Dark Side To Solar? More Reports Tie Panel Production To Toxic Pollution – Energy Hypocrisy is real and is on top of the list of hostile opposing forces to humanity worldwide
ENB Publishers Note: This is an excellent article from Michael Shellenberger on the one side of solar hypocrisy not talked about. Child abuse, a horrible environmental impact, and financial poverty are all overlooked in the […]
“Kill The Whales!”
Authored by James Rickards via Daily Reckoning, On Friday Joe Biden signed an executive order directing every federal agency to work toward “environmental justice for all.” The executive order even establishes a new Office […]
Let’s Find a Way to Get Tax Subsidies for Clean Energy Right
Fiscal support will stimulate private investments in clean energy and foster innovation, but there are risks. Governments must get it right to avoid a wasted opportunity, say Agustin Redonda, Patrick Lenain, and Flurim Aliu of […]
Greek Tanker Owners Dominate Russian Oil Trade
Greek shipping companies are making a lot of money by moving large volumes of Russian oil that other tanker companies are unwilling to touch. Ukraine has added the tanker firms of several Greek tycoons to […]
The wind and solar power myth has finally been exposed
Highlights of the Podcast
00:00 – Intro
01:18 – Dark Side To Solar? More Reports Tie Panel Production To Toxic Pollution – Energy Hypocrisy is real and is on top of the list of hostile opposing forces to humanity worldwide
06:04 – Kill the whales
09:01 – Greek Tankers Owner Dominate Russian Oil Trade
12:57 – Let’s find a way to get tax subsidies for clean energy Right
16:54 – The wind and solar power myth has finally been exposed
20:06 – Outro
Follow Stuart On LinkedIn and Twitter
Follow Michael On LinkedIn and Twitter
Video Transcription edited for grammar. We disavow any errors unless they make us look better or smarter.
Stuart Turley: [00:00:14] Hey, Everybody Welcome to the Energy News Beat Podcast Daily Stand Up My name is Stuart Turley, President and CEO of the Sandstone Group and today is the May 12th Friday morning. You’ve made it through another great week we are so glad that you are here with us this week. [00:00:30][16.2]
Stuart Turley: [00:00:30] We are going to have a summary of all the best stories that Michael and I talked about this week. But I also want to give you an idea that legislation through regulation is real. The EPA released a new rule on fossil fuel burning plants, essentially proposing zero emissions by 2038. This is going to be costly to everyone in the U.S. for increasing their energy bills so with that, you’re going to stay tuned because we’ve got some great interviews coming around the corner with other CEOs about this very important topic thanks and have a fantastic weekend. [00:01:15][44.5]
Stuart Turley: [00:01:16] The first one coming around the corner. Dark Side is solar more reports tie panel production to toxic pollution. Energy hypocrisy is real and is on the top of the list of hostile opposing forces to humanity worldwide. There’s a great quote in there that’s part of the quote from this guy. Let’s see where it is. Energy hypocrisy is real and it’s on top of the list of the hostile opposing forces to humanity worldwide. Stu Turley, I wonder who that guy is. All right. This article is actually from Michael Shellenberger. I love me some Michael Shellenberger. [00:01:53][37.1]
Michael Tanner: [00:01:54] Love Michael Shellenberger, great guy. I listen to his podcast all the time. Didn’t he run for governor of California? Kind of. [00:02:00][6.6]
Stuart Turley: [00:02:01] He did, and he even said he’d come on our podcast and then he got into the run for governor and he’s like, ghosted me. I had his book. It was a good book and I was going. [00:02:11][10.3]
Michael Tanner: [00:02:11] To say he wrote San Fansico, which is a really interesting book, and then what’s the other one? This one, I haven’t. [00:02:19][7.5]
Stuart Turley: [00:02:19] I haven’t. Yeah, I have it and whatever. [00:02:21][2.5]
Michael Tanner: [00:02:22] Okay, let’s. Let’s go ahead. [00:02:23][1.0]
Stuart Turley: [00:02:23] Okay. Solar panels I love me some solar. I love me some wind. But let’s do the lowest cost kilowatt. Let’s go into this here right now. Conventional wisdom today holds that the world will quadruple the number of solar panels in the world over the next decade. And that’s not even taking into consideration the impact of possible new regulations and incentives launched by that green friendly Biden administration said It’s a lesson Love and Doran write in the CBR. [00:02:56][32.9]
