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Net Zero and the Global Militaries Clash
You can not buy this kind of entertainment. The global militaries are set to clash over, wait for it, Net Zero. Doubling down on energy policies will win wars and destroy total echonimies. But which ones will prevail, and which ones are going to be history? You won’t want to miss Irina Slav, Tammy Nemeth, David Blackmon, and Stu Turley on this fun topic. – And yes, that cover photo includes a tank and a troop carrier next to an EV charging station with a wind turbine on top.
Highlights of the Podcast
00:01 – Introduction
01:50 – U.S. Military Steps Away from Climate Initiatives
02:30 – EU’s Net Zero vs. Rearmament Push
05:11 – The Green Military Fantasy
09:48 – NATO’s Net Zero Problem
13:16 – Trump’s Tariffs & Rare Earths from China
17:19 – It’s Not Just Money, It’s Manufacturing
18:14 – Energy vs. Defense: Competing for Resources
19:28 – Europe’s Defense Dilemma
22:54 – U.S. Manufacturing & Tariff Debate
26:01 – Corporate Profit vs. National Security
28:18 – Can You Transition & Rearm at Once?
30:56 – Europe’s defense puts a fresh twist on steel, growth engine of old
31:42 – Opinion: We need to hear political candidates’ views on the globalist vision for 2050
33:51 – Washington Update From the US Oil & Gas Association
33:59 – Trump Can Have ‘Drill, Baby, Drill’ or $50 Oil, But He Can’t Have Both
37:39 – UK floats plan for joint European fund to ‘stockpile’ weapons
39:24 – EU exploring weaker 2040 climate goal
42:55 – Panama Canal is about to heat up
43:54 – Pennsylvania’s Coal Industry Crumbles As Plant Closures Mount
44:12 – Report: States With The Highest Energy Prices Mandate Renewables, Cap-and-Trade Policies
50:12 – SpaceX vs. Blue Origin & Celebs in Orbit
55:03 – Oil Price Predictions & Global Energy Demand
Net Zero and the Global Militaries Clash
David Blackmon [00:00:10] Hey, good morning, everyone. Welcome to the energy realities podcast, which I used to say is the only podcast on the internet that actually starts on time. Uh, today we’re a few minutes late. We got all tied up in, in pre-show conversation and, uh, lost track of time. So here we are. It’s eight O four central time. And I, what is that? Two O four Greenwich meantime. Uh, anyway, we’re here. I’m here with Dr. Tammy Nemeth, who is in her home in the UK today, I believe. All right,
Tammy Nemeth [00:00:42] yes. That’s right.
David Blackmon [00:00:42] can always tell by the background, and Irina Slav, who’s in her library at home today. How are you?
Irina Slav [00:00:50] I’m good. Thank you, David.
David Blackmon [00:00:52] Wonderful in Bulgaria, by the way, I forgot to mention that and Mr. Stu Turley, president CEO of the sandstone group in his mystery cave somewhere in.
Stuart Turley [00:01:05] I’m in Abilene today.
David Blackmon [00:01:07] Abilene, Texas, by God Abiline. It was a great song. Somebody sang back in the day. Anyway, here we are. Uh, we’re going to be talking today, uh, in the middle of our stock market crash, uh about net zero and the global militaries and, uh how, how the two are interacting with one another and, uh, are not interacting with one another as we see in the United States. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has basically pulled back on all of the climate change stuff that had been implemented first in the Obama administration, rescinded by the first Trump administration, put back in by the Biden administration, and now it’s gone again. And, um, so we’re not really using the military as a virtue signaling exercise in the United States anymore. Uh, but other countries, um that’s not the case and, uh, Mainly in Europe and Canada and other countries, you know, are still going down this road and it’s an interesting road to clamber down the idea of running tanks on solar panels and I don’t know, putting windmills on aircraft carriers doesn’t seem exactly viable these days but here we are and to open the discussion, I am going to turn to Dr. Nemeth to kick us off.
Tammy Nemeth [00:02:30] Well, thanks, David. I mean, what an interesting conundrum, right? Where we have this, the EU has decided, oh, my gosh, we need to rearm because America, sugar daddy’s there to defend everybody anymore. I keep thinking of that, that I forget it was this old thing where instead of goodbye, Uncle Sam, or no, sorry, goodbye, uncle sugar, or something like that, I forget. But it was basically that the US wasn’t there just to be. the Iron Umbrella for Europe anymore, and so the EU is doing this really aggressive push for net zero. At the same time, they’ve decided they’re going to rearm, and Irina had a fabulous sub stack on this earlier last week, and, so I guess we’re really building on Irina’s work here. But the UK also has decided they need to rearm. Canada says we want in on some of that stuff that they’re doing in Europe and the UK. But ultimately net zero and rearming in Europe are at odds. And there is a contradiction there, because they’re supposed to be like 50% net zero by 2030. But how do you reconcile that with all the energy that’s required for the steel, for the manufacturing, for all of these different kinds of things? And it’s unclear that they’ll be able to do that. And I think what’s interesting is how the US has said, I think it was Pete Hegseth last week was quoted as saying, the defense in the United States is not going to be doing that crap anymore, that climate crap. So.
David Blackmon [00:04:14] Very eloquent, yes.
Tammy Nemeth [00:04:15] very eloquent, but to the point, right? Here it is. The Department of Defense does not do climate change crap. We do training and war fighting and quotes. So that’s where America is versus EU.
