out.
David Blackmon [00:22:09] Well, we’ve been saying that for four years.
Irina Slav [00:22:11] Yeah.
David Blackmon [00:22:12] And whether there will be unrest in the United States depends entirely on whether or not it will benefit the Democratic Party. If it does, then we’ll have riots. If it doesn’t, we won’t.
Stuart Turley [00:22:21] Antifa just announced this after this weekend that they are fired up. They’re well-armed and they’re coming. So.
David Blackmon [00:22:30] I mean, Antifa is a subsidiary of the Democratic Party in the United States. So anyway, sorry, that’ll piss some people off, I guess. I don’t care.
Stuart Turley [00:22:39] Don’t either.
Irina Slav [00:22:41] Now, I wouldn’t be having this podcast,
Tammy Nemeth [00:22:45] So. But so, I have this funny little thing. So we were talking about the wind turbines and how they were, with my family. We were talking about how the birds get slaughtered by the wind turbines. And then my daughter said, my daughter said, well, isn’t that BLM bird lives matter?
Stuart Turley [00:23:06] No way,.
Irina Slav [00:23:06] Well done.
Tammy Nemeth [00:23:08] You say, can we protest then that BLM signs bird life matter.
David Blackmon [00:23:11] Really good? I wouldn’t want that. Yeah.
Stuart Turley [00:23:15] We need that. That’s almost T-shirt worthy. Having an eagle all jumped up like this, you know. Oh, sure. Yeah.
David Blackmon [00:23:23] It’s getting that aren’t funny.
Irina Slav [00:23:25] Really, really sad. Because the other day, we took our daughter to, an animal shelter. The only one in Bulgaria that takes in wild birds that have suffered some injury or other. Thankfully, we don’t have that many wind turbines. But I was thinking when I saw this hawk, the small hawk with an amputated wing due to some injury. Do we really need more injured birds by building more wind turbines?
Tammy Nemeth [00:23:58] I know, and in Germany they’re putting them in forests and they’re putting the turbines in forests.
Irina Slav [00:24:03] Well, wherever they put them, we have birds that fly high.
Stuart Turley [00:24:08] The the Biden Harris, the Biden Harris group is planning on putting in wind turbines in the Gulf of Mexico, right in the middle of the biggest migratory bird path in the world.
David Blackmon [00:24:24] 16 billion birds a year, 16 billion birds a year fly that route over the Gulf of Mexico. And they’re going to put these big wind farms right in the middle of it.
Tammy Nemeth [00:24:37] Then they’ll say that the bird population is decreasing its climate change.
Irina Slav [00:24:40] With climate change.
David Blackmon [00:24:41] Climate change.
Irina Slav [00:24:43] Well, I was wondering, didn’t they do an environmental assessment?
David Blackmon [00:24:49] I’m sure they do. Yeah, but I mean.
Irina Slav [00:24:51] I’m not troubled that it’s some migratory path.
David Blackmon [00:24:55] You know? I mean, it’s just the same as the, governing agency in the Biden administration saying the wind turbines off the northeast are killing whales.
Irina Slav [00:25:05] Yeah, I know. I know it’s it’s just so frustrating when we’re talking about actual nature and how this transition is devastating.
David Blackmon [00:25:16] it is.
Tammy Nemeth [00:25:16] You got to kill nature to save nature.
Irina Slav [00:25:20] Basically. Like it’s the same with people. We’re all gonna die if we don’t solve the.
Video Speaker [00:25:25] Connector discharged and nasty substance, initially. Described as oil that Rhode Island.
Stuart Turley [00:25:31] This is one I just I just wanted to, turn the volume off. But the we showed this last week, and it is a good enough video that when you take a look at it, the amount of oil and chemicals that are, on these silly things, let me freeze this right. Here it is. 34 million gallons of coolant just in this one wind farm that is out there, ready to, be thrown into the. It’s just it’s despicable, how bad these things are.
Irina Slav [00:26:10] And that’s a mixture of chemicals, because when crude oil leaks or spills there develop technologies to collect it. Yeah. And it’s. But we don’t have these technologies to these mixtures of chemicals in oil.
Stuart Turley [00:26:25] Nope.
Irina Slav [00:26:26] I suppose. Keep it.
David Blackmon [00:26:32] Anyway, I’m getting depressed here. Maybe we should go to headlines.
Irina Slav [00:26:36] I was thinking the same thing.