Stuart Turley: [00:02:57] Okay. The volume of solar panels will destroy the economics of solar even with the subsidies, they say, by 2035. Here’s how the pollutants that are in solar panels. There is no plan to recycle. So if you are truly a lover of the planet, which I am, I love me some planet, I happen to live on it. You’ve got to recycle the solar panels, Michael. And if you can’t recycle them, these things go into waste and cause more damage than any oil ever thought of doing it [00:03:34][37.7]
Michael Tanner: [00:03:35] Well, because we just ship our trash overseas and it’s out of sight, out of mind. Oh, no, it’s. [00:03:40][5.0]
Stuart Turley: [00:03:41] We know this is going into landfills around the U.S. This is this is in your backyard. [00:03:46][5.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:03:46] Oh, 1,000%. But most of our trash gets shipped overseas that’s true. Like Africa is the dumping ground of the world China dumps all of its trash into Africa. We send a lot of our electronics to all the electronics to China, which end up. [00:04:00][13.2]
Michael Tanner: [00:04:00] So what I’m saying is, yes, this being this stuff’s being recycled, not recycled. It is being sent elsewhere, which is horrible. I thought this paragraph was interesting in this article. A new major study on the economics of solar that was published in the Harvard Business Review. The Harvard Business Review finds that waste produced by solar panels will make electricity from solar panels four times more expensive than the world’s leading energy analyst thought. [00:04:22][22.3]
Michael Tanner: [00:04:23] Here’s a quote from that The economics of solar this is why Atlee Atus and Luke Van Wasson Hope if you don’t think those guys are smart, I can’t help you here. The Institute European Administration but for what? One of the leading European business schools. I don’t even know what that means. And some dude from University of Calgary said the economics of solar will quickly darken as the industry sinks under the weight of its own trash. [00:04:47][24.0]
Stuart Turley: [00:04:48] And wind is just as bad. [00:04:50][1.8]
Michael Tanner: [00:04:50] True. But I think that’s I mean, in this specific case, I found that one of the most compelling paragraphs in this article, if only because, you know, it goes on to say that the volume of solar panel waste will destroy the economics of solar. Even with the subsidies, they say by 2035, discarded panels will outweigh new units sold by 2.56 times. In turn, this would catapult the average cost of energy. The LLC, which everybody talks about to four times the current projection. [00:05:15][24.7]
Stuart Turley: [00:05:17] Another key thing in here in this article, Michael, the HDR authors who are business school professors looked at the economics from the point of view of the consumer or customer and past trends and calculated that customers would replace the panels bar sooner than every 30 years. My calculations are coming in on wind farms I haven’t even done solar yet around that eight year mark and I’ve been validated. I’ve been validated, as we say here in Texas. [00:05:50][32.5]
Stuart Turley: [00:05:51] Validated. [00:05:51][0.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:05:52] This this the Stu number, this eight. [00:05:55][2.7]
Stuart Turley: [00:05:55] Years Baby. [00:05:55][0.3]
Michael Tanner: [00:05:57] The Stu Calculation. [00:05:58][1.5]
Stuart Turley: [00:05:57] Hey, and they only come net zero on wind farms around 10 years on carbon net zero. [00:06:03][6.2]
Stuart Turley: [00:06:04] Kill the whales. Okay, Michael, you and I have been having some discussions. You just don’t care about the whales. Me I love me some whales. I’m a humanitarian. I care about people. You heartless to the core. All you do is you care about finances and making money. And me? I’m over here going green is good, but let’s finance it properly. [00:06:28][24.1]
Stuart Turley: [00:06:29] On Energy News Beat. I love this picture there’s a sniper scope pointed at a whale fluke. I just got really tickled at this one. It was authored by James Rickard via The Daily Reckoning. This came in on one of our feeds that we pay for, and this one says, On Friday morning, Joe Biden signed an executive order directing every federal agency to work towards environmental justice for all. If the future of the planet is on the line, then you can justify whatever extreme measure you want to enact. I’m sorry, I’m getting really tired of this when we can’t even have a discussion. [00:07:10][40.8]