Stuart Turley [00:04:28] And this is really important. This just came in. I have a video of Pete talking about this. He is going up to the NATO leaders and talking about this. Pick which one is Pete Hegseth and pick which one is the leaders of NATO, okay?
David Blackmon [00:04:56] Cracks me up every time now. It still makes me laugh. Yeah
Tammy Nemeth [00:05:02] That’s a great segue.
David Blackmon [00:05:04] That is, that is a great segue to our friend in Bulgaria. Uh, I read this law, take it away.
Irina Slav [00:05:11] Did you notice how the dog went and went back?
Tammy Nemeth [00:05:19] So reality hits them in the face and they just keep going back and doubling down.
Irina Slav [00:05:25] Yeah. Well, The EU is talking about media reporting on the EU’s plan to rearm and go green simultaneously, in a way that suggests that both of these are possible to do at the same time. Like political, I’m not saying this is actual media, this is actual journalism, it’s not, but still, they actually suggested that you can have green tanks. made from green steel or whatever possibly fueled by, I don’t know, synthetic fuels, I don’t how they envision this. But it wasn’t a big surprise to learn that the EU has already started going back on its strict transition targets. Even as it continues to repeat that, yes, We’re totally going green, we’re totally cutting. those emissions and all that. But no, they’re starting to relax their emission reduction targets because there are some people, apparently, individuals who have retained the ability to think. even if they believe in the benefits of an energy transition to wind, solar and synthetic fuels. It really wasn’t surprised, but it did happen very fast. I keep getting surprised by the speed with which this whole transition thing is falling apart. They continue the EU, you know, the EU excels at doing mutually exclusive things and this is what they’re doing with regard to the energy transition and their rearmament plans as well because they are going to have the carbon border adjustment mechanism, they are going to retaliate against trans tariffs with more tariffs that concern things like steel and aluminum, which I understand the defense industry needs in significant. of amounts.
David Blackmon [00:07:39] Seems likely, doesn’t it? Yes.
Irina Slav [00:07:41] And then we have all these idle steel mills in the EU because of energy prices. And yet the EU still continues to give us the message that they can totally do green steel and tanks at the same time. And as I suggested in that sub-stack, I think Tammy was referring to it. they will cost their weight in gold, this is what will happen if they go through with this plan. But I think they won’t go through this plan because they can’t, they’ll run out of money, I mean all those billions for the Ukraine, all those millions for wind and solar subsidies, all those billion for tariff relief or whatever they’re calling it. Nobody has an endless supply of money, which I keep repeating and I’m sorry for getting you know tiresome with this. But these people who announce the decisions, who presumably make the decisions, you know put up an appearance that they know what they’re talking about and they think their plans are realistic, which they aren’t. And this is going to you know become very clear before too long. It still keeps happening faster and faster, and this will continue. So we’ll see more targets relaxing, and they will probably have to start tweaking their rearmament plan before they have started actually putting it in action. And may I just say that if Russia really wanted to take over Europe, now would be the perfect time. So why is Russia not doing it?
David Blackmon [00:09:32] Because that’s not the goal and never has been, right? Yeah. Obviously. Well, so, Stu, you said you had some other, some tangential things you wanted to talk about off of this topic.
Stuart Turley [00:09:48] Well, NATO, I think, has got a very big problem with net zero coming around the corner with the defense budgets and things. My interviews with George McMillan have gotten very high up in the administration. And when you sit back and take a look at all Putin has to do is nothing because he’s moved all of his business to Asia. So when you sit back and take a look at the defense budget spending is tied to green energy, as we’re talking about today, it will actually cause NATO to fail faster. And that means Putin, all Putin has to do is nothing faster. I mean, this is really about as funny as you get. I really cannot make it any more serious than. than that. And when we sit back and talk about net zero in finances, right now, the Chinese market is down 10% today, the US market is done about 7%. And I think in my personal opinion, the wealth is not created as Professor St. Onge talks about wealth is created on the stock market wealth is created by the manufacturing. And wealth is going to have to come back to the United States. And that’s what this tariff war is all about. Over 50 countries have contacted the White House in order to come. This is tied to net zero. This is tide to the military. And Pete Hegseth is going to be in Panama this week, visiting with the Panamanian president. In fact, we already have all of our Marines sitting in hotels in Panama. I’ve got Michael Yahn as a war correspondent and he shows up around the world wherever there are troubled spots and I was invited to go down to interview down there and I just couldn’t make it because of the travel problems. But what we are seeing is militaries that go woke will go broke and will not be able to defend themselves. Canada, God bless Canada. I love Canada and I really love one of my favorite cities is up there in Alberta, Calgary and when you sit back and take a look they’re basically Americans they’re snow Mexicans if you want to and I love that funny way to say it they’re great let’s let’s annex them but I don’t want to annex you know the the left wing party And when you take a look at the border of Mexico, or excuse me, the border, the Canadians live below our Northern border is what, 90% of the population of Canada lives very close to the United States. And it’s pretty funny.
Tammy Nemeth [00:13:00] Well, that’s has more to do with climate.
Stuart Turley [00:13:02] Yeah.
Tammy Nemeth [00:13:03] Okay.
David Blackmon [00:13:03] That’s weather-related, isn’t it?
Tammy Nemeth [00:13:04] OK.
