Coal Use To Reach New Peak - And Remain at Near-Record Levels For Years (theguardian.com) 190
The world's coal use is expected to reach a fresh high of 8.7bn tonnes this year, and remain at near-record levels for years as a result of a global gas crisis triggered by Russia's invasion of Ukraine. From a report: There has been record production and trade of coal and power generation from coal since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine inflated global gas market prices, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
The IEA said the coal rebound, after a slump during the global Covid pandemic, means consumption of the fossil fuel is now on track to rise to a new peak of 8.77bn tonnes by the end of the year -- and could remain at near-record levels until 2027.
The Paris-based agency blamed power plants for the growing use of coal over the last year, particularly in China which consumes 30% more of the polluting fuel than the rest of the world put together. In developed economies such as the US and the European Union coal power generation has already passed its peak, the IEA said, and is forecast to fall by 5% and 12% respectively this year.
The IEA said the coal rebound, after a slump during the global Covid pandemic, means consumption of the fossil fuel is now on track to rise to a new peak of 8.77bn tonnes by the end of the year -- and could remain at near-record levels until 2027.
The Paris-based agency blamed power plants for the growing use of coal over the last year, particularly in China which consumes 30% more of the polluting fuel than the rest of the world put together. In developed economies such as the US and the European Union coal power generation has already passed its peak, the IEA said, and is forecast to fall by 5% and 12% respectively this year.
Still convinced China issues empty coal permits? (Score:4, Informative)
For a few years now, we've been assured by many posters that the numerous coal plant permits recently issued in China wouldn't necessarily result in a new coal plant. And yet here we are.
Re: (Score:3)
Xi is now the undisputed dictator and basically emperor of China so they don't really need t
Re:Still convinced China issues empty coal permits (Score:4, Interesting)
China's economy is collapsing (as are their population numbers), but they still are spending a lot on power generation. And coal is still relatively cheap to install and burn. So as their prospects dim, that's when we should expect Chinese interests to call in those permits and build plants. It's likely already happening. Don't expect the CCP to brag about it, though. They want to talk about their solar installations.
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Re: (Score:1)
Why so many ignorant people here?
Yeah but the big users are still industrial (Score:2)
Solar supplementing, not displacing, coal in China (Score:2)
Its time, actually long past time, to stop granting waivers in various climate accords and protocols to China.
Re: (Score:3)
"Coal supply, growing.
Coal production, growing.
Coal pollution, growing.
Electricity generation from coal, growing."
https://www.iea.org/countries/... [iea.org]
China coal use so heavy it imports coal (Score:2)
So you're proving you're a liar again...
Nope. You're just arguing about a different metric. I am referring to absolute use of coal. A greater amount used every year. You are referring to coal as a percentage, that percentage is going down because wind and solar are growing much faster than coal. Renewables growing faster does not change the fact that coal is still growing, being burned as fast as it can be dug up and imported.
Coal is so heavily used in China that China has switched from exporting to
2024 data shows continued increases (Score:2)
You are lying And coal is responsible for 80% of China's CO2 emissions. [slashdot.org] You own link says it was 60% and it's come down since then.
About 80% is based on 2023 data, which was at 78%.
Why can't you show current numbers?
The 2022 link is much more comprehensive than the 2023 article I used a while ago. Here is some 2024 data, all showing continued increases:
https://www.instituteforenergy... [institutef...search.org]
"China’s coal-fired power plants generated 59.6 percent of the country’s electricity in the first half of 2024. China’s coal-fired generation from January to June was 2,793.5 terawatt hours, which was 2.4 percent higher than the same months in 2023 and the highest amount for the first half of the year since at least 2015."
"Power sector carbon dioxide emissions from the use of fossil fuels was 2.826 billion metric tons during the first half of 2024–2.4 percent higher than the same months in 2023."
"China’s imports of thermal coal from the seaborne market, used mainly to generate electricity, were 168.73 million metric tons in the first six months of the year, up 8.5 percent from 155.51 million in the same period in 2023. This was the strongest first half in China’s history."
