[ryukafalz]

As someone who's been pushing for renewables for quite a while now it's dismaying that it's taken a war to accelerate this push, but I'm glad to see that it's happening at least.

It's doubly dismaying that my own country (US) is still doubling down on fossil fuels despite everything.

The concern about a new dependency on China is real, but renewables do have the advantage that once you have the infrastructure in place it keeps working without continuously importing fuel. Nonetheless, China has done a good job building up their PV/battery manufacturing capacity (including via subsidies for a while if I'm not mistaken) and to the extent the rest of the world wants to avoid a dependency on them we should do that too.

[davedx]

I've been arguing with Europeans on twitter (including an environmental scientist) who believe this war shows we need to resume drilling in the North Sea and Groningen.

It feels like this collective insanity will never end

[esperent]

I wish there was somewhere I could talk about world affairs and European affairs with reasonable people, the way I can talk about tech on HN. But anywhere I've tried - Twitter, r/europe or any smaller subs I've found are just filled with reactionaries trying to stir up hate for whatever reasons they have. There are reasonable voices there, people who are capable of actual conversation, but they're just drowned out. I used to comfort myself by thinking they must all be 14 year olds, or Russian bots, or whatever, and some probably are, but now I'm convinced the large majority are just hate filled adults who've gotten stuck on Twitter, Facebook, reddit etc. and literally spend all their time there basically shouting as if they were lunatics on a street corner.

I might pass by but I wouldn't stand and listen to an angry man on a street corner, and I definitely wouldn't try and have a conversation nearby (or with) them. So why would I expect that to work on Twitter?

[guyomes]

In this regard, the subreddit r/NeutralPolitics is interesting: it aims at evidence-based discussions on political issues. Threads are somehow in-between HN and Wikipedia. It is definitely interesting to read, and at the same time, participating in a discussion is quite daunting.

[no-name-here]

I agree with the recommendation.

Link: https://reddit.com/r/NeutralPolitics

And its sister sub NeutralNews for news article discussion (same rules): https://reddit.com/r/NeutralNews

Both subs allow users to submit new posts and comments (but spend 2 minutes checking out the rules first).

[esperent]

Had a browse around and these look good, although very US focused (standard for Reddit though).

However, on every thread I checked, about 70% of comments are deleted. That means that the noise is still there, but the mods are having to work nonstop to fight it and no doubt introducing their own bias as they do so.

I wish them luck and I'll keep checking these places out but I can't help but feel that by the time you're deleting 70% of all comments (and who knows what percentage of threads), you're fighting a losing battle.

[Omniusaspirer]

You won’t find much quality in lay discussion boards, but magazines like The Economist and Foreign Affairs are worth a subscription. I’ve cut back my internet time and incorporated these into my routine, would strongly recommend if you want actual knowledgeable opinions on world affairs.

[arnoooooo]

The idea that there's such a thing as neutral politics is highly problematic.

Evidence and science is one thing. What you should do with it is another entirely. Every decision is a tradeoff. Science can't tell you what to value.

[davidw]

Well "Europeans on Twitter" are probably the kind of people who look at the owner of the site posting about a homeland for white people and that kind of thing and aren't bothered too much by it.

[slashdev]

I think Europe should resume drilling in the North Sea and Groningen if they have exploitable reserves there. Europe depends on energy imports and that won't change in our lifetimes (I'm in my early forties, so at least in my lifetime.) They should take advantage of whatever resources they have.

I'm guessing you think otherwise? Why? Do you think the energy transition will be faster? What makes you think that?

[Scarblac]

Because the continued survival of civilization depends on leaving fossil fuel in the ground. If the transition isn't fast enough then we will have horrible, lethal shortages, but that's still better than the worst climate scenarios.

[NoLinkToMe]

Closing Groningen didn't leave fossil in the ground. It took LNG from US and gas from Norway out of the ground instead.

The decision to stop using fossil fuels is not tied to the decision to stop one of the sources of fossil fuels. They're divorced.

Stopping fossil fuels requires investments in alternatives, and price mechanisms that disfavour fossils. Absent those mechanisms, closing one source of fossil just shifts demand to another source of fossil, which is exactly what happened.

Meanwhile closing the gas source cost the NL a few hundred billion euros, the amount of money it needs to transition to renewables. Instead it is spending that on US LNG and Norwegian gas.

The field shouldn't have been closed in 2023, it should've remained open until e.g. 2030 and all proceeds earmarked for massive energy transition subsidies. Instead we're just importing expensive fossil now and have insufficient money to meet our green ambitions.

[Scarblac]

> Closing Groningen didn't leave fossil in the ground. It took LNG from US and gas from Norway out of the ground instead.

That was getting out of the ground and burned by someone anyway.

[slashdev]

That may or may not be true. But it won't stay in the ground as long as there is money to be made by extracting and consuming it.

Right now all that's happening is the US is extracting that natural gas, and the middle east extracting that oil, and Europe is importing it. Which pollutes more and costs more. Just develop your domestic supplies.

I don't follow your logic.

[Scarblac]

The only direct thing we (the Netherlands) can do to prevent carastrophic climate change is to leave fossil fuels on our territory in the ground. Everything else is indirect.

[Sabinus]

No, the only direct thing the Netherlands can do is decarbonise the economy.

Shifting sources of carbon to outside the country is just passing the buck.

[kyboren]

I know this is an unfathomable concept, but to actually "leave fossil fuels [...] in the ground" you have to stop using fossil fuels. Burning fossil fuels someone else refused to leave in the ground means--surprisingly--that fossil fuels weren't left in the ground after all.

And it turns out that we actually live on a shared planet with a common atmosphere; sourcing your fuels from abroad does nothing to prevent climate change. But it does mean that you are unable to secure some of the most fundamental inputs to your economy.

[Tostino]

That is because that money is allowed to be made by externalizing the cost to future generations.

People hate migrants enough as it is. Climate crisis migrations will make these "little" war migrations seem quaint.

[nandomrumber]

> That is because that money is allowed to be made by externalizing the cost to future generations.

I don’t understand why you wrote this in response to the comment you replied to.

No matter which way you slice it, the UK and Europe using the oil from wells physically closer to them has to be less energy intensive that shipping oil / gas from far away.

What bearing does externalising anything have on that fact.

[slashdev]

I agree, but that's the world we live in.

[nandomrumber]

You’re willing to sacrifice the lives of at least some poor people who exist now, or are likely to exist in the near future, for a theory that is unfalsifiable.

That’s not since.

That’s brainwashing, and it’s not even good brainwashing.

[myrmidon]

> You’re willing to sacrifice the lives of at least some poor people who exist now, or are likely to exist in the near future, for a theory that is unfalsifiable.

