You can vote against this trash and still not consume 99% of the "news" content people pretend is information. You don't need to know "the latest" about this second "administration". Consuming "news" is not a civic duty, it just is bad for you and a waste of your time. Don't be fooled.
I don't think most Americans even knew what the strait of hormouz was, expecting them to vote differently based on that last November is wild. Trump constantly ran as the "no more wars" president and people fell for it. At that point, the blame is just for believing in that he was not lying. But strait of hormouz was a non topic for almost the entire world before the war.
but isn't expensive gas a local issue so local news will cover it regardless. That doesn't mean Americans will care about Hormouz in even an year imo. People only care when it affects their wallets.
November 2024 nobody could have reasonably predicted that the strait of Hormuz would be closed in February 2026 because Trump would declare war on Iran.
But they could have seen he was a fool and predicted that putting a fool in charge of the presidency would make something bad happen.
Last year we had stupid tariff wars, now we have stupid actual wars and a screw worm infestation. Who knows what's next? I don't, but I can predict it will be stupid.
I mean yes, but there are reasons why people vote for him even though it might seem stupid to you or me. Politics is a weird dirty game and its not just about good or bad or smart or stupid. It's mostly theatrics and media management. It kind of makes sense a reality TV actor can do well in these situations funny enough.
Quality? I'm really interested into hard and extensive data about mechanical (drivetrain, suspension, brakes, etc...) engineering and quality control that would make me put them on the same level as the Japanese.
Lacking that, I must hold the preemptive view that they cut corners at least as much as the average make/
Comparing primary energy is VERY misleading. From Marc Jacobson:
The use of primary energy on the vertical axis is an old trick by the fossil fuel industry to mislead people into thinking that one unit of fossils = one unit of renewables. In fact, one unit of primary energy for wind or solar electricity is the equivalent of three units of fossil fuel electricity.
Another trick is to pretend we need all those fossils if we switched to renewables. In fact, if we switch to renewables, 12% of the fossil fuel energy disappears because that is how much energy is used to mine-transport-refine fossil fuels+uranium for energy, and we wouldn't need to do that anymore
A third trick is to pretend we need so much energy if we go to all electricity powered by renewables. In that case, because EVs use 75% less energy than gasoline/diesel vehicles, heat pumps use 75% less energy than combustion heating, etc., energy demand goes down another 42%.
In sum, this plot illustrates the real story of where we are and where we need to go. The proper metric is end-use energy, not primary energy.
Making one unit of primary energy for wind or solar electricity equivalent to three units of fossil fuel electricity is an old trick of renewable energy advocates to argue that in future we will need less primary energy.
They base this on the efficiency of older gasoline engines, which is about 25%. They ignore future improvement in fuel efficiency and disregard all current combustion engines with higher efficiency.
High-tech gasoline engines have a maximum thermal efficiency of more than 50%.
Very fuel efficient diesel engines have been developed for large ships because fuel costs are large part of operating costs of big ships. Low speed diesel engines like the MAN S80ME-C7 have achieved an overall energy conversion efficiency of 54.4%, which is the highest conversion of fuel into power by any single-cycle internal or external combustion engine.
Renewable energy advocates also like to disregard efficiency of gas turbines. Latest generation gas turbine engines have achieved an efficiency of 46% in simple cycle and 61% when used in combined cycle. And still some of the waste heat can also be used for cogeneration.
Another trick is to pretend that renewables need almost no mining-transportation-refining. According to International Energy Agency.
"The special report, part of the IEA’s flagship World Energy Outlook series, underscores that the mineral requirements of an energy system powered by clean energy technologies differ profoundly from one that runs on fossil fuels. A typical electric car requires six times the mineral inputs of a conventional car, and an onshore wind plant requires nine times more mineral resources than a similarly sized gas-fired power plant."
Which combustion engines have good efficiency in real world scenarios? Diesel can do reasonably well under optimal conditions, but in real world driving it’s much less. A small car uses 5l/100km, so about 50kWh. An EV needs well under 20kWh.
Carnot also puts pretty harsh limits on future improvements in fuel efficiency in scenarios like ocean shipping where the engines can get close to their theoretical efficiency.
Much of heating and cooling buildings can be replaced with heat pumps, but many energy uses can't be replaced with heat pumps - high temperature applications, chemical processes driven by heat like cement production.
