THEY SHIP SALMON AROUND THE WORLD--AND BACK--BEFORE YOU CAN EAT IT.
What does a study of the Scottish-Vietnamese salmon industry say about how we use energy, and how long that can last?
A conversation with minerals analyst Dr. Simon Michaux, an Australian mining engineer who now works for the government of Finland.
HART HAGAN: How is the world going to look different? And how is the economy going to be different as a result of energy limitation and minerals limitations? I've heard you say that the economy is going to be more regional because we're not going to have the cheap fuel that it takes to have a global economy with all the long distance travel and all of its complexity.
SIMON MICHAUX: We are in a situation now where transport from one end of the planet to the other end of the planet simply is irrelevant. There's a case study that I like to quote, where in Edinburgh Scotland they have a fishing hub. They go out and collect salmon. They take the salmon off the ship. They load it onto another ship and they send it to Vietnam, the other side of the planet. In Vietnam they take the fish, they prepare it, they put it in cans and put a label on the can. Where does the can come from? Maybe somewhere in China. And then the cans are put back on a ship, a different ship and sent back to Edinburgh and they put it in a supermarket.
So the guys that fished the salmon in the first place would go down to the supermarket and buy some food. But they don't go to the local fish market and buy fresh fish. They buy tins of salmon.
HART HAGAN: Salmon that have been to the other side of the globe and back.
SIMON MICHAUX: It still costs only a couple of pounds. We're in a remarkable place where we can actually do that. But we can do that only because energy is so cheap and effective. Going forward, it will be less cheap and less available. It’s still going to be around, but it won't be as readily available.
Oil analyst Arthur Berman is putting together the best information about the status of the oil and gas industry at the moment, and he's done some recent work with me.
We're a very complex system across six continents. Almost all of our manufactured stuff comes from the other side of the planet, China, or South Korea, or sometimes Japan.
Anything manufactured in Europe, we still use components manufactured in China, or South Korea, or Japan. It will become more and more difficult to ship to Europe because of fuel costs.
OBSERVATIONS:
People in Scotland catch Salmon and sell it to a fishing industry that manages to ship the salmon to Vietnam for processing, canning and labeling, after which that salmon is shipped back to Europe.
This is possible only because of cheap oil. Simon Michaux takes the position that we will run out of cheap oil. We will have oil, but it will not be cheap. So we will be forced to use less of it. That means worldwide shipping will be less affordable, and the global economy will have to make way for more local and regional economies.
Meanwhile, the mainstream climate movement is talking about how to replace fossil fuels with “clean and renewable energy.” They are not talking about how we use energy. They are not talking about whether consuming energy at these prodigious levels is good for people or the planet.
Why? Follow the money. The US government alone is spending billions in taxpayer money to support this “green energy transition.” Companies are making billions of dollars. But where does this all lead?
Does this lead to a lowering of atmospheric carbon? That’s doubtful because solar and wind technologies require massive amounts of energy to implement, most of which is fossil fuel energy. Then the solar panels and wind turbines have to be replaced after 20 years or so.
Does this diminish ecological devastation? This is not likely, because solar and wind cause ecological devastation. Fossil fuels do too, but let’s not be fooled by a false distinction.
Does this lead to less mining? Hardly, because solar, wind and electric vehicles require massive amounts of mining of lithium, copper, cobalt, nickel, sand, silicon and aluminum, just to name a few.
Does this lead to less deforestation? Hardly, because solar and wind installations require massive amounts of deforestation. They both require lots of land. And wind power creates the need to cut down neighboring trees, lest they block the wind.
So, you have to ask, what is the purpose of this big energy transition? Is it clean, green or renewable? Demonstrably not. Recommended reading: “Bright Green Lies: How the Environmental Movement Lost its Way and What You Can Do About It,” by Derrick Jensen, Lierre Keith and Max Wilbert.
But what about that big ship that carries salmon all the way around the globe and back? Simon Michaux says we won’t have the cheap energy for it, and we will have to revert to local and regional economies.
And why not? Do people benefit from a global economy? That massive ship carrying salmon benefits the few at the top, but not average people.
We would do well to question HOW all this cheap energy is being used and eliminate those energy uses that have nothing to do with the well being of the people. I assert that we will thereby eliminate 50% to 75% of all energy usage.
We need to look at anti-human uses of energy in all sectors, including transportation, defense, agriculture, construction, policing and even media and entertainment.
The problem is not how we generate energy. It’s how much energy we use for wasteful, nefarious and destructive purposes. How much energy is used to enslave people? How much energy is used to steal people’s freedom? How much energy is used to steal the self-determination of countries too small to defend themselves? How much energy is used to steal their natural resources and natural beauty?
It is said that the more things change, the more they stay the same. To often “change” just means more of the same.
We are being played by people who pretend to clean up the environment, but they won’t, and by people who pretend to want to stabilize the climate, but they won’t do that either.