What exactly do you mean with "unfalsifiable"? We actually measure atmospheric CO2, sea level and temperature; that's plenty falsifiability to me. And the greenhouse effect itself is not even in question.

Fossil emissions are sacrificing people not just from climate change in the future, but right now from air pollution, too (about 5M deaths per year actually, according to https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38030155/).

[nandomrumber]

Climate science wants us to ignore the geological record and ignore geological processes.

A cubic kilometre of lava at 1200 degrees C is enough energy for thirty (30!) hurricanes.

It’s entirely possible that sea temperature rise is a result of geologic processes at or near the sea bed, and when you warm a liquid dissolved gasses are liberated.

But climate science wants us to ignore all that and place the blame entirely on human caused CO2 emissions and cow farts, while we are literally living through and ice age.

[xorcist]

What exactly is your argument here? That organic chemistry is all wrong and oxidization is unfalsifiable, or that the fossil industry itself is fudging the numbers to make it look life we're oxidizing less organic matter than we think?

[no-name-here]

“Fossil fuel air pollution responsible for 1 in 5 deaths worldwide”: https://hsph.harvard.edu/climate-health-c-change/news/fossil...

[Scarblac]

It means having to make serious decisions on imperfect information, yes. But that's life.

[toomuchtodo]

It would be an inefficient use of capital to support more fossil exploration considering the deployment rates and cost decline curves of renewables and storage.

Ember Energy: European electricity prices and costs - https://ember-energy.org/data/european-electricity-prices-an... (updated daily)

Ember Energy: Wind and solar generated more power than fossil fuels in the EU for the first time in 2025 - https://ember-energy.org/latest-updates/wind-and-solar-gener... - January 22nd, 2026

Bloomberg: How Europe Ditched Russian Fossil Fuels With Spectacular Speed - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-02-21/ukraine-n... | https://archive.today/yxGp2 - February 21st, 2023

> But what the past year has shown is that it’s possible to go harder and faster in deploying solar panels and batteries, reducing energy use, and permanently swapping out entrenched sources of fossil fuel. Solar installations across Europe increased by a record 40-gigawatts last year, up 35% compared with 2021, just shy of the most optimistic scenario from researchers at BloombergNEF. That jump was driven primarily by consumers who saw cheap solar panels as a way to cut their own energy bills. It essentially pushed the solar rollout ahead by a few years, hitting a level that will be sustained by EU policies.

(Europe has enough wind potential to power the world, their energy constraints are deployment rate of renewables, battery storage, and transmission)

[slashdev]

You're talking about electricity, so I assume your answer is directed to the natural gas fields at Groningen. The EU imports a lot of natural gas. Don't you think it would be better to have a domestic supply? It's better for the environment too.

Heck right now, Europe is still burning coal (and worse yet - lignite coal) for electricity. Natural gas would be a huge improvement on that.

Note that drilling for oil in the North Sea is a completely different subject, because that's not used for electricity generation, nor is electricity a substitute. EV market share in Europe is still far too low for that to be a conversation for a long time.

Your comment is wishful thinking and ignores the current reality of how Europe imports and uses energy.

But even if your best case scenario were somehow possible (and it really isn't) there's still money to be made exporting fossil fuels to the developing world. So your assertion "inefficient use of capital to support more fossil exploration" is just flat wrong.

[toomuchtodo]

No, everything can move to electricity, China is doing it, Europe can too. You are free to your opinion, but the facts and evidence are clear. If you would like an hour of time with an expert from Ember Energy to explain this, happy to pay for that hour of time for you to update your priors and mental model on the topic of Europe's energy transition trajectory.

> Note that drilling for oil in the North Sea is a completely different subject, because that's not used for electricity generation, nor is electricity a substitute. EV market share in Europe is still far too low for that to be a conversation for a long time.

Europe's EV uptake will speed based on the price of oil increasing and remaining high for the foreseeable future.

> But even if your best case scenario were somehow possible (and it really isn't) there's still money to be made exporting fossil fuels to the developing world. So your assertion "inefficient use of capital to support more fossil exploration" is just flat wrong.

The developing world is leapfrogging fossil fuels and going straight to solar, batteries, and EVs. What will expensive LNG do to this market? It will force them to renewables and electric mobility faster. Ethopia's uptake of EVs after they banned combustion vehicles is an example of this. Why did they ban combustion vehicles? Because they have no domestic fossil fuel supplies and the import cost was crushing them; their EVs are powered by domestic hydro electricity production.

Citations:

Surging Gas Prices Reignite EV Interest - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-03-14/iran-war-... | https://archive.today/BkAfR - March 14th, 2026

Global EV sales hit 1.1 million – Europe surges while the US slides - https://electrek.co/2026/03/12/global-ev-sales-hit-1-1-milli... | https://archive.today/nhIbF - March 12th, 2026

EVs Avoided the Use of 2.3M Barrels of Oil per Day in 2025 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47420092 - March 2026

Electric Vehicle Sales Boom as Ethiopia Bans Fossil-Fuel Car Imports - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068567 - February 2026

How we made it: will China be the first electrostate? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44101275 - May 2025

Massive global growth of renewables to 2030 is set to match entire power capacity of major economies today, moving world closer to tripling goal - https://www.iea.org/news/massive-global-growth-of-renewables... - October 9th, 2024

The World Hit ‘Peak’ Gas-Powered Vehicle Sales — in 2017 - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-01-30/world-hit... - January 30th, 2024

[slashdev]

I agree that it can. I won't live to see it, and I hope I live 50 years more.

You're living in a fantasy world that doesn't exist.

Global consumption of coal, oil, and natural gas all rose in 2025. We've not even peaked yet.[1]

[1] https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2025/12/record-fossi...

[nandomrumber]

> Why did they ban combustion vehicles? Because they have no domestic fossil fuel supplies and the import cost was crushing them

Your closing argument is that some far away land with no nat gas / oil reserves of their own isn’t convincing anyone with nat gas / oil reserves of their own.

Europeans need inexpensive fuels to power their existing fleet or vehicles now.

Ethiopia’s plan doesn’t generalise.

[tac19]

> It feels like this collective insanity will never end

They simply do not believe that the consequences will be as bad as the models predict. And a lot of trust and good will has been expended on social issues, for example the fight to allow transgender people to use whatever bathroom they choose, or to promote childhood reassignment surgery, etc. As a strategic decision, we have taken our eye off the ball, climate change is actually an existential threat, bathroom choice never was. You can argue that we can do two things at once, but there is a cost for dividing our focus and effort; even if it didn't raise the hackles of those already less predisposed to worry about the environment.

[lelanthran]

> And a lot of trust and good will has been expended on social issues, for example the fight to allow transgender people to use whatever bathroom they choose, or to promote childhood reassignment surgery, etc.