Stuart Turley [00:13:06] Well, yeah, but still, you know, we are very close, but I’ll tell you, I am unimpressed with Kearney. I’ll just leave it at that.
David Blackmon [00:13:16] Yes, but he’s very impressed with himself. There’s no doubt about that. So one of the big things that’s happened over the past week is, you know, Trump announced his tariffs last Wednesday. They go into effect, I believe, on the 9th, which is this Wednesday. I suspect we may see him invoke a 60 to 90-day moratorium on that while he engages in negotiations, which could restore some stability to the stock markets. But part of that is the response from China to place even higher tariffs on exports of rare earth minerals. And that’s important for military applications in every country, right? China controls about 60 to 70 percent of all the global market for rare earth minerals and about 80 to 90 percent of the processing capability for rare earth minerals And so almost everyone is relied on supply chains that go through China to obtain the rare earth minerals. And those minerals, as well as antimony and other critical energy minerals, go into not just green energy. People tend to connect rare earths with wind and solar and other green energy applications. but also into all sorts of military applications. They’re vital to every aspect of the development of a strong military. to the extent what’s going to have to happen for the United States and really every other Western country, if they want to remain disentangled from dependence on China for these rare earth minerals, is they’re going to either start mining or they’re gonna have to engage negotiations with friendly countries. uh, to establish supply chains of those minerals. And this of course is why, but one of the main reasons why Donald Trump is so obsessed with Greenland because Greenland is home to an incredible wealth of rare earth minerals and it’s a known resource. It’s the biggest single existing resource on the planet. And, uh, so this is why we’re going to see in conjunction with his moves on tariffs and everything else, the president to continue to focus on establishing a direct tie with Greenland in one form or another. And so that’s all interrelated here as well. Robert de Domenico was just about to suggest you do what you just did. He said he has a video he just posted this past week, featured it on his LinkedIn profile. And I was about to suggest you post a link to it. There it is for everyone. And I assume that’s related to the NATO question. I’m not sure exactly what it’s related to, but everyone can go look at it. Anyway, all of this, you know, I think everyone hits on really strong points on all this to me. And I wonder what the group thinks. I really feel like The EU in particular is in a precarious position on all this, with the trade war and the net zero thing trying to dramatically increase defense budgets while simultaneously pursuing this net zero fantasy. We’ve heard a lot of bold talk from Rondelain and other leaders in the NATO countries. that, well, you know, we, you know, United States leaves NATO, we’ll continue it and we’ll, we’ll defend Ukraine by ourselves. And we’ll do that by dramatically ramping up our defense budgets from 1% currently to 5% or whatever it is. I don’t really think these EU countries have the ability to sustain that.
Irina Slav [00:17:19] It’s not about budgets, it’s not money, it is about manufacturing. You can throw all the money in the world at ammunition manufacturers, missile manufacturers, tank manufacturers, they will need time to build all this. The problem with the EU is that, again I’ve said it before, it really needs a war to attention and unite people. against the external enemy because they have been so bad at keeping their countries going.
David Blackmon [00:17:58] Well, that gives me to another subject. The follow-on question is. Is, is the EU about to evolve into an adversarial posture with the United States? Not blaming it all on either side.
Irina Slav [00:18:14] But I think something else is interesting, you said rare earths are very important in military manufacturing, does this put the energy transition industry in direct competition with the defense industry? What do we do about that? We want to build tanks and solar, missiles and wind, how are we going to square this circle?
Stuart Turley [00:18:46] Germany has shut down its largest and oldest steel mills because they don’t have enough natural gas or coal. They have totally deindustrialized because of the left. And you take a look at, there are about four or five countries right now that are looking at in defiance of each other in NATO. And there is some geopolitical issues going on in NATO, NATO’s in a little bit of an issue right now. And so.
Tammy Nemeth [00:19:19] Nope, go ahead Stu sorry.
Stuart Turley [00:19:21] I mean, you have some of them already going on, but go ahead
Tammy Nemeth [00:19:28] So, this morning Bruegel released their study that was commissioned by Poland on how they can basically set up a separate financing vehicle for rearmament. And I just had a quick look at it this morning because it just dropped. So it would be, you know, if people are interested, take a look at that. But what’s what was fascinating in there is that they talked about how the US has One tank. The EU has seven or nine or like some ridiculous number because every different country has its own tank that they want manufactured in their own country. So, when you have the point of geo-return… within the defense contracting, that creates a real problem because everybody wants their thing, which means then that you’ve got all these different kinds of tanks, all these kinds of light vehicles, all these kind of weapons. How do you maintain all of that when it’s all different? And the costs of that, and everybody wants the manufacturing in their jurisdiction because they’re spending money, they want their people to be employed in it. So, they outline the challenges and obstacles, and then say, look, if you’re willing to overcome those things, then, um… this is how to basically fund it, and what they’re talking about is an entirely separate funding mechanism, the UK was also involved in these discussions, that would basically not be in a nation’s regular budget, it would be separate. So therefore they could overcome the financing difficulties from a budgetary perspective by creating an entirely separate funds. I’m not really sure how that will work. It seems a little bit odd, but okay. And then the other thing that the UK was really worried about was all these pension, they want pension funds. They want institutional investors to help support this initiative, but they have ESG requirements that say you can’t fund defense companies. So. the UK was like freaking out about this because so I think almost all of their institutional investors have this thing saying that they will not support anything that has 25% investment in a defense company. It’s like, well, how are you going to fund your rearmament? And what I could just one Yeah, they’re reconsidering or trying to twist arms or whatever. You know, it’s for the greater good and all that. But Dieter Helm had a really great piece on his website where he called it defense and the retreat from net zero. Because like he said, what Irena was saying, you can throw money at something, but what is it actually being spent on? And he explained how in the UK, a big chunk of their defense budget is going to pensions. So it’s not even going towards the active military engagement or upgrading their military capabilities. It’s going to pay pensions and other things. So it is like you can throw money at it, but what are you spending it on?