"China’s coal production rebounded in June, with output of all grades of coal rising to a six-month high of 405.38 million tons, which was 3.6 percent above the same month in 2023."
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks again for repeatedly admitting that you lied with your 80% claim. [slashdot.org]
Now you're saying it's only 59.6 %
Wrong, doubly so. "About 80%" is a rounding of 2023's 78%. And 59.6% is a completely different metric, it the amount of electricity generated, not CO2 emissions.
2023 and the highest amount for the first half of the year since at least 2015.
Thanks for also reminding us it's lower than 2015.
Wrong. It's an incomplete comparison, only first half of year vs first half of year. When you look at complete years you see increases.
prety picture showing solar and wind replacing coal [carbonbrief.org]
Wrong. Wind and solar are supplementing coal, adding to coal. Coal itself is increasing. Matter of fact China cannot dig up its own coal fast enough. It has to import coal. The prett
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72% doesn't round to 80...
Wrong, your number is per capita. My number is absolute.
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So your 80% lie was based on 78% in 2023... And you still claim coal is growing when you show in 2024 it's less than 60%... LOL at your silly lies dr no brains
Wong. Your 60% is a completely different metric, it the amount of electricity generated, not CO2 emissions. And the 2024 data is for the first half of the year only, a partial comparison of first half to first half. When you look at entire years you see increases.
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Now that you were caught in a lie you changed the metric. But only to a different lie
Nope. I provided both electricity generated from coal numbers and CO2 emissions from coal numbers. Two very different thing. You mixed up one with the other.
72% doesn't round to 80...
Wrong. 72% is the per capita number. My numbers are absolute numbers.
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your chart only goes to 2022 and you can see it decreasing in slope you idiot.
LOL, A decreasing slope, That "decreased" slope is still positive, still showing increased coal use. Also that twenty plus year chart is full of oscillations, it's not a straight line.
coal for electricity went down 3% last year, so that covers lie number 3
Nope. New data, 2023, shows the same. Your references to one month in 2024 does not reflect the entire year. We have to wait for the 2024 data.
Coal is so heavily used in China that China has switched from exporting to importing coal. See "Coal imports and exports"
The link shows both coal use in total and electricity gene
2023 - China has 95% of new coal construction (Score:2)
Simple math shows that if all those went up coal went down for the year.
Wrong. You are using different metrics, the percentage of coal in energy generation. That percentage is lower only because renewables are growing faster than coal. However coal is still growing.
The metric I am referring to is the amount of coal used, which is growing.
China not only digs and uses coal as fast as it can it even imports it. And China leads the world in new coal construction.
"China accounted for 95% of the world’s new coal power construction activity in 2023"
https://www.carbonbr [carbonbrief.org]
Re: (Score:2)
You are using different metrics, the percentage of coal in energy generation.
demand in May 2024 grew by 49TWh generation from clean energy sources grew by a record 78TWh No percentages, TWh s It's all right there solar of 41TWh, hydro of 34TWh wind of 4TWh
Wrong. You are doing a partial year comparison, fist half to first half. 2024 is not over, we do not have the complete data for the year. The comparisons showing increases are for full years.
Also, you are demonstrating you percentage error right here by bring clean energy into the mix. The data shows when looking at coal alone, coal use in increasing, electricity generated from coal is increasing. Once you start combining clean energy you are looking at percentages, where the *relative* use of coal is lo
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KWh is not a percentage dummy
Combining TWh from clean and TWh from coal is how we get to the percentage comparison.
78 KWh is a bigger number than 49 KWh..
Neither of those values represent electricity generated from coal.
49 TWh is one month's demand.
78 TWh generation from clean energy sources.
They are limited by what China can dig up and import.
They are limited by how much electricity they need from coal. (less and less)
Wrong. The data shows coal being used in increasing amounts with respect to electricity generation.
