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#219. The unravelling begins

January 1, 2022

#219. The unravelling begins

THE REALITY OF SCARCITY, THE SCARCITY OF REALITY

In nineteenth-century England, pictures of great events and famous personages could be purchased “penny-plain or tuppence-coloured”.

Where the world economy is concerned, the price of flattering colouration has soared into the trillions, but the value of a “penny-plain” view has never been higher.

The penny-plain picture now, of course, is that a vast gap has opened up between the consensus expectation of continuity and the hard reality of a post-growth economy. This gap is the counterpart of the chasm that exists between the ‘real’ economy of goods and services and the ‘financial’ economy of money and credit.

Our understanding of these dissonances sets an outline programme for ongoing analysis. The best routes to effective interpretation are those which (a) compare reality with perception, and (b) calibrate the relationships between the ‘two economies’ of money and energy. In the coming months, the aim here will be to add interpretive and statistical detail to the picture that is emerging as the aquatint wash of delusion fades away.

The divergence between expectation and reality isn’t – in itself – a new development. Many of us have long known that, over a very extended period, most economic “growth” has been a cosmetic product of breakneck and hazardous monetary expansion, that the underlying economy has been faltering, and that the confidence placed in ‘continuity’ lacks a basis in fact.

We can go further, recognizing that even the simulacrum of “growth” can’t last much longer, that the real prices of assets are destined to fall sharply in a context of broader financial distress, and that the balance of political power might be poised to shift, perhaps in a direction that, once upon a time, used to be called “left”.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

#218. The real state of the economy

December 24, 2021

#218. The real state of the economy

A FUNCTIONAL SYNOPSIS

As this might be the last article to appear here before the festive season, I’d like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a very merry Christmas and a happy and prosperous New Year, and to thank you for your interest in, and your contributions to, our conversations about energy, the economy and directly-related subjects.

I’m particularly appreciative of the way in which our debates have remained firmly concentrated on the economy. We could all too easily have dissipated our energies on subjects which, whilst topical and important, are not those on which we can add value through specialist knowledge.

It seems to me that the economy – with its profound implications for business, finance, government, society and the environment – is of such importance that clarity of focus is invaluable.

This clarity is singularly lacking in what we might call ‘the public discourse’. The economic debate, such as it is, has become reminiscent of that old Western movie hero who “jumped on his horse and rode off in all directions at once”.

Behind all the partisan argument, the mystification and the theorizing about nefarious plots, the plain fact is that the economy faces challenges and risks without precedent in modern times.

This simple fact is all too often lost in a miasma of misconception, false nostrums and self-interest.

One economy, two systems

We can add value in this situation because we understand two central realities that are neither known to, nor accepted by, the orthodox approach to economics.

First, we are aware of the critical distinction between the ‘real’ economy of goods and services and the ‘financial’ economy of money and credit.

Second, we recognize that the real or material economy is an energy system, in which prosperity is a function of the availability, value and cost of energy.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

#216. It’s now

December 4, 2021

#216. It’s now

TIMING THE MOMENT OF FRACTURE

That, in essence, is the call we need to make now. Far from being “transitory”, current conditions – including rising inflation, surging energy prices and the over-stressing of supply-chains – are indicators of a structural change.

Ultimately, what we’re witnessing is a forced restoration of equilibrium between a faltering real economy of goods and services and a drastically over-extended financial economy of money and credit.

This is where confidence in continuity crumbles, where the delusions of ‘growth in perpetuity’ succumb to the hard reality of resource constraint, and where ‘shocks that are no surprises’ shake the financial system.

If you want just two indicators to watch, one of these is the volumetric (rather than the financial) direction of the economy, and the other is the behaviour of the prices of essentials within the broader inflationary situation.

The economics of stress

In the science of materials, it’s observable that fractures happen quickly, even if the stresses that cause them have accumulated over a protracted period. We can spend hours, days, weeks or even years gradually increasing the tension applied to an iron bar, but the ensuing snap in that bar will happen almost instantaneously.

Economics isn’t a science, but there’s a direct analogy here. Anyone who understands the economy as an energy system will be well aware of a relentless, long-standing build-up of stresses.

They’ll be equally aware that this cannot continue indefinitely.

Two things matter now.

First, when will these cumulative pressures bring about the moment of fracture?