Stuart Turley [00:22:54] And quite honestly, the EU’s GDP is about, it’s looking not good. And you have a debt to GDP ratio in the EU right now that is bad. And Brian, I just want to say this out. I want to let Ryan, I love all your comments and everything, but in this time, I do want to disagree with you in this aspect. USA has evolved into an adversary of the EU, Canada and Mexico and everyone else. I just want to say, and go on the record that I do believe President Trump is on the right track. Because if you look at reciprocal, the word reciprocal means trade barriers and tariffs. And if he’s just trying to get our jobs and our manufacturing, we have lost almost, I believe it was 94,000 manufacturing companies over the last decade or more. And you take a look at that amount of manufacturing loss, we cannot continue. We cannot continue funding all of the problems around the world. So, Ryan, I really respect you and thank you for your comments, but I would like to heartedly disagree with you on this time. I think the tariffs are going to be a short-lived issue. I think that the green narrative and net zero is going to run into a brick wall, kind of like a coyote, the Wile E. Coyote falling off of a cliff in a, in a road runner, a Wile E. Coyotes road runner cartoon. And when you see that he’s gonna get hit in the back of the head with an anvil, cause you can’t afford this crap anymore. In fact, when you take a look at one of the articles that I just put out last week, all in the United States, anywhere where they have green mandates in electricity, their prices are higher. Suddenly the green narrative is no longer, oh, solar panels are cheaper. No, and we have that is a major issue coming around the corner for land reclamation. Land reclamation for solar panels that have lost their subsidies and wind farms is going to be 2026’s and 2027’s big story.
Tammy Nemeth [00:25:29] Jeroen Lentza makes an interesting point that tariffs won’t bring back manufacturing because labor costs are not competitive globally. I think that there’s some element of truth to that, although I think some of it will return just because of the tariffs. If it ends up costing more to try and build it somewhere else and then import it into the United States, they’ll just build it in the United States. and there’s the security aspect.
Irina Slav [00:26:01] But the thing is, that’s how outsourcing started. That’s why all these big companies from Europe and the US and North America outsourced their manufacturing to Asia because of labor costs, because they were trying to maximize profits. Perhaps, I realize this is an outrageous idea, but perhaps… corporations might want to start thinking about not necessarily maximizing profits at the expense of everything else such as, you know, security.
Tammy Nemeth [00:26:37] That sounds like stakeholder capitalism.
Irina Slav [00:26:42] It sounds great to sit in it.
David Blackmon [00:26:44] It is. Yeah. What a thought.
Tammy Nemeth [00:26:47] Well, I think you’re on the right track, Irene, that there has to be a reconsideration of what is in the best interests of a company. If you’re a defense company and you want to make profit, but you also are committed to the national security of the country in which you operate and which you represent, then there has be trade-offs there. But you’re right, I think there needs to be some kind of reconsideration. Are you a domestic company, are you a global company? If you’re a global company, who do you owe allegiance to?
David Blackmon [00:27:22] It’s a great question, you know, I mean, I think Elon Musk has to answer that question, right? Because he’s everywhere. His second biggest market is China. And here he is playing such a pivotal role in the US government right now. At the same time, Trump is putting all these tariffs on. So Elon Musk is in quite a position of, I don’t know how to exactly put it, but he’s got a real conundrum on his plate.
Stuart Turley [00:27:50] He’s announced that he’s stepping out.
David Blackmon [00:27:53] Yeah at the end of the hundred and thirty days which was always the plan in the media exactly Idiots in our media don’t even understand that much and so they misreported it which is Yeah, maybe they did it intentionally. Anyway, um, so I we’re we’re at the halfway point I think what we’ve decided here is I’m not sure. I’m not sure
Irina Slav [00:28:18] You don’t have a transition and a rearmament at the same time.
David Blackmon [00:28:23] Yes, you can’t. And so countries are going to have to decide which has clearly made its decision here.
Stuart Turley [00:28:33] Do you think Net Zero can be defined by a movie or an Elton John song? Rocket Man is absolutely one of my most favorite songs out there.
David Blackmon [00:28:46] I wrote a whole thesis on Rocket Man when I was in college, but yes, go ahead.
Stuart Turley [00:28:50] Let’s go ahead and play. I’m gonna, now when I play this, I’m only gonna play the first 10 seconds of this because we don’t want to get banned on YouTube. When you take a look at this and vision that this is the net zero policies around the world and when they combine those with financial and fiscal responsibility, this is what happens.
David Blackmon [00:29:23] This is in Norway, by the way, this launch was in Norway.
Stuart Turley [00:29:27] I’m gonna go ahead and turn the sound off just because we don’t want to have copyright flag on our yeah
Tammy Nemeth [00:29:33] Yeah, it always goes on mine.