The plant is there, the suppliers are there. It's cheaper to import coal and burn it in a 50% capacity plant (idle most of the time) than it is to build solar wind and nuclear.
Thank you for admitting China prefers coal because it is cheaper. That explains why they burn as much and they can dig domestically or import.
But China is doing the more expensive option because it's better in the long run.
Not really. Coal can't satisfy national dema
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LOL 78 KWh is the increase in green 49 KWh is the increase in electricity... the difference is the coal that went down...
Renewables went up faster, coal went up slower, yielding a smaller percentage number for coal. Electricity generated by coal went up in absolute terms.
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KWh is not a %
LOL. Comparing KWh from one source to KWh from all sources is a percentage.
78 is bigger than 49
More LOL. The two numbers represent different things, apples and oranges.
Re: (Score:2)
More LOL. The two numbers represent different things, apples and oranges.
78 KWh is bigger than 49 KWh
An Orange being bigger than an Apple does not demonstrate Apple usage is going down.
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74 oranges is more than 49 oranges
Yes, but in your 74/49 post you were comparing two different things. I'm glad you understand your error now.
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74 KWh is more KWh than 49 KWh
74 grams of apples is unrelated to 49 grams of oranges. The numbers don't tell us anything about consumption of oranges.
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Even Musk admitted, homelessness is a mental-illness issue: Meaning not a supply and affordability problem. What 'Lone' Musk meant was, mental-illness isn't real and those homeless people are choosing not to be, obedient employees.
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They might still be right. China's economy is collapsing.
I assume this is an exaggeration. Japan went through a similar cycle in the 1980s. Then they had economic difficulty, but calling it a collapse was too much. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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>> permits recently issued in China wouldn't necessarily result in a new coal plant
The cited article states that coal demand in China "is expected to grow by 1% in 2024". That doesn't mean all the coal plants that got permits will be built.
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Yes, but old plants may need to be taken offline or rebuilt, etc. A 1% increase is not the direction the CCP would like you to think they're taking.
Coal use for electricity is increasing. (Score:2)
Coal for electricity has been falling.
Wrong, see "Electricity generation from coal in China" chart
https://www.iea.org/countries/... [iea.org]
Re: (Score:2)
1. that's old data
Nope, its 2022. Newer data, 2023, shows the same but this 2022 link has a lot more into about coal use (like electricity generation). Your references to one month in 2024 does not reflect the entire year. We have to wait for the 2024 data.
2. that's total coal and not coal for electricity like you're claiming.
Nope. This 2022 link looks at coal use in many ways. Total use, use in electricity generation, import/export, and more.
Note the units on the numbers. Its gigawatts generated. "Share of coal in electricity - 61.7% - of total electricity generation 2022"
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You're lying again claiming 1 month when it's clearly a year comparison.
2024 is not over. There is no full year data. At best there is incomplete first half data. And some of your previous comments were about a specific month in 2024.
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Even if true, I'd take a specific month vs same month the previous year showing a trend over your completely made up 80% nonsense.
Partial data for 2024 shows you wrong too. First 6 months 2024 vs first 6 months 2023, increasing.
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I'm beginning to think 80% is an underestimate of your lies drnb
Oops it was 79%, not 78%, that I rounded up to 80%.
"Coal 79% of total CO2 emissions from fuel combustion"
https://www.iea.org/countries/... [iea.org]
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So the 3rd version was a lie, and now you're trying a 4th? And it's still a lie...
Quoting the International Energy Agency is a lie to you? How revealing. Thanks for establishing your lack of credibility.
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Is this a new 5th version of the lie? It doesn't matter if you quote different things later it doesn't change your initial lies.
Wrong again. I started with the quote.
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yes you started with a quote. And then you changed what you're claiming that quote means after each successive lie is pointed out to you.
Wrong again. What changed is I started with was 2022 data showing increasing use of coal, then I changed to show 2023 data showing increasing use of coal, then I changed to show partial 2024 showing increasing use of coal.