Second, what should we expect to see when this snapping-point is reached?

The answers to the second question are pretty clear.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

#215. The price of equilibrium

November 18, 2021

#215. The price of equilibrium

FUTURITY, REALITY AND THE COMING FINANCIAL CORRECTION

The simplest way to define the current economic and broader situation is that consensus expectations and realistically probable outcomes have become polar opposites.

One of the most predictable consequences of this disparity is a sharp fall, both in asset pricing and in the viability of forward financial commitments.

Shared by governments, businesses, the mainstream media and a large proportion of the general public, the consensus line is cornucopian, picturing a future of abundance characterised by continuing economic growth, exponential technological progress and a seamless transition from climate-harming fossil fuels to renewable energy sources (REs) such as wind and solar power.

This essentially optimistic narrative is based on a series of compounding fallacies, which we might summarise as misconceptions of capability.

Three critical realities are ignored. One of these is that the economy is an energy system, which cannot be propelled to infinite expansion by means of the human artefact of money.

A second is that the scope for technology is bounded by the laws of physics.

The third – and arguably the most important – reality ignored by the consensus narrative is that REs are unlikely to replicate the characteristics and economic value historically provided by energy from oil, natural gas and coal.

Those of us who understand the economy in energy terms have to weigh two possible courses of action. These are not mutually exclusive, but a balance does need to be found. One of these is the advocacy of reality. The other is analysis, which involves working out the probable series of events, and providing information which will be of value once the failure of the consensus narrative ushers in a new pragmatism.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

What is Surplus Energy?

October 28, 2021

What is Surplus Energy?

I’ve been meaning to write an article featuring Dr. Tim Morgan’s blog for quite some time due to the fact that he has quite an awesome site. You can find his blog here, Surplus Energy Economics. Many people may find the word economics in the name somewhat off-putting, but these economics are more about energy rather than money and relate to the energy cost of energy rather than financial price of energy. This is a primary distinction that many people simply DO NOT UNDERSTAND, which amounts to precisely WHY there is so much misinformation constantly being spread around about all the predicaments my blog focuses on. Energy stocks are a resource that require energy in order to be extracted, shipped, refined, stored, and transported to end users all over the world. The energy stocks remaining (after the energy required to acquire said energy) are available to do actual work and this is the “surplus energy” in the title. Money is nothing more than a claim on future energy. The predicament of energy and resource decline is that due to these facts, money which has value today will continue to become increasingly worth less as time moves forward because the surplus energy it represents is in constant decline.This particular entry, A Moment of truth, is what promulgated this post. It goes into detail about the false narratives which have been attempted to “fix” the issues with energy decline (the constant borrowing from the future to pay for the issues of today) and the fact that degrowth is the only possibility from here on out…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

#214. Needed – a new model tin-opener

October 23, 2021

#214. Needed – a new model tin-opener

THE LIMITS OF TRANSITION

Logically considered, 2021 ought to have been the place where old assumptions go to die.

In many ways, it is.

Specifically, orthodox, money-based economic interpretation is being debunked. Current events are demonstrating that the economy isn’t, after all, entirely or even primarily a financial system. The proposition that demand produces supply is being discredited, because no amount of stimulus can deliver low-ECoE energy where that energy does not exist. In short, we’re discovering that the economy is an energy system.

Since the start of the Industrial Age, that has meant, overwhelmingly, a fossil fuel energy system. We’re in the process of encountering two constraints to the continuity of an economy built on oil, gas and coal.

The well-known constraint is that we have reached (or passed) the limits to environmental tolerance of our use of fossil fuels.

The second, barely-recognized-at-all constraint is that fossil fuels’ ECoEs – their Energy Costs of Energy – are rising exponentially, in a process that would destroy the fossil-dependent economy even if we were so unwise as to ignore the environmental issue.

The consensus answer to this situation is that we must endeavour to transition from reliance on fossil fuels to an economy based on alternative sources of energy.

This, undoubtedly, is a realistic conclusion.

The snag, though, is that the consensus view combines the logical conclusion of transition with the unfounded assumption of an economy which, far from contracting, continues to expand.

A balanced assessment of the issues indicates, rather, that a sustainable economy will also be a smaller one.

An appraisal of outcomes

At the level of theory, there’s nothing much wrong with the idea of outdated notions undergoing a mass extinction event.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

It’s all happening…..

