[Brian Swartz]

Originally Posted by Solecismic

every time you go down this road, I read heavy condescension on your part. I try to ignore it, because it's not productive to respond in kind.

It's not condescension though. A fundamental question to any discussion is what kind of reply you accept as valid. Are there any, or will the same dismissal result no matter what? I, multiple times in this discussion, have given examples of what I would consider valid rebuttals to what I've said. It's hardly condescension to insist on reasonable terms of debate.

Originally Posted by Solecismic

Ballpark, within your range of serious, you're talking about maybe 10%.

No I'm not. Over the 20-year period you cited, the 50-100 trillion amount is less than 1% to about 1.5%.

Originally Posted by Solecismic

You think wind and solar are the answer and I don't.

Nope, not true. I've never claimed this. I've repeatedly said otherwhise actually in this discussion.

Originally Posted by Solecismic

keep saying you've proven all this is dishonest, over and over again. But it's more that you've written, over and over again, that these sources are dishonest and slanted, as if the conclusion is enough on its own.

Also not true. This is the only source I've described as dishonest. I've mostly agreed with the others you posted and pointed out why I disagreed with the other points, based on the quality and use of data in them. Meanwhile you've dismissed the dominant scientific consensus as a weird theory not worth taking seriously. Suffice to say I'm on exceptionally solid ground here.

A few specific items from the Manhattan Institute link:

Originally Posted by Manhattan Institute

the realities of the physics, engineering, and economics of energy systems are not dependent on any facts or beliefs about climate change.

This is 100% true. The reverse is also true; the facts and science regarding climate change are not dependent on the costs and difficulties involved in reducing reliance on fossil fuels. It's a handwavium approach that allows the analysis to proceed without considering the other side of the equation: the cost of continuing to use fossil fuels at an accelerating rate. They don't even mention the shortages issue or address in any way whether continuing the increasing rate of consumption is sustainable. By itself, this demonstrates the whole argument of the article to be intellectually unserious.

A second element is the section devoted to shale. The price difference between shale oil - other sources such as tar sands are also in this boat - and more conventional sources of oil is not addressed. There is discussion of price fluctuations, improving productivity with technology, and so on, but the long-term impact of relying more on sources such as shale is that the price of oil stays high, because unless it is fairly high, shale isn't viable. It is several times more expensive to extract than the oil that OPEC produces, about 5-6x by the best estimates I've seen. Oil at that price can only lower prices if there's a shortage of supply elsewhere, and the more the global supply comes to rely on such sources, the more consistently the price will be high. Shale oil can't survive in a cheap oil environment. That doesn't mean it isn't good - purely from a supply & price standpoint - to have it as a source, but the idea that it's a solution to rising prices is just wrongheaded.

Then we have the Top 10 Energy Truths:

- #8 is particularly egregious starting at 40% instead of 0% which is blatant data distortion, and also presenting an absurdly short 6-year time period.
- #7 assumes there will be no increase in global production of aluminum to meet demand, contradicting what is said earlier in the piece (rightly) about oil, and the fact that there are massive available aluminum deposits.
- #9 makes a similar error, focusing on China's market share instead of available deposits, assuming no changes will happen in resource development. Of course, when you look at available deposits, the scenario is flipped; what OPEC has is a far greater share of oil than what China has relating to mineral deposits used in green energy. All of this of course runs into the other point I've made repeatedly about how our current economy relies on a wide variety of resources from China and other countries anyway - that's just an unavoidable reality regardless of what we do.
- #4, no one, literally no one, claims green energy is carbon free. It's the kind of statement that shows you aren't really being serious about the issues involved.
- #5 Energy density is completely besides the point; batteries don't need to come close to the energy density of oil, because of how much more efficient they are compared to internal combustion engines. This is a near-complete red herring. Better battery energy density would obviously be a good thing, but it's not essential.

And so on.

Again, there are many valid points made in the article. But a valid point robbed of appropriate context doesn't get very far. When you look at the whole picture, it's clear the goal in this kind of piece isn't to take in all of factors involved and come out with a logical conclusion. It's what an exercise in bolstering a pre-determined conclusion looks like.