2024 data shows coal use increasing (Score:2)
1. that's old data
It's 2022. 2023 also shows increases. The partial data from 2024 also shows increases.
https://www.instituteforenergy... [institutef...search.org]
"China’s coal-fired power plants generated 59.6 percent of the country’s electricity in the first half of 2024. China’s coal-fired generation from January to June was 2,793.5 terawatt hours, which was 2.4 percent higher than the same months in 2023 and the highest amount for the first half of the year since at least 2015."
"Power sector carbon dioxide emissions fr
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Thanks for admitting again that you lied with your 80% claim.
Wrong. I rounded 78% to 80% for conversational purposes. Nope, 2023 data showed 78%
2023 and the highest amount for the first half of the year since at least 2015.
So it's lower than 2015... sure sounds like a decrease.
LOL. Wrong again, those numbers are only for the early months of the year. Not the entire year as I am referring to when I refer to increases. Sorry, you can't cherry pick and mislead.
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72% doesn't round to 80...
Wrong, your number is per capita. My numbers are always absolute.
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\Your numbers are always absolute bullshit. That's why your 80% doesn't match anything from anywhere. It's completely made up by you ;)
Oops it was 79%, not 78%, that I rounded up to 80%.
"Coal 79% of total CO2 emissions from fuel combustion"
https://www.iea.org/countries/... [iea.org]
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So the 3rd version was a lie, and now you're trying a 4th? And it's still a lie...
So quoting the International Energy Agency is a lie to you? Thanks for establishing your lack of credibility.
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Is this a new 5th version of the lie? It doesn't matter if you quote different things later it doesn't change your initial lies.
Wrong again. I started with the quote.
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you started with a lie. And then with each successive lie changed what you meant by that initial lie. Each time another lie.
Wrong again. What changed is I started with was 2022 data showing increasing use of coal, then I changed to show 2023 data showing increasing use of coal, then I changed to show partial 2024 data showing increasing use of coal.
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Thanks for admitting again that you lied with your 80% claim. Now you're saying it's only 59.6 %
LOL. 59.6% is a completely different metric, it the amount of electricity generated, not CO2 emissions.
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Same lies repeated again Coal in China 2023 was 72% [ourworldindata.org] 72% doesn't round to 80...
To get to 80% coal you need to go all the way back to 1990...
Wrong again. That is the per capita number not the total number. My numbers refer to total, absolute, coal use.
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that's the % of coal for the country. per capita or per total is the same as a percentage dummy
You're just lying to cover your precious lies.
Oops it was 79%, not 78%, that I rounded up to 80%.
"Coal 79% of total CO2 emissions from fuel combustion"
https://www.iea.org/countries/... [iea.org]
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So the 3rd version was a lie, and now you're trying a 4th? And it's still a lie...
Quoting the International Energy Agency is a lie to you? Thanks for establishing your lack of credibility.
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Is this a new 5th version of the lie? It doesn't matter if you quote different things later it doesn't change your initial lies.
Wrong again. I started with the quote.
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you started with a lie. And then with each successive lie changed what you meant by that initial lie. Each time another lie.
Wrong again. What changed is that I started with was 2022 data showing increasing use of coal, then I changed to show 2023 data showing increasing use of coal, then I changed to show partial 2024 data showing increasing use of coal.
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coal use for electricity in China has been falling.
That is not true, see "Electricity generation from coal in China" chart
https://www.iea.org/countries/... [iea.org]
Re: (Score:2)
1. that's old data That's 2022 data. More recent data shows the same.
2. that's total coal and not coal for electricity like you're claiming.
Wrong, read the units on the numbers. Its gigawatts generated. "Share of coal in electricity - 61.7% - of total electricity generation 2022"
Re: (Score:2)
1. that's old data
That's 2022 data. More recent data shows the same.
2. that's total coal and not coal for electricity like you're claiming.