I think a lot of people miss this: each time you take up the good fight, you spend some trust/goodwill. If you're going to expend the public's goodwill, make sure that there is nothing more important to you than what you are expending it on, or expend less of it to save some trust and goodwill for this.

[empyrrhicist]

> for example the fight to allow transgender people to use whatever bathroom they choose

Ugh, I'm going to regret commenting here, but it really seems like this obsession is almost entirely on the right wing. In the US, the centrist Dems have been banging the appeasement drum for my entire political life, and it's gotten us nowhere.

Like... the right isn't going to wake up and start caring about climate change if everyone just shuts up and lets them discriminate against the hate group of the moment. The bathroom thing is also such a bait and switch, same as sports. In my state, we removed protections for housing and employment discrimination against trans people because... one trans athlete existed?

The real question we need to answer is why the right is so obsessed with other peoples' genitals, to the point that they have to make up stories and generate AI videos to get mad at.

I for one am sick of people focusing on a tiny fraction of the population and making them a scapegoat for everything. You're absolutely right that climate change is a bigger issue - so why can't we focus on it?

We can't focus on it because the anti-reality reactionaries are using trans people as a distraction. It's all one big malignant tumor on society, not a collection of unrelated issues.

[rawgabbit]

The reality is that the US is divided on gender issues. Full stop.

It is a distraction and a useful one for MAGA. Among the Democrats, we keep getting tripped up by it and nominate candidates who don't realize the political land mine that it is. I am for gender equality, for racial equality, for renewables, for nuclear energy. But please win the election by prioritizing talking about jobs, jobs, jobs, economic disopportunity, and naked corruption. After winning the election, then you can address gender issues along with the full slate of Democratic platform priorities.

[zardo]

How are you supposed to know which Democrat secretly supports trans rights?

[Sabinus]

Dems are supposed to be able to talk frankly about their beliefs without the left wing of the party destroying them. There shouldn't be political consequences from within the Dem coalition for saying "I don't think we should have trans people in professional women's sports". Since the Dems can't talk about the policies, the right wing gets to take up all the attention on them.

[watwut]

Democrats were NOT talking about transgender issues. Conservatives were.

Democrats talking about jobs, economic disopportunity, and naked corruption gets no votes, because republican voters are not motivated by those. They are using those as talking point against democrats, but that is about it.

[cogman10]

It's all about propaganda. Rightwing media is incredibly well funded and a big portion of that reason is because rich people have been using propaganda to boost their industries since almost forever.

Republicans in the late 60s were the party of the EPA. What changed? People like the Koch brothers dumped literal millions into rightwing outlets big and small to talk about how awesome it is to burn oil.

A similar thing happened with smoking. Rush Limbaugh, even as he had lung cancer, was talking about what a myth it was that smoking caused lung cancer almost right up until his death.

Whenever you find highly monied interests, you can find a right wing propagandist that will tell you black is white.

And the insidious thing is that they don't spend their entire broadcast talking about the glories of oil or smoking. No, the best ones just insert it in as little throw away lines while talking about feminazis, gay people, trans people, black people, mexicans, etc.

That's effectively how the propaganda works. Get people highly tuned up on an emotional topic and then just slip in here and there lies that you don't even think about.

As a kid, I listened to probably a thousand hours of rightwing talkshow hosts because of my parents. Once I started viewing things with a more critical mind it became beyond obvious what game they are playing. Unfortunately, not everyone picks up on this game.

[chazzalpha]

The propaganda machine is powerful, precisely because the ultra-wealthy who fund it want the people to fight a culture war instead of a class war. The wealthy have been successfully astroturfing right-wing anti-democratic movements for decades, to the point that fascism is making a comeback. Climate-change denial was one of their earlier experiments, and anti-trans psyop is their most recent. The result is the same, creating false divisions among the masses who have more in common than they realize.

The world is burning before our eyes. It is unconscionable to use the rights and the bodies of the marginalized to put out the fire. What would be the point of making a better society if it requires leaving the most vulnerable behind? How would that even be a better society? We must be cognizant of who the real enemy is and never do the oppressor's work for them. Billionaires have class solidarity; for our planet’s survival, we must build solidarity as well. Fight the class war, and you fight climate change, transphobia, and all threats to life and liberty.

[JumpCrisscross]

> the ultra-wealthy who fund it want the people to fight a culture war instead of a class war

We're capable of fighting more than one political war at a time. All evidence points to the donor class actually being vested in these culture war issues. Democrat donors prioritise Gaza and trans issues. MAGA donors prioritise Israel and Bible thumping. The Adelsons aren't donating to GOP candidates to distract anyome class issues, they're donating because they have non-economic policy preferences to push.

[JumpCrisscross]

> the right isn't going to wake up and start caring about climate change if everyone just shuts up and lets them discriminate against the hate group of the moment

No. But a lot of people in the center will listen to academics again if they don't think they're being lectured on a new definition of bigotry every fifteen minutes.

Also, from what I can tell, the issue of trans rights caused issues in the centre when it lept to kids' sports. Even the bathrooms were mostly the edges of the political spectrum screaming at each other. But when it touched kids' sports, a lot of folks got off their couches, and that was–given the stakes–a sort of needless battle.

[empyrrhicist]

> No. But a lot of people in the center will listen to academics again if they don't think they're being lectured on a new definition of bigotry every fifteen minutes.

I get annoyed by some performative language games too, but I just don't see any evidence that your broader claim here is true.

> Also, from what I can tell, the issue of trans rights caused issues in the centre when it lept to kids' sports.

Most people are willing to acknowledge that the sports issue is a bit complicated, but it's also such an incredibly niche issue and so much lower stakes than everything else. People got off their couches for the sports thing because it's a "safe" environment in which to express hatred towards an out group. You can tell that it was never about sports by the actions taken by the loudest complainers on the issue (enshrining housing and employment discrimination, weird laws about forcing teachers to report violations of religious principles to parents, creepy nonsense like the bill to make lists of all trans people or mass cancel all of their drivers licenses etc.)

[tac19]

> climate change is a bigger issue - so why can't we focus on it?

What it needed was for strong left-wing people to stand up and denounce the distraction. To claim loud and proudly that transgender issues were not important when compared to climate change. To refocus the public on climate change and take the wind out of the fringe issue.

Instead, we took to the street for BLM, when it wasn't an important issue, when compared to climate change. You can't blame the right-wing for the number of people who filled the streets for BLM... during a pandemic where we were supposed to socially distance. It cost us doubly. And not one important left-wing voice stood up and said so.

[JumpCrisscross]

> What it needed was for strong left-wing people to stand up and denounce the distraction

Here's the reality: very few people actually believe climate change is an existential problem. As you say, this is abundantly signalled by very few folks being willing to compromise on other beliefs to advance it.