David Blackmon [00:26:38] Yes. Let’s go to headlines.
Irina Slav [00:26:41] Have some fun.
Stuart Turley [00:26:43] Let’s see who’s on deck first. Here. It was great, Tammy.
Tammy Nemeth [00:26:49] Okay, so I’ll go to the second one first. The the headline is, from Pipeline Online. TC energy signed a deal to sell minority stake in a natural gas pipeline to indigenous groups. So this is one of the the major natural gas pipelines in Canada. And a group of indigenous people, I think, from Alberta, have now, bought a minority stake in the pipeline. And there are some talk that the recently completed Trans Mountain pipeline, which is owned by the government, and they’re looking to divest their ownership. The sorry, the Canadian federal government owns the pipeline, and they’re looking to divest it or sell it off to different indigenous groups. And what’s interesting is that there is a split within the indigenous communities in Canada, because the majority of the the First Nations want, energy infrastructure, they want, development on their lands, and to be able to generate revenue. And then there’s a small minority who are against it. And it’s this conflict that has created a lot of issues in Canada with respect to construction of pipelines, construction of LNG terminals, and, and increased expansion and development. So it’ll be interesting to see what happens with this sale and potentially with, the oil pipeline sale and with what’s interesting, because I think one of the the reasons why we had this de-industrialization, theme today was because Chevron Chevron is moving out of California to, to Texas, just like Space-x and Tesla and everything else is moving to Texas, away from California. And, and what’s interesting is that the the Trans Mountain pipeline, which is exporting oil to California. So while California no longer is reducing its oil, oil production, it’s getting it from other places. Interestingly, they’re getting a lot from Argentina, which has increased significantly over the past six months.
Stuart Turley [00:28:59] Yeah. And Tammy there’s there’s still getting they they are still getting 70% of the oil generated by Chinese companies out of the rainforest. Californians are hypocrites in in destroying the rainforest.
Tammy Nemeth [00:29:16] Yeah, absolutely. And like again, let’s kill the environment to have a good life and whatever. Right. And then the other story there is what is great British energy and what does it mean for me? And this is from the UK government website. So one of the first initiatives the new labor government in the United Kingdom did was to create a state company called Great British Energy at first, and I knew they were going to do this. And during the campaign and whatever they said, oh, it’s just going to be an investment organization. And then when you read the details, it they’re actually going to be asset owners. And they’re going to be a state energy company, but it’s going to be renewables and they’re going to fund it by increasing the windfall taxes on existing oil and gas operations in the North Sea. At the same time, they’re saying there can be no more oil and gas development in the North Sea. So I don’t know how they’re going to continue funding this since it it’s like drain squeezing the last drop of revenue from oil and gas companies in order to fund their death. I mean, it’s it’s absurd. And
Irina Slav [00:30:26] believe they’re idiots rather than evil people because they are skinning the oil industry in the North Sea alive instead of leasing it, and they expect it to survive.
Tammy Nemeth [00:30:40] Yeah I know. It’s unfathomable. And you’re. And you’re right. It’s it’s it’s idiocy and an absurdity to the, to the nth level kind of thing. But one of the other things. Yeah. Why do they think this is going to. But this is the it’s like they’re testing it because this is what they want to rule out for every Western country. I don’t see how they can do it in the United States, but they’re definitely going to try it in Canada. They’re doing it through different means, similar, but different means. So, I don’t know it. It’ll be interesting to see how this template works. If it will work. I don’t think it will, but yeah. So thats
Irina Slav [00:31:22] the it’s always the same with work in Sri Lanka. And if they that’s it’s going to be different just because Europe is. I’m sorry. Most civilized as. You know, the former chief of EU diplomacy said not my words. You know, the garden and the jungle around the garden. That was Europe. It’s going to work out the same way. Yeah. It might take longer, but it will in the same way. Because people are people.
Tammy Nemeth [00:31:52] Yes. Thank you for mentioning Sri Lanka because people kind of put that in the memory hole. I want to talk about their little experiment. So it’s like if you want to see what happens in an energy transition, if you do it quickly and it doesn’t matter, even if it’s not quickly, the outcome is the same. Look at Sri Lanka.
Irina Slav [00:32:11] Yeah. Well you can look at Germany. We don’t have riots yet in Germany. But if the government keeps going in the same direction, the scenario will repeat.
David Blackmon [00:32:23] I don’t know, the German people seem to be have become an amazingly complacent. Sheepish bunch of people.