"The energy devoted to heating and cooling buildings accounts for around 35% of all energy consumption, the largest share attributable to any end use. "
There are electric replacements of fossil fuels for many applications where heat pumps can't by used, but usually they don't use 75% less energy than combustion heating. Usually they use more energy...
Also the sewer system backs up after about a week because the pumping and lift stations need power to operate.
The water system shuts down because the tanks aren't reserve supply they're pressure support.
And solar plus storage will keep you running for maybe a week if you're conservative and mostly don't use anything...which doesn't help you if it's months till replacement.
solar + storage + water sheath fireplace can run pretty much till you run out of wood.
But yes, unless you spend serious money (own sewer, water from underground etc), it's basically solution for "the power pole is down", not any grid wide problems.
> unless you spend serious money (own sewer, water from underground etc)
It is often the case (at least where I live) that having a septic system and well is far more economical than obtaining a property with access to city utilities.
Have a wee guess at what the big boxy things beside the distribution centres with "AGGREKO" written on the side in big orange letters, a big exhaust pipe sticking out the top, and seriously massive electrical connections at one end are.
There's a lot of bizarre sniping comments here coming from users who seemingly have _zero_ experience living outside of high uptime largish municipal grids.
It's incredible, isn't it? I get similar when I point out that while it's nice that they believe in the whole gas stoves vs. induction hobs thing (a gas stove fills the air with toxic pollution and an induction hob doesn't, IF you seal the room with the gas stove up absolutely airtight and burn fried food on it compared to using the induction stove to slightly warm a pan of water in a well-ventilated room), a gas stove solves a problem I have in a way that an induction stove doesn't.
"Oh but we never get power cuts here!"
Yeah. Try living in a part of the world where 140mph winds for four weeks just just Normal January Weather.
"But if I got power cuts for more than a few hours I'd complain to the provider!"
Yeah. That sure is going to help rebuild 30 miles of blown-over 275kV power line that runs through some of the most inaccessible country even if it's not storm-force winds that prevent access by boat and fallen trees that prevent access by land. Complain all you like, but doing beats talking.
The context of this subthread is the intentional destruction of "large, bespoke transmission transformers" so the on-site backup generators will hold you over for a few days, maybe a week or so until they run out of fuel. Meanwhile the lead time on replacing those transformers is years, and that doesn't account for the collapse "into the Stone Age" that is unfolding in the meantime.
Way stations still need power to accept and refrigerate shipments. Distribution isn't just on trucks - although they could act as a small stopgap that also prevents them from making deliveries while being used as storage.
But US mostly wins from global warming relatively, right? I mean, it's going to suffer less than others (except EU), for geographical reasons, thus winning. I don't think global warming is a concern for US at all (some places sure, Florida will be royally fucked, but not most places).
Everyone is suffering sure, but what matters is relative degree of it. Side that suffers less, wins against others and that's the only thing that matters.
And no, in China global warming means worsening desertification, in Russia it means melting permafrost that covers 60% of the country, same in Canada. Europe and the US are uniquely positioned to suffer the least from it and many industries will win outright. For example, there will be year-round tourist season within continental EU: all summer on the Baltics and the North Sea and all winter in the Mediterranean; winemaking in Spain and southern France will suffer badly and in some places may become commercially non-viable, but will expand to great lot more territory in northern Germany, low countries, Poland, UK, thus enabling a lot richer wines due to great variety of soils.
> This seems like soft trolling. Global warming is canonically the opposite of a zero sum game. Everyone is losing.
No not everyone loses, people in colder climates win a lot from global warming, especially Russia and Canada. There is so much land there that is currently not viable due to being too cold that will open up from global warming.
Don't forget all the states in the middle that are experiencing the worst drought in a millenium, with snowpack and river flows at record lows, all while each state is adding more people (and thus more water demand), and interstate river compacts expire, and years-long negotiations on a renewal have been fruitless.
In the short to medium term, sure . . . again, left unchecked gets bad for every human when tipping points are passed.
Eg: When surface ice gets very low the trapped heat will go more torward heating water than melting ice.
That's very double plus bad (ask a high school physics teacher about the energy used to melt, say, a kilogram of ice .. then ask them by how many degrees C does that same energy raise the temp. of water).
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