Wrong, read the units on the numbers. Its gigawatts generated. "Share of coal in electricity - 61.7% - of total electricity generation 2022"
There is cheap gas (Score:3)
It is under our feet, in NL, for example. But we will keep on buying way more expensive, lower quality LNG from US because we can't produce evil emission! And four houses in Groningen experienced tremors! Think of the earthquakes!!
Never mind that the whole province screams to high heaven for reopening of the fields.
Never mind the stupidity of Germany and their "green transition".
Never mind the fact that US was looking at every opportunity to stop the trade between Russia and EU. Or at least replace the gas with Ukrainian "democratic" gas. And blow the pipeline, just in case.
Never mind the enforced destruction of western economies in combination with quasi-planned economy, ever more directed by Brussels. Hint: look at the ecological impact of East and West Germany. East Germany was 3.5 times higher in CO2, 10 times higher in SO2 and about 6 times higher in NOx per unit of produce compared to West Germany.
You know, in 2016 I attended a conference of LNG producers and transporters. The plan was (and still is) that natural gas usage globally, in any form, will rapidly increase at least until 2070. The greens were so happy! Why, gas is so much better than coal and oil! And then the tune changed to "all fossil fuels evil, shut down everything". Which of course it did, since all of this is a cult. Cultist never stop. Ever. And eventually they run against reality and are destroyed. The issue of course is that often they take the whole of civilization with them.
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>> pausing US export of LGN
Obvious lie. There was "a temporary pause on pending decisions on exports of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to non-FTA countries" (non-Free Trade Agreement countries).
Approved exports continued and "The U.S. is already the number one exporter of LNG worldwide".
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It's not really a lie, freezing exports at 2024 levels and preventing the construction of new export terminals is definitely going to cut down on US exports vs where they could have been.
Fox Logic (Score:2)
So Joe is now being bashed for being "America first"?
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There's nothing "America First" about killing exports.
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There was no pause of exports as was claimed. Probably there was an impact on additional exports, and for the reasons explained in the fact sheet.
Biden has restrained oil and gas (Score:2, Interesting)
>> pausing US export of LGN
Obvious lie. There was "a temporary pause on pending decisions on exports of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to non-FTA countries" (non-Free Trade Agreement countries). Approved exports continued and "The U.S. is already the number one exporter of LNG worldwide".
Yes, drilling approved in the prior Trump administration produced oil and gas under the Biden administration.
Yes, LNG exports approved in the prior Trump administration increased exports.
That fact remains that Biden has done what he could to restrain both oil and natural gas. Despite such a policy position contributing to higher prices and funding Putin's war. Redesignating land with huge reserves as undrillable. Slow walking pipeline permits, particularly the small pipelines that connect drills with thei
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>> approved in the prior Trump administration
That may well be true, and so it is yet another indictment of the trump policies of unfettered pollution.
>> due to the low price of oil that Trump policies contributed to
Utter bullshit.
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>> due to the low price of oil that Trump policies contributed to
Utter bullshit.
Nope. Back in the day of low oil prices I read an article on how low prices had stopped Putin's modernization efforts. How he barely had enough money for maintenance on what he had. It was a wide held belief that low oil prices restrained Putin's adventurism. Also, once Ukraine was invaded there were analysis on how its paid for and the rising oil prices were basically the answer.
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"Back in the day of low oil prices" was during the depths of the pandemic. The price of oil briefly went negative. I guess you could say that trump's extreme incompetence caused the pandemic to be worse and therefor the price of oil fell more.
I notice you showed no actual evidence for anything you said.
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"Back in the day of low oil prices" was during the depths of the pandemic. The price of oil briefly went negative.
No, the levels way under $90, where cash is too short for Putin's adventurism, is way beyond the pandemic.
I guess you could say that trump's extreme incompetence caused the pandemic to be worse and therefor the price of oil fell more.
Actually he handled the pandemic itself well. The shut down travel with China early, while the Democrats were literally telling every to come to the new years party's in chinatown. And he cut red tape and bureaucracy on vaccine development that delivered in a timeframe the "expert" said could not happen. You seem to be confusing all the mask nonsense with "progress". Note the masks people actually wore,
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>> is way beyond the pandemic
In that case it had nothing to do with trump.