Want to build infrastructure? Cut taxes? Suddenly, people can put their differences aside. Want to do anything on the climate? Everyone has a policy bogeyman to attach, whether it be union requirements and gender issues or immigration and religious tests.

[empyrrhicist]

There's a Guante lyric I really like about this topic that I think highlights how I feel about your argument:

"Those who turn hoses on water protеctors

Are those who cage "Stop Cop City" protеstors

And enforce the brutality of the border

Same ones who enforce bans on drag performers

Same ones who enforce bans

On crossing state lines for abortions

Some of those that work forces

Are the same that burn crosses

Are the same that burn everything

For the bosses"

I don't think we totally disagree, but I come down differently on where to point the blame.

> What it needed was for strong left-wing people to stand up and denounce the distraction.

I mean, that did happen.

> To claim loud and proudly that transgender issues were not important when compared to climate change.

That was said, along with housing prices/inflation/corruption.

> Instead, we took to the street for BLM, when it wasn't an important issue

Here's where you're really, really losing me. You're:

1. Pivoting to a totally different issue

2. Ignoring the role of the media in promoting the most controversial takes and presentation of both issues. It sucks to blame people for having values when the real problem is for-profit engagement-based media.

3. Ick - it really rubs me the wrong way to see people say "BLM wasn't an important issue when compared to climate change". That seems really easy to say if you're not under routine threat of state violence, but BLM was a reaction to a very real epidemic of state violence against black people. To those people, that kind of immediate threat IS as big a deal as climate change. If anything, criticize the branding of "defund the police" (which was so bad I half wonder if it was a psyop).

Moreover, part of my original point was that climate change isn't a separate thing - it's a problem because the same systems that use wedge issues to divide us all benefit from the unsustainable status-quo.

The realpolitik take on this seems so short sighted - it takes for granted that some progress can be made on climate change by ignoring our values, while also ignoring that alienating the affected groups makes it harder to change our society enough to do anything about climate change.

[tac19]

> 1. Pivoting to a totally different issue

No, i am not. It's the exact same issue. If you honestly believe that climate change is an existential crisis, then ALL other issues are by definition less important. That might be difficult to accept, because it feels like saying other issues aren't important. But that's not what i'm saying at all.

What i'm saying is, if something is about to destroy the entire world, then every other concern is a distraction. What does it matter what bathrooms we use, or if the police are using violence too much, etc?

Our actions speak to people who don't believe that climate change is real. Every time we take to the streets for ANY OTHER ISSUE, we re-affirm their belief that climate change isn't something to worry about.

You are showing exactly why we have been less effective at convincing people than we could have been. Because even you are diminishing the importance of climate change. Why should "they" give up any freedom, or luxury, in the name of climate change, if we give ourselves permission to assemble in public during a pandemic for a BLM protest, that let's face it, accomplished little.

[lelanthran]

> In my state, we removed protections for housing and employment discrimination against trans people because... one trans athlete existed?

I think you're sort of proving the parent's point - when you're in an existential fight, is it really that important that you use the limited attention of the public to fight for the rights of a single person?

Trans rights ain't even that popular; most people are okay with "you think you're someone else? Well, fine, no skin off my nose". OTOH, the majority of people globally aren't okay with "It must be a crime if you don't treat me as a member of the opposite sex".

The identity politics, of all forms, sucked out much of the air from the room leaving precious little left for discussing things like climate change.

Whether we like it or not, human attention is a limited resource. If you're going to allow a few vocal nutters to direct the course of your discussion, then you can't very well complain, now can you?

I mean, that's what leaders are supposed to do - direct the discussion. When the opposition says "They want to let men into women's changing rooms", then you say "No, we don't support that at all".

I mean, voters find some things distasteful - you have to choose which of those things you are going to argue for, and which you are going to back down from.

Diluting your message so that you mention a little bit of everything is just dumb politics, because human attention is a limited resource!

[empyrrhicist]

I made my position clear in other comments, so I'll leave it at that. I do not find your arguments persuasive.

[Planktonne]

> when you're in an existential fight, is it really that important that you use the limited attention of the public to fight for the rights of a single person?

Yes. That's what rights are. If we don't support them for one person, we don't have them for any person.

[lelanthran]

> Yes. That's what rights are. If we don't support them for one person, we don't have them for any person.

That's not the question that was asked. The question is whether it is wise to dilute your message when the message is warning of existential threat?

The binary question of fighting for a rights was never contended. The question was weighting that specific right against an existential threat.

There's more nuance here than you're willing to admit (hence the resounding loss of the left).

[watwut]

> I think you're sort of proving the parent's point - when you're in an existential fight, is it really that important that you use the limited attention of the public to fight for the rights of a single person?

Literally conservatives did that. THEY made this focus of the debate. Democrats reaction do not even matter here. It is ultimately irrelevant, because people like you then obsess over imaginary democrats positions democratic party never really had.

[lelanthran]

> Democrats reaction do not even matter here.

It does indeed matter - they were the ones who were insufficiently convinced of their nominees messages. Not convinced enough to vote for them, at any rate.

The opposition does not matter when your "supporters" don't vote for you because the message they received is different from the message you think you transmitted.

[Jensson]

Conservatives focus on the points that splinters the liberals, and vice versa the liberals try to focus on points that splinters the conservatives. Liberals are very split on the trans issue, so it makes sense to focus on that.

It was a bad move to put themselves in such a position that they can't defend when conservatives attacks it, that was moving too fast and therefore we ended up with a conservative government.

You can say it was conservative that is to blame since they used this vulnerability of the liberals position, but you can also say that it was the liberals fault for doing things that is unpopular with a large part of their supporters so they are now in a vulnerable spot.

[array_key_first]

> "It must be a crime if you don't treat me as a member of the opposite sex".

This is a thing that basically does not exist. This is, again, more right-wing culture war bullshit that was cooked up in a meth lab. It's not real.

Can you get fired if you purposefully antagonize your boss at work? Yes. That's always been the case. Guess what, if I call my boss a jackass I'm probably getting shown the door, and that's not even a pronoun.

Can you get in trouble for discriminating based on gender and sexual orientation? Yes, and that's been the case for a while.

Nobody is getting into legal trouble because they don't personally believe trans women aren't "real" women, whatever "real" might mean to them. Nobody, not a soul. It's just a non-issue.

What's going on is there is a set of people who are basically just doing nothing who are under constant new and innovative threats from the right. And, when they say, "hey, don't do that", we somehow have the gall to point at them and yell "Culture war! Culture war!"

It's not that people's goodwill is being burnt on trans people. It's that the right has been playing to the populist messaging they have in order to continue their crusade.