Stuart Turley [00:29:36] I turn off on the energy realities, I turn monetization off because I just don’t care. You know, it’s like, this is net zero in action.
Tammy Nemeth [00:29:54] freehold
Stuart Turley [00:29:57] Yeah, beautiful.
Tammy Nemeth [00:29:58] So this is what I find so interesting about SpaceX because they’ve been so successful with the with um with their rockets landing that it’s become just why can’t everybody do that actually not everybody can do that and they’ve normalized how how they make it look so easy compared to how everybody else is struggling.
David Blackmon [00:30:19] Right. People don’t realize that booster that they land in South Texas when it comes back to Earth and it, you know, the apparatus literally catches it in midair. That booster is 29 stories tall. That is, that is an inconceivable feat of engineering 10 years ago. And they just make it look like routine. Anyway, let’s go to the articles and Tammy is first.
Tammy Nemeth [00:30:51] Okay, so the first article there is Europe’s defense puts a fresh twist on steel growth engineable. That’s a really interesting story about how they figure they could probably use green hydrogen to help make green steel and all these kinds of things and how it’ll help the EU. defense industry and bring back steel because you’ll be putting all this public money, taxpayer money into keeping these factories going. But anyway, I encourage people to take a look at that one. And then the other one that I have is an excellent op-ed by Bob Climb in. in the financial post and his op-ed says we need to hear political candidates views on the globalist vision for 2050 and he basically outlines what Mark Carney’s net zero plan seems to be because he hasn’t been so forthcoming and they haven’t really been talking about climate on the campaign at all which is quite interesting and I would like to point out that the day he was sworn in. after he talked to the governor general, he had a side meeting with the leaders of all the major environmental groups in Canada. Now it’s unclear what was said at that meeting, but normally the environmental groups are all about climate and they want to know what everyone’s climate plan is and they’ve been silent. Of course. Which tells you he doesn’t want the public to know what he really wants to do with net zero. But Bob Lyman really lays out all the different things where he says. He’s going to keep the emissions cap, he’s going to keep The No Pipelines Act, which is this impact assessment. It’s terrible, nothing. We’ve had it for 70, nothing’s been approved. I mean, it’s a joke. And the emissions, clean fuel standard, clean electricity standard, all of that will remain the same. So, I highly recommend people check that out if they want to see what’s happening in Canada.
David Blackmon [00:33:02] It’s so hard to believe that WEF guy is being dishonest with the Canadian people. How could that happen?
Tammy Nemeth [00:33:08] Who figure? Who knew?
Stuart Turley [00:33:12] I don’t want to say this really, but it sure seems if you wanted to pick a guy to finish the job of ending Canada, this would be the guy. But that’s just me. Well, he’s way up in the mold with me. Anyway, here we go. Your substack is really cool.
Tammy Nemeth [00:33:32] Thanks, my substack, I didn’t post anything last week. I was working on a different project, but this week I’ll be publishing on climate finance. What the heck is it?
Stuart Turley [00:33:43] Nice.
David Blackmon [00:33:48] Oh, this is me. Washington update from the U.S.
Stuart Turley [00:33:53] I didn’t see a note from you, otherwise I just picked two.
David Blackmon [00:33:57] Oh man, I sent you a note. Anyway, um, so Trump can have drill baby drill or $50 oil, but he can’t have both. Uh, yeah, that’s a story I wrote for the daily caller over the weekend. You know, Trump keeps talking about wanting $50 all to break the back of inflation. And then his next breath, he keeps talking about drill baby, drill in the oil and gas business in the United States. You can’t have both a $50. All is well below breakeven drilling costs for, uh, Really every shale well in America that’s drilling for oil, no one can make a profit at $50 anymore with new drilling projects. Now you’ve got an inventory of about 3,000 drilled but uncompleted wells that could go ahead and be fracked and completed that could be profitable at $ 50. So there is an inventory of wells to be completed that have already been drilled that could remain profitable at that price level but that’s not gonna sustain. any sort of a drilling boom in the United States. This chart shows, this is from the Dallas Federal Reserve Board’s first quarter survey of executives in the oil and gas industry, showing their view of breakeven prices they need in various shale plays. As you can see, even in the Permian, in the Midland and Delaware basins, the subbasins of the Permia, You need sixty two or sixty four dollars to break even That’s on the prime drilling locations, which the inventory of those are dwindling. And then in other Permian less prime spots in the Permian, you need $70 oil, okay? We’re sitting at $60 today. So we’re below breakeven today. And if this maintains for any length of time, you’re gonna see, you know, probably 100, 150 drilling rigs of the 600 that are out there right now active. 100, 150 of those will be laid down very quickly with more being idled throughout the rest of the year, as long as these low prices linger. It’s a price sensitive industry. President Trump knows that. Uh, but one thing for sure, you’re not going to hear people in the beer joints in Midland and the barbecue places talking about drill baby drill in this current price environment. So it’s just one of the inherent, uh, conflicts, uh within Trump’s. overall energy agenda, and I’m sure he’s well aware of.
Stuart Turley [00:36:26] And I think one of the things that people are going to miss the point is the drill baby drill at $50 oil, and I heard this from his administration, David, is that we need $50 oil. Well, that chart is beautiful from the Dallas Fed. And LNG will not happen as exports. natural gas prices will go up dramatically. And Drill Baby Drill does not mean that we’re going to be increasing our LNG exports, which is a huge issue.