Irina Slav [00:32:33] A lot of them not. Unfortunately,.
David Blackmon [00:32:34] Yeah. I mean, it’s it’s astonishing to me what they have put up with without major social unrest. And.
Irina Slav [00:32:43] They did protests last year. When was it? When the Higher Energy Council began supervising. So that that’s reason to hope?
Tammy Nemeth [00:32:52] Yeah. And the farmers.
Irina Slav [00:32:54] The farmers of the hope of that nation. Yeah. Okay. My turn up. The activist pushing companies to ditch their diversity policies. Apparently there’s this guy who’s a music video producer doing nothing to do with diversity, inclusion, whatever. But he has taken to X to call on companies to stop being stupid and stop hiring people on their merits and not their skin color or ethnic group.
David Blackmon [00:33:32] What. A concept.
Irina Slav [00:33:34] And apparently these calls are gaining traction and companies are pulling back the. The AI programs and sustainability programs because people are getting unhappy with them. And I think this is absolutely great. And I forgot his name.
David Blackmon [00:33:55] Robbie. Starbuck.
Tammy Nemeth [00:33:56] Starbuck.
Irina Slav [00:33:57] Yeah. It’s been a great job. I think he’s just, he’s he’s picked the right time when people are already beginning to be disgruntled about this whole equity, inclusiveness and diversity trap because it’s not working. You get a lot of incompetent people. And as I said, he’s Cuban American. And as he said, I feel the same way. He doesn’t want his children to be hired just because they’re Latino. I think the same way, which is why I hated, you know, female executive quotas in Germany when they implemented them years ago. I don’t know if we want to be had because I’m a woman. I want to be hard because I’m good at what I do. Everyone should be the same way and I do not understand why they don’t. Maybe because they’re incompetent. Well, yeah. I mean, I’m not the press secretary of the white House on a story that.
Stuart Turley [00:35:03] Thanks for bringing that painful memory up. Holy smoke.
Irina Slav [00:35:06] That’s why I’m apologizing. It’s me, and I’m an American. And we have some great news from from the CEO of shell, who I told was a smart man. I still think he’s a smart man. I have no idea why he says that Europe’s energy crisis is over. Just because gas prices have temporarily fallen back to pre 22 levels. And I’d like to read this quote of the falling prices and volatility in Europe. So Shell’s renewable energy solutions business, which includes power trading, boasts a 187 million loss. Yeah up 215% drop from the quarter before, the oil majors said it had reduced its pipeline of renewable power projects under construction from 4.6GW in the first half of last year to 3.8GW. That must be because the gas crisis is over and they are going to make big money from trading gas instead of building renewables. I don’t know this. This though. This part was actually buried towards the end of the very, very long interview. Very long article, you know, sort of. Just mentioning it, by the way. But this is important. Just because gas prices are back to levels from three years ago doesn’t mean they will stay there. First of all, it’s summer. It’s you know, the week is demand periods. Because Europeans are not as big on air conditioning, especially in France as you see us as Americans.
Stuart Turley [00:36:51] Yes.
Irina Slav [00:36:52] I would like to to ask Mr.. So on how you feel about gas prices come November. And yet they’re cutting the renewable, so-called renewables portfolio.
David Blackmon [00:37:07] Yeah. He’s, embarked on a pretty big project to cut their spending on renewables and, refocus on their core business. And BP’s doing the same thing.
Irina Slav [00:37:18] Yeah.
David Blackmon [00:37:18] Right. Yeah. So I just wonder if that’s just rhetoric he’s using rather than anything he really believes.
Tammy Nemeth [00:37:25] Yeah, I, I it’s behind a paywall. So I haven’t read the article yet. So does he actually say the energy crisis is over or is that just a headline they wanted to get attention with?
Irina Slav [00:37:38] I can’t quote literally, I can’t. I don’t have this kind of memory. But he did say that, prices are back to pre-war levels. So this means the crisis is over. There was no mention about price volatility. Yeah. The massive and plus a lot think that, you know, prices are back down to where they were three years ago. It’s all good.
David Blackmon [00:38:05] Doesn’t seem to be logical, does it?
Tammy Nemeth [00:38:08] I think, yeah, I don’t understand it because they’re they’re taking this huge loss on their renewables. And it it almost sounds like he’s, he’s saying we’re taking this loss because the crisis is over. I don’t know. That’s weird.