>> shut down travel with China early
Obvious lie, he didn't shut it down. I notice you showed no actual evidence for anything you said.
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>> is way beyond the pandemic
In that case it had nothing to do with trump.
Correct, those high prices had nothing to do with Trump policy. Unlike lower prices.
>> shut down travel with China early
Obvious lie, he didn't shut it down. I notice you showed no actual evidence for anything you said.
Trump's early travel ban and democratic criticism of it are well known history. We lived through it. We saw it.
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>> Trump's early travel ban
Was not actually a ban. Why did you lie?
"A restriction on foreigners traveling from mainland China took effect on Feb. 2, 2020, but thousands of Chinese and foreign nationals from Hong Kong and Macau entered the U.S. in the three months following. Thousands of Americans and foreigners still arrived in the U.S. on direct flights from China after the restrictions were imposed."
https://www.snopes.com/fact-ch... [snopes.com]
Re: (Score:2)
>> Trump's early travel ban
Was not actually a ban. Why did you lie? "A restriction on foreigners traveling from mainland China took effect on Feb. 2, 2020, ...
Thank you for agreeing I am correct.
... but thousands of Chinese and foreign nationals from Hong Kong and Macau entered the U.S. in the three months following.
The travel ban was about a region with an emerging contagious disease outbreak, only US citizens returning home were allowed. It was never about anything else. What did you erroneously think "travel ban" referred to?
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What part of "thousands of Chinese and foreign nationals from Hong Kong and Macau entered the U.S." did you not understand? You claimed trump "shut down travel with China early", clearly he didn't.
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What part of "thousands of Chinese and foreign nationals from Hong Kong and Macau entered the U.S." did you not understand?
The part with individuals outside of mainland China having anything to do the travel ban. Are you under the erroneous idea that the travel ban had anything to do with Chinese citizenship or something? That was never claimed, nor was it ever true, despite you possibly having been misinformed so.
You claimed trump "shut down travel with China early", clearly he didn't.
That's the travel ban. You mentioned it in your quote: "A restriction on foreigners traveling from mainland China took effect on Feb. 2, 2020"
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So now you're saying the ban wasn't actually a ban, and thousands of potentially infected people flew from China to the mainland USA. Got it.
Completely ineffectual, and just another sign of failure on trump's part.
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So now you're saying the ban wasn't actually a ban, ...
No, I am saying whatever you imagined that I said was mistaken. I still have no idea what your point is, the ban was over mainland China, where the outbreak was. Taiwan is a different country regardless of what the CCP says, or the silly "One China" appeasement political fiction. It was also a source of early and open information, unlike the mainland. Macau, a special administrative region with some autonomy was also an open source of information. Unlike the locked down news of the mainland, and with its cl
Re: (Score:2)
You claimed trump "shut down travel with China early". Obviously untrue.
>> Allowing more people to take appropriate precautions and preventing our healthcare system from being overwhelmed.
trump attacked all attempts to mitigate the pandemic and called it a Chinese hoax. The healthcare system was completely overwhelmed
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You claimed trump "shut down travel with China early". Obviously untrue.
Uh, no. "China" is often used to refer to mainland China only. Taiwan is a different country, as much as the CCP would like to believe otherwise.
>> Allowing more people to take appropriate precautions and preventing our healthcare system from being overwhelmed.
trump attacked all attempts to mitigate the pandemic and called it a Chinese hoax.
LOL - You need to get a better source of information than Joe Biden
"Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden is presenting a distorted account of President Donald Trump’s words on the coronavirus, wrongly suggesting Trump branded the virus a hoax. In fact, Trump pronounced Democratic criticism of his pandemic response a hoax."
https://apnews.com/article/ [apnews.com]
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Trump didn't shut down travel with China early like you claimed.