David Blackmon [00:37:05] Yeah, the other article I wanted to talk about today was just the one about China putting new tariffs on rare earth minerals, and I’ve already talked about that, so no big deal.
Stuart Turley [00:37:17] your substack is fantastic.
David Blackmon [00:37:19] My substack. Yes, you are the carbon they want to reduce. Never forget it folks. David blackmon.blackmon.substack.com. Come see me.
Irina Slav [00:37:33] Oh yeah. UK floats plan for joint European fund to stockpile weapons. Okay, this is a hilarious story that basically tells us that they will try to do with weapons when they try to with gas. You know, the EU joined gas buying mechanism, which didn’t work out so well, although the EU counted it as a success, but it turns out it only covered. less than 5% of total EU gas demand, so I’m sure this is going to work fine with weapons and I imagine this scenario in which the UK and the EU buy weapons jointly and then they have to review the guns, or whatever, or the missiles, how are they going to do that? I mean, you take five because you paid so and so much, and you get 100 because you’re a bigger target. How is this going to work?
Tammy Nemeth [00:38:48] Exactly.
David Blackmon [00:38:50] It’s a great question. Isn’t it? They think, they think people are so stupid. They they’ll just accept it at face value.
Irina Slav [00:38:57] Oh my God, they are the stupid ones, they’re idiots. The very fact that someone in a position of national decision-making power could come up with such an idea is really, really troubling me. Really. Besides it being perfectly absurd and very funny. And the other thing that I already talked about. EU exploring weaker 2040 climate goal. Amazing! Wopke Hoekstra is not going to be happy and I’m happy about this because this man has been relentless. He hasn’t stopped pushing for more and more and more and Well. You know, it’s a day of reckoning. So yeah, they’re going to water down targets. And I knew the UK has already watered down its petrol engine car ban targets. They’re going allow companies to sell hybrids because they’re starting to wake up to the fact that this is not going to work. So that’s good news.
David Blackmon [00:40:10] Better late than never, right?
Tammy Nemeth [00:40:16] I think what’s so interesting is that with the Russian attack of Ukraine was the golden opportunity to save face and say, you know what, I think we need to put Net Zero on the shelf because we have bigger fish to fry. And, you know, instead, and even with this, with Trump’s tariffs and everything, and, oh, Europe’s in trouble because, you know, they don’t have enough weapons or whatever, another opportunity to say, you know what, maybe we should reconsider this stuff and, you know, do other things. But instead you see it doubling down. And while I’m grateful that maybe they’re going to explore weaker climate goals, I’ll believe it when I see it. That’s because they’re not rational people
Irina Slav [00:41:00] You’re talking the way my husband talks about these things. This can be happening. Well, no, it can and it is happening, but it shouldn’t be happening in a rational world. This would not be happening, you’re quite right, in a rational world with rational people and this would not be happening because they would be, you know, capable of thinking rationally, which they are not. They have done the wrong cool aid that is about their wrong propaganda. they have taken their own drugs, which any dealer I believe knows they shouldn’t be doing. This is what the EU is doing, this is what they are doing. They believe their own propaganda and they’re acting perfectly irrationally.
Stuart Turley [00:41:49] I think rational thinking only happens to men after 38 years of marriage.
Irina Slav [00:41:58] Then we’re all doomed, Stu
Stuart Turley [00:42:02] yeah that’s right my wife still does not have me trained but hey she’s a sweet lady here we go Irina you’re so i absolutely love your Substack
Tammy Nemeth [00:42:13] I loved your walk around the garden this week. That was great.
Irina Slav [00:42:17] Thank you. Yeah, you should have seen it this morning with like 10 centimeters of snow
Tammy Nemeth [00:42:23] No!
David Blackmon [00:42:28] That’s not good.
Irina Slav [00:42:29] not good.
Stuart Turley [00:42:30] What’s the address?
Stuart Turley [00:42:37] your Irina Slav at
Irina Slav [00:42:41] Substack.com
Stuart Turley [00:42:42] just making sure. Sorry. The mouse went nuts there for a sec, sorry. I’m blaming it on the mouse. We already talked about the Panama Canal is about to heat up and how important is the Panama Canal to shipping? It’s pretty important when you consider 90% of the world’s LNG tankers, up to 3.9 billion cubic feet of capacity in 2018, LNG reached 340 vessels, can go through the Panama Canal. How much of the Panama canal can do the crude? Not as much because of the size of the tankers. They have Pan Max tankers. It’s not nearly as big, but for LNG, which is important to the United States, oh, that’s why we have an air show possibly going on down there. That’s a lot when you consider the tariff war and how important it is right now for trade balances is LNG export. The next thing is Pennsylvania coal industry crumbles as plant closures mount. And I’ll tell you what, the world is rethinking coal and I, I still think that exporting clean coal energy is going to be critical. And when you take a look at this report that came through, the highest energy prices mandate renewable cap and trade policies. Whenever you start doing this kind of crap, your electricity prices go through the roof. You take a work at who has the highest prices in the United States, it’s because they put this cap and trade crap all over it. And you try to put this stuff in here. Wind is not what it is. I mean wind is not a sustainable nor is it renewable. Solar I think has more legs than than does wind. But in both cases they are not good for farmers and I personally want to see us get rid of ethanol in order to do that. Anyway did I just say that out loud?