Stuart Turley: [00:07:11] Here are the facts. They got it backward. I love the way he phrased it. There’s a slight warming trend from 1985 to around 2005, although there’s nothing unusual since 2005. There’s been a slight cooling trend. But again, that’s not unusual. [00:07:27][16.3]
Stuart Turley: [00:07:28] Okay. Let’s leave climate change off of this discussion. Let’s talk about wind farm and the damage that we are doing to children. I know that you don’t like abusing children, Michael. I you relate to them at the mall they all come up to you, Michael. They come up to you because you’re the same height. They love you. Okay,. [00:07:52][23.5]
Stuart Turley: [00:07:52] So you’ve got to put into your mind the copper mines. The kids have to be listened to. Michael Cole, Champion them. Please, Michael, I implore you, save the whales and the children. Michael for a podcast listeners, I’m begging Michael to just change his ways. [00:08:11][19.1]
Michael Tanner: [00:08:13] No, I. That was good, actually. I am with you on. I think wind is a bad investment, even from a financial perspective. I don’t think, you know, talking about leverage, cost of energy, talking about the recycling game, talking about some of the negative second order effects that happen from this. My only thing is if a few whales die, I’m cool with it. It’s really all my it’s all it is. That’s all I’ve been saying this whole time. [00:08:39][26.5]
Stuart Turley: [00:08:40] Oil saved them the first time when we we had. [00:08:43][2.9]
Michael Tanner: [00:08:43] Winds going to kill, winds going to kill them again. [00:08:46][2.8]
Stuart Turley: [00:08:46] And oil and natural gas are going to save this time. [00:08:49][3.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:08:50] It’s a good point, actually. We’re going to have to save them twice. [00:08:52][2.3]
Michael Tanner: [00:08:53] Greek Shipping companies are making a huge sum of money by moving large volumes of Russian oil that other tankers are unwilling to touch. Title of the article Greek Tankers Owner Dominate Russian Oil Trade. Many of these tankers are still covered by Western Insurance, and this is the most interesting part suggesting that they have been complying with the price cap. [00:09:12][19.1]
Michael Tanner: [00:09:13] So this price cap is working now, Does that mean the price cap is actually working or is there that big of a discount for your euro oil? That’s the other thing that I don’t think people are taking into account is there was already a huge discount for the Russian crude grade, which is known as Urals if you played risk Ural, it’s kind of funny. It’s that little I don’t know if it was ever a country. At some point I’m on, I could be looking like a big idiot right now for not knowing where the term Ural came from let me know if it’s something if it’s something that I should know. But whatever I just remember from risk is this country that was always hard to invade. You’re always like, I got girl, shoot. Okay, whatever. [00:09:47][34.4]
Michael Tanner: [00:09:48] But my point being here is that these Greek tankers are complying with the oil with the oil price cap. What does that mean? Does that mean does that mean that they’re buying by the price cap? No, it’s just that Russian oil on the open market is trading below. [00:10:02][14.3]
Michael Tanner: [00:10:02] So a lot of this Russian price cap, what we’ve talked about in that first article is just posturing. And so it comes back to people just don’t want Russia to be able to export. Oil and it comes back to a much more geopolitical conversation of we should be who controls what other people should do and I don’t know if there’s a clean answer to that, but Greek shipping companies are have their hands full in all of this. [00:10:22][20.1]
Michael Tanner: [00:10:23] TSM tankers, Eastern Mediterranean dynamical tankers and Rivera Maritime are all included in the list for proposed sanctions because get this, guess what’s happening? Basically you. Ukraine has added all of these firms to a list of international sponsors of war. So little. I don’t know what to think of that to be honest with you. It’s you know, I mean, I’m sure Stu. Stu is definitely on the international sponsors of war list for the way he talks glowingly about Putin. So I have no doubt that this list is probably a little bit political. [00:10:55][32.5]