While the economy is burning down, and the climate is worsening, and we are entering wars, they are trying to convince you the problem is some set of people who are doing nothing. And, that the solution is simple: beat down this set of people.

This includes immigrants, trans people, gay people. Of course, it's just not true. But humans are stupid. We're already pre-wired to be uneasy around people we don't understand who are different from us, especially visibly different. And, humans understand and have high confidence in simple solutions.

I mean, God, look at the border wall. Will that work? Did that work? Of course not. But it's such a simple, almost child-like understanding of the problem that people had very high confidence in it.

[Jensson]

> What's going on is there is a set of people who are basically just doing nothing who are under constant new and innovative threats from the right

Trans people haven't done nothing, there are many reforms that have moved the trans issue a lot that were pushed by trans people, that is not nothing. The right isn't innovating anything by rolling back those, they are just being conservative which is in their name.

You could argue those reforms are good, but you can't argue it is the right that is changing things here, the right just undo change they don't do the changing on these issues.

And you can't fault the right for trying to win the election. You have to try to win the election as well, throwing it away by sticking to unpopular policies such as trans in sports is just ignorant. It isn't just the right that doesn't want trans in sports, it is a large majority of the entire population that doesn't want that.

[asmsecnd]

In the US, it was the left who decided to push gender identity into law and policy, with no regard to the adverse consequences of doing so. That the right decided to capitalize on this for political reasons is just them taking an opportunity that was basically handed to them on a plate.

Interestingly it's a bit different in the UK. Both the main left and right parties had been promoting gender identity based policy for years, and it was only though the dedicated efforts of feminists who pointed out all the problems with this, and particularly the negative impacts on women and girls, that it recently started to be reversed.

[empyrrhicist]

I don't think you and I live in the same information universe, since I disagree with literally every thing you've said here. Unfortunately I don't have the energy to productively try to disabuse you of (what I believe are) delusions, misinformation and ignorance, so... have a nice day I guess.

[asmsecnd]

Perhaps we have received different information on this topic. I am curious why you disagree though, as I consider my perspective to based in verifiable fact.

For example, in the UK, it was Theresa May's right-wing Conservative government who planned to reform the law to make it easier, and with fewer medical requirements, for people to acquire a Gender Recognition Certificate. They had a public consultation too. This move was supported by the left-wing Labour Party.

And in recent years, legal action and advocacy by feminist groups has been a highly significant factor in policy changes around this area, most notably For Women Scotland who took their legal challenge all the way to the UK's Supreme Court, winning the case with a statutory reinterpretation of the Equality Act.

[BLKNSLVR]

The attention to those fringe issues is brought by those conservatives and lobbyists etc who explicitly want to distract and divide attention from climate change and renewables.

It's strongly my opinion that there are far fewer people championing 'wokeness' than there are 'getting outraged by it's pervasiveness'. Mainly for the fact that all media like to seize upon controversy, thus turning minor fringe issues into multiple days in a row of front page headline items.

Blech. I've done the same thing...

Address climate change, accelerate the shift towards renewables. It's something that actually fucking matters!

[Jensson]

> It's strongly my opinion that there are far fewer people championing 'wokeness' than there are 'getting outraged by it's pervasiveness'. Mainly for the fact that all media like to seize upon controversy, thus turning minor fringe issues into multiple days in a row of front page headline items.

You fight this by keeping your own ranks in check. The right condemns nazis and racists, so you wont find any open racists and nazis in their ranks. The left doesn't do the same, so they leave themselves open to attacks based on having bad apples in their ranks.

You could argue the right is still worse, but you don't decide that the voters decide, so you have to clean up the ranks until the voters are happy with what you present, otherwise you leave yourself open to attack like this.

[Planktonne]

> The right condemns nazis and racists, so you wont find any open racists and nazis in their ranks.

This is flagrantly inaccurate.

[stackbutterflow]

You can't discuss any longer with someone who believes that. You're in "the sky is green" territory.

[cogman10]

IMO, "wokeness" is usually a reaction to the reactionary.

Being transgender wasn't some sort of political football 10 years ago even though 10 years ago basically everything that was happening WRT trans individuals that made the pearl clutchers clutch pearls was happening then and earlier.

The only reason "the left" started caring about trans individuals is because right wing reactionaries decided that it was the source of all the ills of the world. It was a pretty natural "no it's not, you guys are being insane". Especially because as a result to the right losing it's mind over trans individuals, we are seeing all sorts of insane over reactions in the law (In idaho, they are passing a law with a 5 year prison sentence for a trans individual taking a shit in a public bathroom).

This is basically how the cycle goes. The right targets a minority, the left defends the minority, the media capitalizes on the "both sides" of it all at the exclusion of talking about things like taxing rich people, funding public services, or addressing climate change.

The only time I've seen the reverse was BLM, but it's pretty much the same outcome.

[bombon]

Dismissing all of this as some sort of right-wing moral panic avoids engaging with legitimate feminist objections.

It's not "insane" to question whether males should be allowed to access female-only spaces, or to resist the erosion of sex categories in law. Many women on the left have done exactly that, and have been vilified and harassed for it.

[watwut]

> the fight to allow transgender people to use whatever bathroom they choose, or to promote childhood reassignment surgery, etc.

This is entirely made up right wing hysteria. Complain to them for beating that drum constantly, because the more people hate the more they vote for them.

[breakyerself]

Kamala Harris started out with a surge of popularity. Talking about corporate price gouging and selecting Tim Walz as her running mate who had clear populist messaging.

Then the strategists who think like you got in her ear. Told her to stop attacking corporations to protect donations. Had her campaign with Cheney and talk about shooting home invaders. Then of course she refused to take a strong stand on the genocide in Gaza.

Her momentum faded and she lost. In the aftermath some braindead analysts tried to blame words like Latinx and transgender rights.

She didn't campaign on that shit. She campaigned as Republican lite and it fucked her.

The fascists aren't going to rewards you with good environmental policy just because you throw trans people under the bus. They'll just demand another sacrifice. Meanwhile gender affirming surgery on minors is so fleetingly rare that it basically only exists in right wing propaganda and here you are repeating it like it's a valid concern.

[cogman10]

The funny thing is I don't think Kamala needed to be woke to win. She just needed to adopt policies the base liked.

Had she not campaigned towards conservative voters, I think she could have won. Really strong campaign positions like medicare for all or taxing the rich have pretty broad appeal. Heck, she even could have campaigned on abortion access and rights and that would have been pretty decent. She didn't need to touch or address immigration. And her "no tax on tips, me too" thing was just embarrassing.

Gaza was a major issue, and a major misstep of hers was to say that none of her policies would be different from Biden's. Even if that were true, she had a whole lot of popular policies and positions from Biden's cabinet she could have ran on (like breaking up monopolies).