David Blackmon [00:45:03] Well, you’ll never win the Iowa caucus is taking that stance Stu.
Stuart Turley [00:45:08] Well, too bad. You know, I don’t really care about them. I do care about our farmers. And I think if we had a plan to wean them off of the subsidies, weaning them off the subsidies would be fabulous, get them onto different things. And let’s stop importing food from other countries. Let’s grow our own food. And then that way everybody’s a win-win except for the people that we import from. And I believe that was a who will win from lose backtracking globalization. The U.S. Yes, because we cannot. I think that’s Heron, I think, that is a great thing because we can’t fund the rest of the world and USAID is now dead. So I think the USAID is not going to fund the militaries of the world. uh this is from Robert net zero net widths remind me of the moron who wanted to carry an ax to a fire on board our submarine and died up dry dock what good is an ax for a hydraulic oil fire in a steel compartment way to go Robert that’s a movie scene waiting to happen there uh this was my Substack TheEnergyNewsbeat.Substack.com and energynewsbeat.co and By the way, I am tired of people trying to hack my site. We’re up to about 7,000 denial of service attacks a day on the site. That means I’m saying something that somebody doesn’t like.
David Blackmon [00:46:45] It’s hard to imagine, Stu, it’s just really hard.
Stuart Turley [00:46:50] Alright. And Robert.
David Blackmon [00:47:14] I’m just like the acts, you know, the acts would have been a bad idea. So.
Tammy Nemeth [00:47:18] Yeah, for sure.
David Blackmon [00:47:20] Thank you. Obviously Robert will never be a part of the E the European commission. That’s too much.
Stuart Turley [00:47:28] See, I’m dumb enough that I went to Oklahoma State University and I probably would have showed up with a chainsaw trying to get through that bulkhead door on a submarine.
David Blackmon [00:47:40] Well, here we are. So we got nine minutes left if we want to take it. If not, we can adjourn early, but is there any other topics anyone would like to raise like the climate change hair cutters in Ireland?
Tammy Nemeth [00:47:53] That was hilarious, but you know, they’re building on a project done by Australia that was trialed in Australia.
David Blackmon [00:48:01] That’s right. Yeah.
Tammy Nemeth [00:48:02] where they educated hairstylists and barbers on how to engage their clients with climate conversation to try and get their clients to think there’s a climate emergency. Like, I don’t want to hear that from my hairdresser. Like, come on. Especially if you’re using all the different products and they’re washing your hair and the water use and the hairdryer, the chemicals that you’re getting at color. Yeah, I mean, come on, really? So I, you know, why am I not surprised that they they try in these periphery countries to see how it goes, and then make a decision whether to roll it out on in larger jurisdictions. But honestly, I don’t want to go my hairdresser and get lectured about climate change.
Stuart Turley [00:48:48] I got a solution. Let’s just do a number one on the clippers for everybody. Works for me.
David Blackmon [00:48:59] Oh, a buzz cut for everybody, yeah.
Tammy Nemeth [00:49:01] Buzz cut.
David Blackmon [00:49:04] That’s how I spent my childhood, going to the local barbershop to get a buzz cut, man. I was a social outcast because I was the only kid in my class with a buzz hairdo in the seventh grade and everybody thought I was the biggest nerd on campus, which I was, so they were right.
Irina Slav [00:49:20] That’s good, it’s good for the entrance.
David Blackmon [00:49:23] It’s amazing the things you still obsess about, uh, all these years later. Yeah. I’m still pissed.
Stuart Turley [00:49:30] I just thought you grew your back hair so long it was a cape that when you left the house you’d comb it over.
David Blackmon [00:49:38] Oh, yeah, those were my mullet days. Yeah, that was college. Yeah. That was college Oh, okay
Tammy Nemeth [00:49:46] Hey, I heard mullets are making a comeback or something. No, don’t That could make a comeback.
David Blackmon [00:49:55] Oh well.
Tammy Nemeth [00:49:56] mullet. Oh, can I comment just for one second? Heron made a comment that SpaceX is a fake company. They’re so fake that 90% of Earth’s payloads are being taken into orbit by SpaceX.
David Blackmon [00:50:12] I don’t understand that comment. I mean, we applaud to reach ISS, which is only 400 kilometers above Earth, I suppose I well I mean we used to applaud the space shuttle for doing that NASA.
Irina Slav [00:50:27] Yeah, but NASA couldn’t get something to the ISS to get those astronauts back.
David Blackmon [00:50:34] Exactly. I mean, NASA can’t, right. NASA can do these things. And so Elon Musk is doing them. Yeah. I mean.
Tammy Nemeth [00:50:42] Hey, I give credit where credit’s due. If there’s another company out there who can do the same thing as SpaceX and surpass them, absolutely. Do we need competition? For sure. It’ll be great when Blue Origin actually gets perfection on what they’re trying to do. They’ve had a few successes, but a lot of failures, but it’s early days, so it’d be great.
David Blackmon [00:51:02] Hey, they’re sending up sending up Gail King and Oprah and Bezos his wife here pretty quick here up in the next few weeks
Stuart Turley [00:51:12] They get it.
Stuart Turley [00:51:15] Do they have three or four extra boosters on that bad dog?
David Blackmon [00:51:19] Don’t be mean.
Stuart Turley [00:51:22] it’s a payload.
