Excellent article:
Indeed this is why Xi referred to the Thucydides Trap
Trump had no idea what it was or what Xi meant but I believe it applies perfectly here
The world is changing. I see it here myself.
We moved from petrol car to hybrid car and currently await the arrival of an electric car.
On the way we go solar energy with battery and it can operated off-grid. We only buy a bit of electric power in winter. The garden grill, the string trimmer, the chainsaw and the riding lawn mower all went electric since we now live a live with endless free power in summer.
Either you fight the change or your embrace it. Your choice.
I look forward to the last day I have to buy petrol!
Thank you, Christian.
Farmers in Southern African countries are grateful to people like you. By the end of this year, our house in Gaborone, Botswana, will also switch from grid power to off-grid solar power.
Petrol is an old tehnology. Electrical cars are efficient and can help the environment.
I hope to keep my 14 year old diesel-guzzling, non-automatic car going for another decade.
Also my more than 25 year old petrol ride-on mower.
I stopped taking the latter for servicing over a decade ago, got sick of the lawnmower guy trying to persuade me to replace it with a new model.
Since then I sort-of service it myself and drive it slow and easy so no parts get too hot.
If I was starting now I’d likely go electric everything but it can environmentally friendly to keep old stuff going too. I buy renewed PCs because I’m cheap but apparently it also saves a lot of emissions.
Christian, that day has recently come for my family. We’ve had solar for almost 20 years, and like you all our power tools (trimmer, mower, drill, grinder) are all battery powered. The arrival of an electric car completes the transition. We can charge the car for free from our solar, but for approximately EUR 2.18 (AUD 3.534) we can also charge at home from the power grid (which provides around 400kms in range). They have deals to recharge at off-peak times 11am-2pm or midnight-6am usually between AUD 6 to 8 cents per kWh.
Kind regards, Andrew
May be in 10-15 years
The price is too high for the majority of people
Who can buy a car equivalent of 1,5 year of salary ??
I never buy a electric car, I don’t want when temperature < 0° autonomy divide by two.
You can take a plane without oil ?
Boat ship can go china → Usa without oil ?
The Author dream, oil are the star until 2040
Most f them are more half of a year salary. Looking on my payroll the most are earning enough to do it. And some already done.
We are on the grid. We use the grid as backup. Main source is solar and battery.
For the car, I recommend to drive any car you have as long as it keeps working and repairs are affordable. Only when you buy next car, please consider an electric one.
For the heating we also got a heat pump, which works very well.
usually around 5:1 ration, which is excellent.
In Canada, electric vehicles are very popular in the major cities.
But our country is so big, it can literally take days to drive from one major city to the next. Not to mention all the small centres in between (or our Northern regions) where there just isn’t the infrastructure for highway charging stations.
EV range efficiency needs to increase SIGNIFICANTLY before Canada will see wide spread adoption.
Alberta is located in one of these EV inefficiency zones, which is why I think they believe their future is still oil & gas (and rich enough at the moment that they imagine separating from Canada).
I’m simplifying, of course. So when I hear about new investments in oil & gas in Alberta, it makes me wonder how people can be so short-sighted (or short-term greedy), because 10 or 20 years from now - Alberta will be a shadow of its former self.
I say this without prejudice, because I have lived in Alberta twice and benefited from it. My oldest son was born there and still lives there.
electric airplanes are being developed
some have done test flights already
and solar powered ships
its coming
Just not super fast
nor will it be a fast transition
Watch what China is doing
Sure they have lots of coal & other fossil fuels but they are also deploying renewables at an unmatched scale
Renewables free them, and any economy, from the soft of crazy pricing thats going on because of the war in Iran, the price spikes when Russia invaded Ukraine, etc
And because the sun dumps more energy on our planet in one day that we could use in a year
Converting just a fraction of that to electricity is a huge win
Chinese EVs are extremely inexpensive FWIW
Born here
live here
and TBH the last decent premiere we had that KNEW oil & GAS would run out one day tried to make sure Alberta was prepared for it and set up the heritage savings trust fund - modelled after the Norwegian one
But successive conservative governments lowered taxes, dropped royalty rates and stopped putting money into it so now its not nearly as large as it might have been
So now it sits at something like 30 billion $
Alberta established its fund in 1976
Norway’s was established until MUCH later - 1990
Norways has nearly 100 times as much in it (just shy of 2 trillion $)
For the production facility we have a 320kw/p solar system running. At home we want to install it after renewing the roof next year but anly 20kw/p. We sell the energy we are not consuming and are with a 25kWh battery of grid available with the company. Should be enough to run our lab and the programming part not the production but okay, no problem.
The stuffs are cheap as heck. I have the modules already in stock so I can install them when needed, As we have our second synology station at home (the other one is in the production facility) we have enough security. The one at the company has a battery system for 24 hours, at home for 36 hours. Should be good enough.
The latest Chines EVs have a range of allegedly 1,200 km …
Norway vs UK
Thatcher fans… One of her biggest, almost criminally bad ideological mistakes concerns our oil and gas reserves in the North Sea as part of her privatisation crusade. Here is Jack Pandrelli explaining:
Norway and the UK drilled the same North Sea.
Norway got $2 trillion.
The UK got tax cuts.
Same basin, same era… Completely different outcomes.
Norway captured $30 per barrel in government revenue. The UK captured $11.
That gap, compounded over 50 years of production, is the entire difference.
Norway’s model was simple: tax heavily (78% marginal rate), take direct equity stakes in fields via the SDFI, own part of Equinor, and put everything surplus into a fund invested abroad.
The Government Pension Fund Global now holds over $2 trillion in assets.
That’s $390,000 per Norwegian citizen about 1.5% of all listed equities on earth.
The fiscal rule: only spend the 3% annual real return. Never touch the principal.
The UK started producing earlier, at lower prices, with a lower tax rate (40%) and no saving mechanism.
North Sea revenues flowed straight into the general budget.
Economists estimate the UK missed out on roughly £400 billion compared to a Norwegian style regime.
The windfall largely financed tax cuts in the 1980s and shareholder dividends rather than a fund.
Where things stand in 2026?
Norway’s petroleum sector will generate $63 bn in net cash flow this year alone feeding a fund already large enough to cover 10-15% of the national budget from returns alone.
The UK is a net energy importer.
Since 2021 it has paid countries like Norway more than £100 billion for gas.
One country treated oil as a finite resource to convert into permanent financial wealth.
The other treated it as income.
We have one Tesla in our company. For me it is even in germany not really useless cause when it is cold outside the range of this brand new model s decreases down to 300 kilometers. The problem: To munic I need to charge two times. Makes no sense. With the Diesel not. Cause I am driving around 6 and a half hours with the Diesel I needed last time near 8 hours and had to search working charge places
Speaking from experience (having driven across Canada about a dozen times), that’s about a day’s worth of driving here.
But given that Canada is often below 10º C, newer battery efficiency still won’t be enough.
You just described exactly what our various premieres did over the last 50 years
Only 1 had the foresight to know it was finite & tried to do the right thing
The rest of his successors in the “conservative” party screwed it up horribly