She ditched all of that to run like you said and it absolutely crushed the giant boost she got from Biden stepping down and Walz calling Vance a weirdo.

[Arnt]

They're wrong.

A couple of years ago the last of the exploration rigs in Norway left Norwegian waters. Because nothing that could be drilled (and hasn't already) can compete on price with solar etc.

Lots of people think someone should do this or that. They don't invest their own money though, they just think someone else should do, etc.

[alvah]

How did 40 wells get drilled in the Norwegian shelf last year, and 42 the year before? You can't just make things up.

[myrmidon]

This appears to directly contradict you, with exploration activity increasing in 2025 (compared to 2024) to 49 wells:

https://www.norskpetroleum.no/en/exploration/exploration-act...

[Arnt]

You're right. There must be something more to it.

I notice that all the recent finds on sodir.no are close to existing fields, like 5km, or even in existing fields. My friend who told me this works in strange places, far from existing infrastructure. I assume there are different kinds of equipment, and he was talking about his kind, and I understood it to be more general.

[roryirvine]

If it's anything like the situation in the UK's part of the North Sea then it'll be development of new wells in existing fields rather than entirely new exploration.

The majors have effectively abandoned new drilling, leaving a bunch of smaller or independent players - but even they are mostly doing limited appraisal & development operations rather than exploration in the traditional sense.

If the Iran situation drags on for more than a year then there'll likely be a temporary increase in activity, but the declining trend will almost certainly continue in the longer term even without further regulatory intervention.

[NoLinkToMe]

That's not so strange is it?

With respect to Groningen: 1. zero deaths reported ever 2. quakes in Groningen maxed out at 3.6 which is considered light. By comparison NL's worst earthquake wasn't in Groningen (North) but in the south of the country unrelated to the gas, a scale of 6. Again no people died. 3. the 450 billion m3 of gas left is worth 170 billion last month ('normal'), 345 billion at today's prices, and 1.6 trillion at 2022 peak prices. 4. Field used to supply 10% of EU gas, this shifted EU/Worldwide demand to Russian gas, helping them fund the cold-war against the EU and hot-war against EU's ally Ukraine.

Governments routinely put a price on a human life. The Dutch government puts a price of about 3-4m on a human life. i.e. if a policy measure costs 500m and is estimated to save 100 lives, it's deemed financially irresponsible because the 5m cost per life is more than the value set by the government. Whereas if a measure costs 100m (e.g. implementing an anti drunk-driving program) and it is estimated to save 500 lives, it's financially OK'd because the cost of 200k to prevent a death is less than the value of a life.

The estimates for the Groningen gas field are completely off. Even if you take another €50 billion out of the ground, experts don't expect an earthquake to kill any people. While on the contrary, if you don't, numerous people will die from alternatives (dirty coal and in russian war).

Should be move as fast as possible to renewables? Yes. But green advocates severely overestimate how fast we can do that. We have broken renewable records for 10 years in a row, yet we use about 80% of the fossil energy that we used 35 years ago. We didn't replace Groningen with renewables, we replaced it with Norwegian gas and US LNG imports, and Russia picked up the slack elsewhere because we dropped Dutch supply. So yes in the long-term renewables will make Groningen unnecessary, in the short-term we continue to use gas and keeping Groningen open longer seems to be supported by an objective analysis. Of course politics aren't just objective, they're emotional, which is why Groningen was closed, not because it was the best idea.

[b00ty4breakfast]

twitter is a self-selected group these days, even assuming these are real people and not some kind of propaganda op.

It's like going on stormfront and wondering why there's so many white nationalists on the internet.

[bpodgursky]

Yes, this is correct, Europe energy policy is catastrophically behind and needs to pursue all paths simultaneously, because the future is very murky, Europe needs a LOT of power, and it's not clear which will work best:

- Continue building out solar + battery storage

- Resume drilling in domestic accessible offshore locations safe from trade disruptions

- Recommission and build new nuclear plants

- Build LNG import terminals to eliminate dependence on Russian gas

[devilbunny]

> we need to resume drilling in the North Sea and Groningen

Well, there's also the simple reality that the US doesn't actually need fossil fuels from the Middle East or Russia in the same way Europe does. It affects prices here, obviously, and an increase in energy prices can do severe damage to the economy, but it's not a potentially existential crisis in the same way.

[darth_avocado]

Funny part about oil is that it’s in everything. US is energy independent, but its supply chain is not. AI chips, for example, which prop up the entire economy need oil for the various materials needed to produce it.

The other funny part about oil is that it has an inelastic demand. A 20% reduction in global supply doesn’t mean a 20% increase in prices. It means increase in prices until 20% demand collapses (which could theoretically mean orders of magnitude of increase in pricing). Which means expensive fertilizers, medicines and pretty every other bare necessity.

With these two facts, pretty much every country needs the oil from the Middle East.

[devilbunny]

Oh, I know, but "we are going to freeze to death in a month" is a far stronger motivator than "the economy is going to go into a tailspin".

[dzhiurgis]

> Be kind. Don't be snarky. Converse curiously; don't cross-examine. Edit out swipes.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[layer8]

> It feels like this collective insanity will never end

You’re referring to Twitter, right? ;)

[watwut]

The Russian threat in the short term is very real and this is making Russia stronger. And the economic threat to Europe in the super short term is bigger then the one to America ... and will help internal fascist movements that are very much already empowered there (and sponsored and supported by BOTH Russia and America despite being very much homegrown).

So, like, both I guess.

[weinzierl]

"As someone who's been pushing for renewables for quite a while now it's dismaying that it's taken a war to accelerate this push, but I'm glad to see that it's happening at least."

It takes tremendous hardship and a lot of time to push people to renewables. Give them their cheap oil back and they are hooked on the needle again in no time. Historically we've been there, multiple times.

Sorry for the cynicism. I too hope it is finally happening at least, and maybe it is at last.

[bee_rider]

Resilience against geopolitical disruption has always been a nice characteristic of renewables (of course, centralizing the production in China is a mistake from that point of view, if for no other reason than the general danger of centralization). It is unfortunate though, if we needed an actual event to see this advantage.

[baq]

Nobody wants to sacrifice growth today for stability tomorrow and there are good reasons why this stance makes sense.

That said I’m all for it, too bad the supply chain disruption that this mess will cause will make it twice as hard as it could’ve been.

[ta20240528]

"The concern about a new dependency on China is real,"

The dependency is latent, is only become a problem when you (USA) does something to dick with China's dependency on you.

If you don't do that, no problems. The rest of us live just fine depending on things from China.

[KellyCriterion]

Well, but in case you have already infra & ecosystem, you could then affort maybe to produce a little bit mor expensive in your own country, if supply from china will be under threat like oil today?