Irina Slav [00:38:25] Yeah, and it is really weird. Let me just see.
David Blackmon [00:38:33] When pushed to.
Irina Slav [00:38:34] Normalize pricing margin level that is pre 22. Normalizing prices. That’s what he’s talking about.
Tammy Nemeth [00:38:43] Right? Okay. Until they’re.
Irina Slav [00:38:46] Unrelated, they’re shrinking the wind and solar portfolios.
David Blackmon [00:38:52] Yeah.
Tammy Nemeth [00:38:53] Because the crisis is over. They don’t need it, I guess. Right.
Irina Slav [00:38:58] That doesn’t sound good. That doesn’t sound very, very green. You know, the build out of wind and solar is dependent on a gas price crisis.
Tammy Nemeth [00:39:10] Yeah. And I thought they’re getting off gas anyway, so wouldn’t they still need this wind? And so, does the article give any explanation on why they’re reducing those projects?
Irina Slav [00:39:24] Because their loss making means very simple. And their shareholders, I’m sure, are pressuring them to do what they are actually doing.
David Blackmon [00:39:33] Yeah. And they had to wait until they got their headquarters moved out of The Hague to, to London before they could, you know, make that shift in strategic, vision. Because, you know, the Dutch weren’t going to allow, shell next to move the headquarters. Well, maybe.
Irina Slav [00:39:50] It’s about time it.
David Blackmon [00:39:51] Was bought it. Yeah.
Tammy Nemeth [00:39:52] Well, they already did. Right. So they move from The Hague to London, and now they’re talking. Maybe they’d move to America somewhere. Yeah, but that again, just another way to try and get more European laxity in applying the rules or something, I don’t know.
David Blackmon [00:40:10] I don’t know.
Stuart Turley [00:40:10] BP is also rumbling on that it’s who knows. There aren’t rumors, but if, hey, there’s lots of room in Texas. More of the merrier.
David Blackmon [00:40:22] A lot of empty office space in downtown Houston, too.
Stuart Turley [00:40:25] Yes.
Tammy Nemeth [00:40:27] They could get a good deal.
David Blackmon [00:40:28] Yep.
Stuart Turley [00:40:30] Are you done there? Irina. That was good.
Tammy Nemeth [00:40:34] That was awesome.
Irina Slav [00:40:35] That was a.
David Blackmon [00:40:35] That was a good catch. All right, here we go. Chevron taking its headquarters to Texas. Yes, indeed they are.
Stuart Turley [00:40:42] That I love that quote I found.
David Blackmon [00:40:45] Yeah, that’s a Davy Crockett was a hero of the Texas Revolution who had been a US senator in Tennessee. And when he was leaving Tennessee in early 1836, he told his political tormentors that you may all go to hell and I will go to Texas. And, about three months later, he was dead, killed by Santa Anna’s army at the Alamo. But it’s a great quote. I don’t think Chevron will suffer the same fate from moving to Texas, from California, but, they are moving their headquarters there. It’s been they’ve actually been kind of gradually doing that over the past ten years or so. They only have 2000 employees remaining in California and, already had 7000 at their headquarters in, in, Houston. So this is just, the last tranche of people moving, including the CEO and, the rest of the executive team. And, you know, it’s just, it’s a continuation of the consolidation of the oil industry down to Houston. Companies like to be in Houston because that’s where all the deals are made. Exxon moved its headquarters from from, the Dallas-Fort worth area to Houston last year. And, it’s it’s, it’s kind of a fad. Everybody’s doing it. And I wouldn’t be surprised, as we talked about a few minutes ago of shell and or BP ended up doing the same thing because as bad as things have gotten in the United States, it’s still a friendlier regulatory environment, at least for now, than the UK is. And, a friendlier tax environment, at least for now. And, you know, of course, and that’s one of the reasons why you moved to Texas from California, because we don’t have a state income tax. And, you know, these executives, will say millions of dollars in taxes every year. So that’s, another kind of incentive we have in Texas for moving people here. And then there’s a resource base, which Chevron is a huge producer in the Permian Basin. And, so this gets the executive team a lot closer to that and to their big operations in the Gulf of Mexico. So kudos to Chevron. Welcome to
Irina Slav [00:43:00] Why didn’t they do it sooner. Sorry, David.