Michael Tanner: [00:10:56] But it is funny to think that now all of a sudden abiding by the price cap, which was set in place by G7 nations and agreed upon by Ukraine. Now, if you abide by it and you follow the rules, you will get on the international sponsors of war that seems a little bit like, okay, what more do you want? Do you just. Do you want to go for an outright ban and go for an outright ban? Just tell me that’s what you want to do but they won’t they won’t necessarily make that total step. Why? I can’t tell you that. But that’s what they want to do. You know. [00:11:23][26.4]
Michael Tanner: [00:11:23] I think moving on, the next thing that’s important to cover before we dive into finance is really you know, we’ll dive into a little bit of what this Bureau of Labor Statistics report means, macro economically here in the finance section coming up. [00:11:35][12.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:11:35] But what it means for the oil field service sector is interesting because we saw jobs climbed 5001 hundred in its to its highest level since March of 2020, which is absolutely insane because that is right before COVID hit. [00:11:48][12.8]
Michael Tanner: [00:11:48] So what does that mean as oil prices have pretty consistently dog in the last three months, we’ve actually seen still growth in the oilfield service sector, which me seems to me activity is still staying high. We’ve seen rigs continue to rise companies might be figuring out or dealing with windfall profits that they’ve made from all of the, you know, the six-month period of $100 oil that they are continually to invest in capital. You know, we’re about to cover some interesting thoughts from David. [00:12:16][28.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:12:17] There are other things companies are doing with their windfall profits, but they’re definitely dumping them back into pouring out more capital or else the oilfield services sector wouldn’t be hiring because, as you know, one of a very good proxy for how the industry is going from a spending level is how many jobs, the oilfield service sector. [00:12:32][15.5]
Michael Tanner: [00:12:33] You know, The Energy Workforce and Technology Council CEO Leslie Bryer this April jobs increase are significant and show the resilience of our sector through a slowing overall economy. Do I necessarily agree that it’s a slowing overall economy. She’s right, which is I guess I do agree with that. I think we’re headed off to a little bit more of a cliff than anything. But, you know, good for the good for the US oil sector. Love to see jobs keep going. [00:12:56][22.9]
Stuart Turley: [00:12:57] Let’s find a way to get tax subsidies for clean energy right. Fiscal support will stimulate private investments in clean energy and foster innovation. But there are risks, says the first paragraph. Governments must get it right to avoid a wasted opportunity, says Gustin Reed, Donna Patrick Lang, and for him, Ali of the Council of Economic Policy’s. [00:13:25][28.6]
Stuart Turley: [00:13:27] After years of procrastination, governments worldwide are finally providing substantial fiscal support to clean energy. They’ve been doing it all along, dude. I mean, they have flat doing it. I do like this. The Oxy Oxford Global Recovery Observatory, an international energy agency, has to make global fiscal commitments on green measures between 1,000,000,000,00 and 1.2 trillion since 2020. [00:13:58][31.4]
Stuart Turley: [00:13:59] Kind of goes with what I just said the OECD Green Recovery Database estimates roughly similar amount of €1.1 trillion in government spending allocated to environmentally positive measures. [00:14:15][15.4]
Stuart Turley: [00:14:15] Here’s where the problem is on the Inflation Reduction Act that’s the next paragraph down. All of the inflation reduction items, including the the tax credits and tracked tax deductions for EVs, had a lot of strings on them. Michael It was almost like a can a can of worms. And in fact, they wanted a bill in the U.S. they wanted the minerals done in the U.S none of the minerals are done in the U.S. [00:14:42][26.6]
Stuart Turley: [00:14:43] So when they actually came through with all of these things put in there, the unions were upset because it meant that not many union jobs would be getting money from the Inflation Reduction Act. Last week, the unions walked away from Biden. So you sit back and kind of go, he’s lost a lot of his base based off the tax credits being a farce. [00:15:09][26.6]
Michael Tanner: [00:15:10] Yeah. Well, I agree with most of what you said I think what’s interesting in this, what this article does is bring up what I’ve been preaching is the unintended consequences of, quote-unquote, subsidizing clean energy the right way. [00:15:24][13.4]