Wrong again, from the other poster's source: ""A restriction on foreigners traveling from mainland China took effect on Feb. 2, 2020"
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Wrong again, from the other poster's source: ""A restriction on foreigners traveling from mainland China took effect on Feb. 2, 2020"
thanks for agreeing and pointing out your yet lie again travel wasn't shut down
Wrong again, only US citizens were allowed to travel under that order. That's a ban for non-US citizens.
Re: (Score:2)
Trump didn't shut down travel from China drnb. Why are you lying again?
The CCP probably did not allow that in your news. However for those of us in the US the early travel ban was recent history, heavily covered in the news and highly criticized by democrats.
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I quoted directly from that page. Why did you lie?
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Could just as well be about trade, as it says the existing regulations "no longer adequately account for considerations like potential energy cost increases for American consumers and manufacturers". Don't want to grow export capacity faster than supply and let foreigners increase the energy cost for industry too much.
With mercantilism a nation prefers to export high value goods rather than relatively low value inputs and mercantilism works.
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Don't want to grow export capacity faster than supply and let foreigners increase the energy cost for industry too much.
A hypothetical he works to create by constraining the natural gas supply. He doesn't want to grow capacity at all, he wants to eliminate it.
Re: (Score:2)
That God that Biden is looking to help by pausing US export of LGN [whitehouse.gov] right now.
A puppet of Putin obviously.
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Now that Putin lost Syria, Europe can look forward to a nice pipeline from the Middle East and gas much cheaper than Putin can provide. Not that anyone wants to buy it anymore anyway.
Europe is still burning coal in some areas. Displacing that with natural gas would be an improvement. Switching any oil based industry to natural gas is an improvement. Its temporary, a bridge to renewables, but waiting for renewables just keeps coal and oil in use.
Re:Nuclear fanboys (Score:5, Informative)
Compare that to something like the Site C hydro megadam [wikipedia.org] in BC, Canada. Started in 2007, will be until 2025 before fully operational, and cost around $16B. Going full bore, it will only add about 8% additional capacity to a single province in the country.
The nuclear plant sounds like a hell of a good deal, and far lower environmental impact too.
Re: (Score:2)
$32B does not seem like a steep price for 5.6 GW of reliable, always available capacity
?? That sounds like an extremely risky economic bet compared to $16B for the same amount of intermittent wind, or $5B for the same amount of intermittent solar. When you take out loans to build the nuclear power plant, you're gambling that neither grid-scale-battery nor geothermal technology will improve enough in the 30 year loan payback period that would make your up-front investment in nuclear pointless. The long payback period and the risk means there's no hope of private investment, and hence tax-payer
Re: (Score:2)
When I read the 2 links I saw 1.2Gw for the dam, 5.6 for the reactor.
Around 6 to 8 years to build a nuclear reactor (Score:5, Informative)
https://www.sustainabilitybynu... [sustainabi...umbers.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Name one.
Chinese nuclear plants (Score:5, Informative)
https://thebreakthrough.org/is... [thebreakthrough.org]
China is averaging under 7 years.
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Name one? Did you follow the fine link? The linked article made the claim of a nuclear power plant being built in three years in the summary, if that is something you find incredible then perhaps reading beyond the summary would provide answers to your questions.
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Name one? Did you follow the fine link? The linked article made the claim of a nuclear power plant being built in three years in the summary, if that is something you find incredible then perhaps reading beyond the summary would provide answers to your questions.
I read the full article a while ago. If you bother to read it yourself you will find: "Reactors built after 1990 were more likely to be built faster. 58% took less than six years. 89% took less than a decade. The extremes are also missing: no reactor was built in less than 4 years"
So the three year case(s) was pre-1990. I'll go with that being an outdated outlier. So do you want to quibble about 4 years now?
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Name one.
From the link I provided you above:
"On average, it took the Japanese less than 5 years to build one. In South Korea and China, less than 6 years."
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Meanwhile, 4.6GW's of hydro at C$16 billion is considered a bad deal, especially with the original price of C$7.9 billion.