David Blackmon [00:43:03] You know I don’t know I mean yeah. And you can ask that of any of these companies that, have moved from California to Texas. Why it took them so long to get here. Kevin Kilgore, but just as an aside, has a great article at just the news.com about this and the companies that have moved to Texas from California. I mean, it’s like, I mean, the number of fortune 500 companies that have made that move in over the last 5 or 6 years is pretty amazing. So everyone should go read that. In fact, I’m going to post a link to it on my Substack so folks can access it there. But, you know, I mean, there’s a lot of read. I mean, Chevron’s been in California since its inception in 1879, so it has a long history there. And, you know, it just becomes kind of hard to break those ties. Chevron, also, historically, you know, decades ago, the preponderance of its production domestically was in California and several refineries still has two refineries left there. And so it that state had been a big focus of the company’s business until. You know, the last 20 years or so when California has really become a really heavy handed, Soviet style regulatory system that they’ve implemented over there. And so, I guess, you know, and they just finally decided they’d had enough and kind of like Elon Musk did with Tesla first. And now he’s going to move Space-x and Twitter, headquarters down to Austin. And so, you know, it’s just, kind of the sign of the times, I think. Then the other stories about Hertz and, just the fact that they had another awful second quarter earnings report. Well, their stock price has collapsed by 78% over the last 12 months. The most of their losses over the last year have been attributable to their. Virtue signaling effort to make 25% of the company’s fleet electric vehicles that nobody wants to rent. And so now they’re trying to sell off a big portion of them at well below market prices. And nobody wants to buy used electric vehicles. They’re not even able to do that. So the company’s fallen on very hard times. And as Stu mentioned, they are a few minutes ago. This is why. Because this is another company just like Ford Motor Company and General Motors that bought in whole hog to the Biden fantasy that the government was going to be able to subsidize a major EV industry in the United States into being. And you don’t have to be economically viable to build them and sell them here. You know, without the subsidies and that’s all going to collapse. It’s collapsing in real time as we sit here today. We’re kind of in the I don’t know, we’re we’re not even in the early stages of it anymore. Every every pure play EV maker in America, except for Tesla, is either in bankruptcy or on the brink of it. And Tesla has had three horrible quarters in a row now, despite the introduction of its goofy Cybertruck onto the market. And, and so it’s I mean, we’re kind of in the mid stage of the collapse of the electric vehicle industry and in the United States.
Stuart Turley [00:46:31] And when you have come on the.
David Blackmon [00:46:33] Last man standing.
Stuart Turley [00:46:34] Standing up there singing the wheels on the bus, go round and round. They put $7.3 billion in. They get 60 busses. I mean,
David Blackmon [00:46:44] well, a $9 billion to build eight charging stations.
Stuart Turley [00:46:47] Yeah. I mean, yeah, man.
David Blackmon [00:46:50] And three of them don’t work.
Stuart Turley [00:46:53] Even I could do better than that. Wow.
Tammy Nemeth [00:46:56] Well, in which jurisdiction was it that that, pulled all their electric school busses? Because they them they were always breaking down.
David Blackmon [00:47:05] Oh, no.
Irina Slav [00:47:06] It was on the East Coast.
David Blackmon [00:47:07] Yeah, that was.
Irina Slav [00:47:09] Was in.
Tammy Nemeth [00:47:11] Pennsylvania
Stuart Turley [00:47:11] Austin was a city that just came there
David Blackmon [00:47:15] Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, maybe.
Tammy Nemeth [00:47:17] Yeah, I guess so. They got a whole bunch of subsidy money to to buy these, these school busses. I wouldn’t be I’m not sure what the make was because a lot of those makers gone out of business now. Yeah. And, that. Yeah. Maybe, that they would just break. They were constantly breaking down. The charge didn’t last long enough. It put the kids at risk. Oh, big surprise, big surprise.
David Blackmon [00:47:44] All the things people told them, warned them what happened, happened. And then they said, oh, you know, this doesn’t work. But we couldn’t have possibly known this wasn’t going to work.
Irina Slav [00:47:54] Yeah. That’s what’s so infuriating. Yeah?
David Blackmon [00:47:58] Yeah.
Tammy Nemeth [00:47:59] How? We had no idea. Everybody’s telling them that this was gonna happen. We had no idea. You didn’t listen to you.
Stuart Turley [00:48:08] I love Robert.
Irina Slav [00:48:09] Yeah, because when we had this, nobody believes us. Nobody listens to us.
Stuart Turley [00:48:14] Robert. The only were electric cars or subways and elevators, neither of which has any batteries.