I would rather have solar everywhere and the risk depending on china (and the risk of producing something over market price) than the current ongoing forever riskof fossil dependency, because solar manufacturing you could resolve in theory in every country (at some scale), while fossil production is limited to a handful with no chance for anyone else to do it?

[graemep]

> renewables do have the advantage that once you have the infrastructure in place it keeps working without continuously importing fuel

There are issues if the infrastructure is network accessible and is updatable. The consumer end of it (e.g. home solar) is often dependent on apps etc. and is very vulnerable. I hope (probably optimistically) that critical systems are air gapped.

Its always been obvious to me that we should have a variety or energy sources for security and its complacent to think otherwise. Over-reliance on an unstable region makes it all the worse.

[leonidasrup]

Germany is very slowly starting to understand, exiting nuclear power and installing a lot of intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind power and solar power, does not make your country independent of fossil fuels.

China builds a lot of renewables, but they don't build them to replace fossil fuels, they build them in addition to fossil fuels. We should absolutely not follow this way.

[ben_w]

Germany has plenty of coal (and gas) plants for when the dunkelflaute happen: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/electricity-prod-source-s...

But even if it didn't, not only grid-scale but also large-residential-scale batteries+PV is cheaper in Germany than industrially priced nuclear, and even "small" batteries+PV are cheaper than residential electricity: https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/press-media/press-releases/...

But electrification of transport and heating is more critical at this point than the inevitable short-term changes to electricity: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-consumption-by-sou...

[leonidasrup]

Yes, Germany has plenty of coal reserves. Germany has about as much subbituminous coal & lignite reserves as U.S. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_reserves (But neither should Germany, U.S., China, India or any other country burn fossil fuels if possible).

The levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) are pure generation costs, you take total cost of generation (building power plant, operating costs, fuel, decommissioning) over expected life time and divide it total produced energy produced over expected life time. You don't take into account electric network as physical and economical system. For example you disregard transmission, demand for electricity, costs of stabilization of the energy grid, costs of backup - dunkelflaute.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LCOE

The main problem of German electrification (and in general the whole Europe) are too high prices of electricity.

The problem of too high CO2 emissions are too low CO2 prices (zero in U.S., low in China).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_and_demand

[ben_w]

> Yes, Germany has plenty of coal reserves.

I don't care, I was talking about power stations. Look at charts linked in previous comment.

> For example you disregard transmission, demand for electricity, costs of stabilization of the energy grid, costs of backup - dunkelflaute.

I literally said the word "dunkelflaute" on the first line; and I have absolutely accounted for that, that's why I said what I said about batteries, and why even with those renewables are cheaper.

Transmission and demand are approximately identical for all power sources, modulo only where the specific power lines go. Well, that and that in principle one can be off-grid for PV+batteries at a reasonable cost (especially for new builds given how much a grid connection costs in the first place), which is itself rather novel, but IMO will only be worth accounting for when almost all vehicles are EVs and/or literally all new houses come with PV and it's no longer optional (last I checked this was not yet the case).

[leonidasrup]

If you want to go off-grid I would recommend in addition to PV+batteries also a passive house. In the long-term costs nothing beats good thermal insulation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_house

The grid connection cost are so high because the high electric system costs, which are distributed to the market participants using grid connection cost: the transmission costs (upgrade costs of electric lines - digging earth is surprisingly costly, overhead power lines are cheaper but they are not for free, upgrade costs of transformers), costs of backup - Germany plans to build new gas power plants, which will have a very low utilization.

[iancmceachern]

The only thing that is dismaying you about this war is the fact that it caused people to push for more renewables?

[paulryanrogers]

They didn't say 'only'. Unless there was an edit after your reply

[markus_zhang]

I guess the oil industry is laughing their ass off nowadays. They can sell at such a premium. Inflation? YP.

[toomuchtodo]

It’s just pulling forward future gains while shrinking the time horizon, if the world speeds the transition to renewables and electrification from this. Short term gain for faster irrelevance.

Oil to $200/barrel please, as long as possible, same with LNG.

Edit: Iran attack wipes out 17% of Qatar’s LNG capacity for up to five years, QatarEnergy CEO says - https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/business/2026/03/19/iran-attack-... - March 19th, 2026

Looks like the global clean energy transition will be getting back up to speed.

[graemep]

Businesses are short termist these days. They will be happy to pull forward gains. Shareholder value, right?

[toomuchtodo]

Certainly, but you can solve for that with windfall taxes or nationalizing the oil industry in your jurisdiction, if there is the will. Based on all available evidence, the will does not exist.

Broadly speaking, the overall system dependent on energy must adapt or die. The capital exists to decarbonize rapidly. How hard the arm must be twisted is the natural experiment to observe. In the meantime, all critical fossil assets are legitimate targets in the operating environment.

These are all choices. If you are unhappy with the outcomes of choices you have the authority to make, make better choices.

[anonymars]

Heh, depends on who's nationalizing the oil industry. Isn't that the common thread for the present-day situations of Venezuela, Iran, and Cuba?

[chii]

It will take longer than the duration of the war to realistically transition to renewables in any quantity that truly matters.

So the oil companies are happy because this temporarily brought forward future demand and thus profit, as well as expend a bunch of money/resources from competitors of oil which predicates a high price per barrel to make financial sense. If/when oil prices drop back down, these renewable investments might not compete.

To truly transition over will mean doing it with the world kicking and screaming imho. It cannot be made smooth.

[markus_zhang]

If you tell me I can make 10 million bucks this year, with the penalty of not making anything for the rest of my life, I guess I don’t mind?

[toomuchtodo]

Would you have made it anyway? Can we stop you? Does it cause a negative externality that will be more rapidly diminished if you pull forward this gain? Consider it a premium paid by fossil fuel consumers to encourage a more rapid transition from fossil fuels by pushing pain into the energy market for the next half decade.

Congrats to those who won the lotto, enjoy your luck.

[markus_zhang]

Eh, definitely not me, still a salary slave. But yeah kudos to whoever won the oil lottery.

[noelsusman]

Oil companies love $90 oil, but much higher than that and you start to run into demand destruction issues in the medium term.

[shevy-java]

> It's doubly dismaying that my own country (US) is still doubling down on fossil fuels despite everything.

A few get rich. Project2025 (that is, their hardwing agenda is the cover up for theft).

We need to monitor these guys and then take back what they took from all of us globally.

[anovikov]

But why does US need any of that? It's a massive exporter of fossil fuels and will be much richer as a result (but yes just as every other way of getting richer, it will also increase inequality).