October 10, 2021

It’s all happening…..

Anyone who has been following this blog long enough will know that I predicted 2020 was crunch time and that we were heading into the mother of all energy crises. As I write, the UK is in deep turmoil, Germany is making contingency plans for blackouts, Lebanon has turned power off, China’s rationing electricity and India is doing the same. Low rainfall in Scandinavia has resulted in diminished hydroelectric power output (that will probably impact the UK if Norway is unable to send electricity down the new North Sea cable), and this is happening in South America and the West of the USA where speculation of the grid going down this winter is going rife. South Africa is also in trouble….. It’s hard to not feel like it’s all happening…..

So why are all these crises happening all at once…? Read on, this article is from SURPLUS ENERGY ECONOMICS, one of my favourite sites, which explains the predicament the whole world is seemingly in the grips of…..

#213. A moment of truth

THE ARRIVAL OF ECONOMIC CONSTRAINT

Some of us have long understood that the economy is an energy system, and is not – as orthodox economics insists – wholly a financial one.

We’ve identified credit and monetary adventurism as futile efforts to deny this reality, efforts which, whilst not ‘fixing’ low and reversing “growth”, have exacerbated financial risk by driving a wedge between the ‘real’ economy of goods and services and the ‘financial’ economy of money and credit.

We’ve highlighted relentless rises in ECoEs (the Energy Costs of Energy) as the process by which expansion in economic output peters out, and prior growth in prosperity goes into reverse.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The case for contingency planning

September 21, 2021

The case for contingency planning

LONG-ODDS BET OR A PORTFOLIO OF SCENARIOS?

An intelligent investor – as distinct from a gambler – doesn’t put all his or her money on a single counter. He doesn’t stake everything on a single stock, a single sector, a single asset class, a single country or a single currency. The case for portfolio diversification rests on the existence of a multiplicity of possible outcomes, of plausible scenarios which differ from the investor’s ‘central-case’ assumption.

This isn’t a discussion of market theory, even though that’s a fascinating area, and hasn’t lost its relevance, even at a time when markets have become, to a large extent, adjuncts of monetary policy expectation. The concept of ‘value’ hasn’t been lost, merely temporarily mislaid.

Rather, it’s a reflection on the need to prepare for more than one possible outcome. Sayings to this effect run through history, attaining almost the stature of proverbs. “Hope for the best, prepare for the worst” is one example. Others include “strive for peace, but be prepared for war”, and “provide for a rainy day”. There’s a body of thought which has always favoured supplementing hope with preparation.

Dictionaries might not accept the term “mono-scenarial”, but it describes where we are, working to a single scenario, with scant preparedness for any alternative outcome. The orthodox line is that the economy will carry on growing in perpetuity. Obvious problems, such as the deteriorating economics of fossil fuels and the worsening threat to the environment, will be overcome using renewable energy and the alchemy of “technology”, with “stimulus” deployed to smooth out any economic pains of transition.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

#202. The shape of things to come

June 8, 2021

#202. The shape of things to come

As, when and if the coronavirus pandemic recedes into the past, there’s a widespread assumption that we’ll see the welcome return of a ‘normality’ defined to include “growth” in the economy. The big change looking forward will, we’re assured, be the replacement of climate-harming oil, gas and coal with renewable energy sources, primarily solar- and wind-power.

This aside, almost everything else is going to be ‘more of the same’.

In reality, this consensus narrative of the future is based on the big two fallacies of our age. One of these is that the economy is a financial system, such that we’re assured of growth in perpetuity by our control of the human artefact of money.

The other is that there are no limits to the capabilities of technology, potentialities often extrapolated to and beyond the constraints of physics.

We cannot know quite how much of this is believed by governments, or whether they ‘know, but don’t say’, that most of it is implausible. Businesses and the general public seem to have bought into this narrative.

Energy reality

The facts of the situation, as we understand them here, are that the supply and the ECoE-cost of energy determine material prosperity, and that this equation has been turning against us over an extended period.

ECoEs – the Energy Costs of Energy – have been rising relentlessly, passing (during the late 1990s and early 2000s) levels at which Western prosperity ceases to grow, and then starts to contract. The EM (emerging market) economies have now reached the ECoE thresholds at which their prosperity, too, turns downwards.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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