David Blackmon [00:48:20] Are the old cars, you know, that we used to have. And I mean, Houston, up until 1954, had the second biggest network of trolley cars in the United States and dumped them all for diesel busses in the mid 50s.
Stuart Turley [00:48:39] Let’s go here. David, I stole your mount, Etna, on your, Substack, which is blackmon.com. It’s absolutely wonderful. And I want to ask the panel a question as we bring this up. This is, mount. Etna, I’ll turn the sound down cause you really. No, no commentary or anything, but as we have an energy transition. David, do you want to tell us about that article?
David Blackmon [00:49:10] Well, I mean, it just. Mount Etna, erupted, for the first time since 2020 on Saturday, and I happened to go out and find a study that was issued in the wake of its last eruption that finds that Mount Etna has for a volcano in, in the context of volcanic eruptions, produces an unusually high CO2 content because of where the lava the formations underground, deep underground where the lava is, boiling and the 2020 eruption accounted for 10%, fully 10% of the global CO2 emissions from volcanoes on the face of the planet in 2020, because of that high CO2 content. So, I mean, the point was that all the climate alarmists are going to be telling us that we’re all going to die because of all this carbon dioxide. And, you know, it’s just another day, folks. I mean, don’t worry about it.
Irina Slav [00:50:11] Hasn’t anybody had suggested that we plug volcanoes?
David Blackmon [00:50:15] Yeah. Well, I mean, that’s the this point, right? Yeah. Maybe maybe we should penalize, implement a tariff on Italy for failing to plug their volcanoes.
Stuart Turley [00:50:27] I got an idea. Let’s put all politicians in the world in volcanoes.
David Blackmon [00:50:33] That’s a great idea. I think we have the next meeting of the World Economic Forum inside the crater of Mount Etna.
Stuart Turley [00:50:40] I think that’s great.
Tammy Nemeth [00:50:42] And that sounds very pagan. Like you’re giving an offering or something.
David Blackmon [00:50:45] Yeah, well, I’d gladly offer the debate.
Irina Slav [00:50:48] You’re right.
Stuart Turley [00:50:49] Yeah, I guess I would sacrifice every politician, Hey Irina. This is this is, hats off to you. And I love your slogan. Sanctions don’t work as intended. I absolutely love that line. And when you take a look at the satellite images show LNG at sanctioned Russian plant. This is the Novatek, LNG facility. And my calculations on the number of new builds that are being built of LNG tankers. We have the dirt fleet, which is an estimated 500 to 700 oil tankers that are being used by Venezuela, Russia, you know, and, and Iran and, or all around the world in order to ship oil and gas. And I’ve been saying for a while that the LNG dart fleet has been rising and the LNG fleet is we are now still seeing Europe buying a lot of Russian LNG oil. And so when you sit back and take a look at this, the European sanctions set to kick in next year are intended to limit port access and trans trans shipment for Russian LNG cargoes. It’s still going to happen. I hate to tell everybody that sanctions don’t work as intended. Quote, according to my dear friend Irina Slav.
Irina Slav [00:52:21] Yeah, because they’ll be shipping it to Turkey and they’ll regasification it in Turkey. Exactly. In Union. And you can’t make, Dugan play by your tune. They should have done that already. It’s so it’s it’s boring. It’s exasperating. Keep trying.
Stuart Turley [00:52:42] How fun.
David Blackmon [00:52:43] But nobody could have seen it coming. Nobody possibly predicted it.
Stuart Turley [00:52:47] In.
Irina Slav [00:52:49] This in. In March or April 22nd or whenever the first sanctions were imposed. This is not going to end well.
Stuart Turley [00:52:57] You know, and it’s part of the new energy corridor between Russia, Turkey, the Caspian Sea and Iran. They have the new energy corridor, and it’s outside of the Western or U.S. sanctions, and they’re pipelining it, or they’re making sure that they can’t. And this is also part of the new pipelines that are going into North Korea, South Korea and Japan from Russia. It’s not being covered. And I guarantee you’re going to see lots of natural gas in the U.S. is losing Japan as an ally because energy matters.
David Blackmon [00:53:34] It does that. Absolutely.
Irina Slav [00:53:36] That’s an amazing conclusion, you know, but they could have anticipated, I.
Stuart Turley [00:53:40] Believe, a great. Great lady said, energy will always find a way. Energy and love. Like, yes, I think I wonder who said that.
Irina Slav [00:53:50] I have no idea.