David Blackmon [00:51:25] Maybe it in Oprah it’s, it’s three ladies. It’s Gail King. Who’s. I think that’s Oprah,
Stuart Turley [00:51:32] and the face was this way. I’d like to put the old view cast of the view on there, and let’s see if we can get that thing into orbit.
David Blackmon [00:51:42] faster than you. Oh, no, you can’t do that, no. I mean, you’d have to toss everything overboard just to deal with the weight.
Stuart Turley [00:51:52] See, now you’re making a weight joke. It’s OK if you make a weight-
David Blackmon [00:51:55] Plus they’d piss off everybody at flight control so badly that they’d intentionally crash the rocket on takeoff.
Tammy Nemeth [00:52:05] So it’s it’s an all-female crew that includes Katy Perry Gail King Lauren Sanchez, but I don’t think Oprah’s in there. I think it’s
David Blackmon [00:52:18] Oh hey, ok, it’s Katy Perry who has the auto
Irina Slav [00:52:20] Katy Perry, I don’t know, celebrities, yeah.
David Blackmon [00:52:24] So I’m not sure what the qualifications were for that, but obviously it wasn’t. All women. Yeah, I guess so. Anyway.
Tammy Nemeth [00:52:33] They have one former NASA astronaut, I think, in there.
David Blackmon [00:52:38] Yeah, they’re going to have to have somebody who can fly the thing. But, uh, you know, and, but, but that’s, that’s the business blue origins in, you know their space tourism company, whereas SpaceX is a space freight company, basically at this point, trying to figure out how to get to Mars. Um, I believe SpaceX has also sent, uh uh, didn’t they send a moon arbiter at some point in the last few years, I think they did. They, uh developed the Falcon heavy to begin with. Anyway, we’re way off topic.
Tammy Nemeth [00:53:12] Hey, but that uses methane, it’s a methane rocket.
David Blackmon [00:53:16] It’s a methane rocket, whereas blue origin is hydrogen with the blue flame. Yeah. Um, so anyway, yeah. We’re going to name it the Hindenburg.
Tammy Nemeth [00:53:29] And it’s not all electric.
David Blackmon [00:53:32] Not yet. But it’s coming. That’s coming, of course. No, it’s going to be nuclear, ultimately. I mean, that’s what you’re going to have to do to get to Mars.
Tammy Nemeth [00:53:39] Well, can you imagine if there if nuclear had a had an accident on takeoff or something? That would be bad
David Blackmon [00:53:46] It’d be a bad deal. South Roger Island. be dust.
Stuart Turley [00:53:49] Yeah, it would need to be a court plasma as opposed to nuclear.
David Blackmon [00:53:55] Well, but you can also do like hydrogen on takeoff with the booster, and then the rocket that’s going to take you, you know, the additional burn to take it to Mars, could be nuclear. So if you blow up, you know, in outer space, you don’t kill everybody. Mars is a stupid go. I don’t necessarily disagree with that, Robert.
Tammy Nemeth [00:54:19] But that’s his private goal, why not?
David Blackmon [00:54:23] And it’s his company so he can do what he wants. There’s a whole show about this, by the way, called For All Mankind. It’s on Apple TV. Oh, cool. It’s like a big soap opera based on an alternate history of NASA that’s really kind of interesting. If you can get past all the completely observed plot lines, it’s really good. It’s kind of like Yellowstone, but space-wise.
Tammy Nemeth [00:54:49] Oh my gosh.
Stuart Turley [00:54:51] Where do we see the financial, let me throw this question out real quick, where do we oil prices in the next three months?
David Blackmon [00:55:03] Three months from now, I’ll say 62 for Brent, 57 for WTI. But that’s gonna be up from the lows. We’re going below 50 WTI
Stuart Turley [00:55:17] I think the world is going to right-size, and this is my opinion, I think the world was going to recover from President Trump’s negotiations. And I think that if India continues on its upwards path, which is doing everything, India will be the leader in many ways. China, if China can avoid a catastrophic failure in the AKE we will see their demand remain solid. When you take a look at China’s demand remaining just normal, close to normal, India growing, we will get back to the 70 and 80 because we’re still short $4 trillion in exploration capex. Yeah. Eventually we’re gonna get there. Now, how fast depends on how soon everything gets around.
Tammy Nemeth [00:56:12] Well, especially with EU rearmament, right? So when they start building out and pumping out stuff, you need lots of energy and you’re going to need oil and gas to do that. And it’s interesting because India, I think they’re going to have a bilateral, they want a bilateral deal with the United States for trade. So once that finishes, what is the market response going to be and what’s the oil price response going to be because you know it anticipates what those what that the consumption will be and there don’t forget we have the SPR that needs to be refilled so when the prices are low that’s when
Stuart Turley [00:56:54] Exactly. And I, the SPR refilling, uh, in the damage that the Biden administration has done is almost permanent because I don’t know that it can be refilled and because the tanks may or may not be available, the salt, um, you know, they may or may not, I’m just saying they may have permanently disabled it.
Tammy Nemeth [00:57:15] Wow, that’s bad.
David Blackmon [00:57:18] It’s not good. Folks, it’s 9 o’clock. We gotta go.
Tammy Nemeth [00:57:21] Okay, thanks everybody.
David Blackmon [00:57:23] Everybody have a great week. Thank you all.
Tammy Nemeth [00:57:26] Bye.
Stuart Turley [00:57:28] See you, David. See you, Tammy
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