Michael Tanner: [00:15:24] They bring it up. Another concern is that law may not be as environmentally friendly as presented to lawmakers. There are always unintended consequences to harm natural ecosystems, perfect, particularly in developing economies due to the supply chain components of clean attacked. [00:15:38][14.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:15:38] They go on to cite an example of the, as you mentioned, the EV, which is already showing huge. You know, as we’ve talked about the deforestation in the biodiversity, you love the talk about how the whales are dying because we’re rolling out offshore wind. You know, it clearly the unintended consequences of this that needs to be taken into account. So if we’re going to do anything subsidy wise, understanding those second order effects are critical,. [00:16:05][27.2]
Stuart Turley: [00:16:06] Right? And in the right under the unknown fiscal cost. I love this, Michael and this. It says The tax and climate law is already subject to debate, which will prompt useful lessons for other countries. They’re printing money just as fast as we can right now. [00:16:22][16.3]
Stuart Turley: [00:16:23] First, providing tax credits without funding gap could turn out to have a very costly impact on government coffers. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the energy and climate provisions would cost over 369 billion over ten years, but they also admit they don’t know how much it’s going to cost. Let’s ask for an open checkbook. Can’t do it. [00:16:50][26.5]
Michael Tanner: [00:16:50] Yeah, I mean, I’ll I’ll take a I’ll take a easy check, please. [00:16:53][3.3]
Stuart Turley: [00:16:54] The wind and solar power myth has finally been exposed. You know, it is really kind of interesting to see what’s coming around. People are really wanting to not have to pay so much in in food, energy or gas. And this article I thought, was really, really good. These plans have a single fatal flaw. [00:17:19][24.4]
Stuart Turley: [00:17:19] They are reliant on the pipe dream. That is, there is some affordable way to store surplus electricity at scale that’s the biggest problem and some of this is really pretty good quotes in here. And it is the scale of the issue we need to consider the scale relatively simple calculations show that California would need over 200 megawatts of storage per installed megawatt of wind and solar. [00:17:52][32.4]
Stuart Turley: [00:17:53] Germany could probably manage with 150 megawatts per megawatt so per megawatt, per hour per megawatt this is expensive. Solar and wind capacity is very you can’t go on 100% solar, you can’t go on 100% wind. [00:18:14][21.2]
Stuart Turley: [00:18:14] And that getting to the net zero emissions of carbon in the near future the U.S. and the UK say they will deliver by 2050. It’s widely believed that wind and solar power can achieve this. They can’t there’s a lot of things that are coming around the corner. We have supply chain issues. We have the fact that the infrastructure bill has actually in the Inflation Reduction Act and they actually printed money. You may have access to the money, but you may not have access to the products to even get the done any of the installations done. [00:18:48][33.6]
Stuart Turley: [00:18:48] And then there’s permitting so I thought this was very, very good article. I thought this other this last piece in here, and I’ll go to the next article after this. Solar power disappears completely every night and drops by 50% or more during cloudy days capacity, meaning a meaningless figure for wind or solar plant about 3000 megawatts hour of wind and solar is needed to replace a thousand megawatts of conventional power in terms of energy over time. [00:19:22][33.8]
Stuart Turley: [00:19:23] So it’s about the physics. I hope you had a great time this week listening to the Energy News Beat Daily Stand Up Summary for the week. Have a great weekend. Like subscribe If you find anything that you need to get the word out, let us know. [00:19:39][16.3]
Stuart Turley: [00:19:40] Send us a note. If you’re an industry thought leader and you want to get on the podcast with me, please send me a note. Reach out and we’d love to talk to you about anything going on with energy, geopolitical, renewable, wind, solar, and nuclear. We’d love to talk to you about energy. Thanks. Have a great weekend. Talk to you soon. [00:19:40][0.0]