David Blackmon [00:53:55] Well, we’re ending on a happier note than we started.
Irina Slav [00:53:58] Good.
David Blackmon [00:53:58] Which is.
Tammy Nemeth [00:53:59] Nice. I, I put a link in there because this is kind of funny. It’s a 14 article from 2017 where it says, here’s why we can’t just let you know.
Irina Slav [00:54:09] Oh, imagine somebody actually having to write that to to explain why we can just do that.
David Blackmon [00:54:17] Man, I got to go read that. That’s a real problem.
Irina Slav [00:54:20] Yeah, I read that too.
Stuart Turley [00:54:24] All right. So what are we going to see this next week, guys in the UK? I’m really worried that the UK is going to erupt into social, disruption. And I believe that it is with Antifa, announcing that they’re well-armed. And as David said, this is all David’s fault, that it is that that once the Democrats believe it’s going to be beneficial for them. We have the Democratic convention coming up on the 17th. I still don’t believe Kamala will be their person on the ticket. I think they still can pull her off.
David Blackmon [00:55:03] We need to do a separate podcast on how you think that’s going to happen, but that’s another topic.
Stuart Turley [00:55:10] I think they’re.
David Blackmon [00:55:10] Pretty much stuck with her at this point.
Stuart Turley [00:55:13] I think they’re still going to pull something because she’s ineffective. So, but that in effect, this.
David Blackmon [00:55:21] Is Joe Biden in 2020.
Stuart Turley [00:55:25] But I still am worried about the UK. I’m worried about Germany. Are the poor folks in Venezuela? In the voting machines? Our hearts and prayers go out to them. So we are not in a good situation. The Japan, and.
Tammy Nemeth [00:55:47] Stock crash.
Stuart Turley [00:55:48] Stock crash is going on. So it is.
Tammy Nemeth [00:55:52] And Bulgaria has an election coming up. The government fell this morning again. Again?
Stuart Turley [00:55:58] Wow. What’s going on there?
Irina Slav [00:56:01] Nobody wants to form a coalition with. Anybody else. Which is good, because the last coalition we had, I told you about it. We had two parties that campaigned aggressively against each other only to form a coalition. And now even they have realized it would be too arrogant to do it again. So nobody’s playing with anybody else. So we need a clear majority for some party.
David Blackmon [00:56:28] Yeah, yeah.
Irina Slav [00:56:30] Wow. But yes, how people are feeling after. What is it? Five votes over two years or something. Yay! Let’s go vote again.
David Blackmon [00:56:39] Yeah. Why not? That’s democracy.
Irina Slav [00:56:42] Yeah. So probably our next government will be, you know, elected by a 10th of the voting age population or something. That will be great.
David Blackmon [00:56:51] Yeah, sure.
Tammy Nemeth [00:56:52] It’s it’s their base out. Right?
David Blackmon [00:56:55] That’s about how the percentage of that elected labor. You had a 20%..
Irina Slav [00:56:59] I’m hoping that the nationalists, so-called nationalists, the patriotic parties will get more traction.
David Blackmon [00:57:08] Yeah, yeah.
Irina Slav [00:57:11] Will see.
Stuart Turley [00:57:13] Wow.
Tammy Nemeth [00:57:14] Oh. Joanna had a comment here last second. Stu. That is why they want her. She is ineffective, but usable.
David Blackmon [00:57:21] Yeah.
Stuart Turley [00:57:21] Wow.
David Blackmon [00:57:22] They’re just electing another. They’re nominating another sock puppet. Not a functional president. Just somebody that’s willing to read the teleprompter for four years.
Stuart Turley [00:57:32] Wow. Great, I love Joanna.
David Blackmon [00:57:34] He can read. She can’t speak extemporaneously, but.
Stuart Turley [00:57:37] Joanna can read.
David Blackmon [00:57:39] I’m talking about the politician, not Joanna.
Stuart Turley [00:57:44] I’m just being a jerk. Hey, let’s have a great week, guys.
David Blackmon [00:57:46] Before I get us in. Too much more trouble. We probably should close out with the Dow Jones industrials only down 1073 points. This is David Blackmon, Irina Slav, Tammy Nemeth and Stuart Turley saying thank you for joining us. Appreciate all the great comments and we will talk to you again next week. Have a great week. Everybody.
Tammy Nemeth [00:58:06] Have a great week everyone. Bye
David Blackmon [00:58:08] Bye.
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