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4,600 GWh/year is not 4.6 GW
It says it's 1,100 MW (1.1GW) output, and later 4,600GWh/year expected.
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Start testing Plan B (Score:2)
Countries do want to hedge their energy sources by having multiple sources, so coal is tempting as a backup to oil and renewables.
Seems we gotta figure out geoengineering; humans bicker too much to prevent.
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Almost all the coal China burns to provide electricity is mined in-country. It can't be limited by sanctions by hostile countries preventing it being imported. Energy security is something most countries don't think about until bad things happen.
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Almost all the coal China burns to provide electricity is mined in-country. It can't be limited by sanctions by hostile countries preventing it being imported. Energy security is something most countries don't think about until bad things happen.
Nonsense. China had blackouts from the lack of coal when they banned Australian coal over some Covid slight a few years ago.
Power crisis forces China to ease Australian coal ban [afr.com]
Re:Start testing Plan B (Score:4, Informative)
China mostly imports metallurgical-grade coal (i.e. anthracite) from Australia for use in its iron and steel industry. In early 2024 Reuters reported "China imported 52.47 million metric tons of Australian coal in 2023". In contrast China mined about 4.5 billion tonnes of indigenous low-grade coal in 2023 for local consumption in power stations, ninety times more than its coal imports from Australia.
I think there are a few coastal coal power stations in China where the cost of imported coal delivered by ship is less than the cost of transporting it thousands of kilometres by rail from the coal mines in the far north-west of the country, however most coal power stations are supplied exclusively from Chinese coal mining operations.
Re:WHOOP! (Score:4, Interesting)
Use of coal for energy isn't likely to go anywhere soon but coal may be replaced by nuclear fission for electricity fairly quickly. A lot of energy use is industrial heating and getting that from electricity isn't nearly as convenient as getting it from coal. Also for some industrial processes the coal is part of the chemistry than just providing heat, such as in steel production.
I've heard of efforts to restart a lot of shuttered nuclear power plants around the world. One such plant being considered for a restart is nearly in my backyard. Since I moved into my house there's been a couple big floods and a big wind storm that forced some updates to the electrical system which resulted in my electricity getting more reliable. What would add to that reliability is getting that nuclear power plant restarted.
The fine article blamed the increased use of coal on Russia starting a war in Ukraine, which is without a doubt a factor. Also a factor would be Germany and other nations shutting down perfectly functional nuclear power plants. I don't know how long it takes to restart a recently shuttered nuclear power plant but I'm quite certain that takes less time than building new nuclear power plants. We are seeing Koreans build a new nuclear power plant in something like 7 to 8 years, claims that it takes more than a decade to build a nuclear power plant is outdated. We used to be able to get nuclear power plants built in 5 years with regularity but when coal and natural gas prices dropped, and protests on anything "nukular" slowing progress, the build times crept up. With experience we can get build times down again, likely to something like 3 years from breaking ground to putting power to the grid.
I've been watching some YouTube videos from Decouple Media on progress to getting more nuclear power plants built, that is some interesting stuff and it sounds like the major hold up is largely political than anything technological or economic. Biden and his administration was lukewarm at best on nuclear power so with that administration ending, and Trump bringing in people that are enthusiastic about nuclear power, we should expect political hurdles to fall. Because the USA is a big consumer of Canadian energy I expect Canada to go big on nuclear power too.
So, sure, we will likely see coal use rise some yet, likely peak in 2027 as the fine article claims. With old nuclear power plants getting a second wind, and new nuclear power plants getting built, coal use could fall quickly after that. Other technologies will undoubtedly play a part too, I expect onshore wind to be the biggest contributor for North America. Solar and offshore wind are getting to be more costly than nuclear fission since the best locations have already been occupied. We are seeing UK running a huge power line to Africa for solar power, that can't be cheap. Underwater cables are vulnerable to being cut by malicious actors, something to keep in mind given current events.