[_alternator_]

The argument that high oil prices are good for America is one of the most ridiculous ideas being pushed right now. Yes, on a trade deficit front, it slightly reduces the net amount of money leaving. But we are also the world’s largest consumer of oil, and it literally powers every part of our economy.

Saying that America is better off with high gas prices is like saying Americans will eat more beef if the price of beef doubles because we make lots of beef. Cattle ranchers will be better off; everyone else eats more potatoes.

[anovikov]

Think of it this way: less trade deficit means more imports that come through without causing extra damage. It means more cheap products of all kinds for everyone.

And yes this is exactly how petrostates work. I wonder why is it surprising. Sure their population also pays higher prices for gas at the pump when the oil goes up, but they massively win in every other way.

It's simply a long, embedded stereotype of "high oil price = bad" because of traumatic experience of 1973 and 1979. It's different today. The higher the oil price, the better it is for America.

Also again, US gas prices are by far the cheapest among every halfway developed countries. Everyone else will suffer more. So relatively again, US wins even here.

[dalyons]

It causes massive inflation of goods and food prices, as farming and supply chains are heavily dependent on fuel prices. How is runaway inflation “massively winning in every other way” for regular americans?

[usefulcat]

The price of oil isn't just about the "cost of gas at the pump". It's about how much it costs to transport anything. There aren't many products that don't need to be transported or that don't depend at least partially on something that does.

So yeah, when the price of oil goes up, oil companies make more money, and prices go up for pretty much everyone.

[_alternator_]

The difference between the US and a petrostate is that the US is rich because we use gas, not because we make gas. Put differently, petrostate economies rely upon on oil revenues; we rely on the actual product at every stage in our economy.

There is a segment of our economy that does benefit from oil revenues, but the vast majority of our economic output involves oil consumption.

[rootusrootus]

> US gas prices are by far the cheapest among every halfway developed countries

Most of the retail pump price difference is self-inflicted, though. If those other countries wanted to suffer less in that regard, they know how.

[defrost]

"Oils ain't Oils" - old motor oil company slogan from the 1980s.

What the US exports isn't "car ready" - most primary oil sources are heavily biased one way or the other (heavy, sweet, light, etc) and the useful end product is blended.

It's not straightforward for the US to get high on it's own supply and even what it delivers to others is less useful to thse others when other non-US sources aren't readily available to blend in.

Also ... using sequestered carbon has been increasing the insulation factor of our common atmosphere, left unchecked (ie. stopping the use of fossil fuels) is a major problem for the coming century.

[standeven]

Burning fossil fuels also raises the global temperature, reduces air quality, and people still have to pay more at the pump.

[anovikov]

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).

[graemep]

The big winners from global warming will be Russia, China and Canada - places that will become more habitable.

Its not just Florida. There are multiple problems. Many can be mitigated, but I very much doubt they will be as its easy to put off.

[_alternator_]

This seems like soft trolling. Global warming is canonically the opposite of a zero sum game. Everyone is losing.

[anovikov]

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.

[_alternator_]

> Everyone is suffering sure, but what matters is relative degree of it.

Is that what matters?

[Jensson]

> 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.

[ImPostingOnHN]

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.

[defrost]

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).

[noelsusman]

Being a net exporter of a global commodity is only relevant in an extremely acute crisis (e.g. WWIII).

Plus one of the reasons why we export so much oil is because it's cheaper to import oil to a refinery in New Jersey from Saudi Arabia than to get it there from Texas due to some very stupid US laws.

[devilbunny]

Assuming you mean the Jones Act?

[pif]

Hello, could you please elaborate about those laws?

[noelsusman]

The Jones Act requires that all goods transported by water between US ports be carried on ships that were built in the US, fly the US flag, and crewed by US citizens. That effectively makes it impossible to ship oil between US states at scale without a direct pipeline.

Though to be clear I believe we would still be a net exporter without the Jones Act, it's just one of those weird things about the US oil industry.

[spacephysics]

Unfortunately much of China’s perverse tactics (they’ve done this in a wide array of industries) is to steal patented tech and trade secrets from companies outside China, subsidize the manufacturing and development etc, then sell their product at an artificially low price which kills the original company and good faith competitors as they cannot compete with the artificially lower prices.

Then once the dust settles they’re the only company which can handle large order sizes required for supply chains to build downstream products, and the world becomes further reliant on them.

Security concerns and national defense aside, a prime example pre-ban was Huawei layer 1 infrastructure products which far exceeded feature density, and cost effectiveness than competitors due to the subsidies. They’ve done similar tactics with solar panels.

This doesn’t imply China or their state sponsored companies never create novel tech, but there’s a hugely perverse system whose purpose is to illegally undercut competition overseas with no real recourse from the victim countries outside of total company bans. And even then, people find a way around the bans and the damage is already done to the original companies.

Solar panels: https://www.marketplace.org/story/2021/12/09/chinas-state-sp...

Huawai: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounders/chinas-huawei-threat-us-na...

[cogman10]

At this point, I guess I don't really care.

The reason china was able to do this is because of the free trade movement that started with Reagan to undercut US unions. US companies outsourced all the manufacturing as much as possible and china capitalized on the market opportunity.

Am I supposed to be mad that jobs shipped to china who steals a tech weren't shipped to Vietnam who hasn't stolen tech?

China is hardly the only country that has used internal policies and loose intellectual copyrights to get ahead (Famously, the US did the same thing in the late 1800s, stealing factory designs from england). And part of the reason US companies still do business with them is because they are cheaper.

[hypeatei]

Ideas are cheap and execution is what matters. Any attempt to "own" an idea is an exercise in futility and a sign that you probably suck at execution. Sorry, but we should be encouraging competition and reducing barriers, not sitting here crying that the Chinese are running laps around us because of intellectual property "theft"

[Theodores]

Really? How did anywhere get started?

Germany ripped off British engineering texts because they had no copyright laws there.

America got started taking what was started elsewhere, the same can be said for any country except for Scotland.

I think those lovely Chinese people would laugh at your sinophobic 'thinking'. Maybe stay off the corporate media and do your own research.

Huawei are an amazing company, all of their kit is highly innovative, but too good for you and your slave masters. Hence the lies. In fact, if you want a computer that isn't 'NSA Inside', go with Huawei. You won't look back, although they won't sell you a PC with Nvidia in it or a phone with Google in it because of your government.

Solar panels? Germany did the work on that, China bought the IP and did the production engineering. All is legit.

Besides, that screen you are looking at, was that made in America? Nah, it is going to be China, outside chance, Korea.

[nixon_why69]

> the same can be said for any country except for Scotland.

Found the Scottish shill. Big whiskey won't rule the world forever, you know!

[Theodores]

It's whisky, not whiskey!!!

I am an English person exiled in Scotland, and you would be amazed at the industrial heritage here. Scotland was once used by England to outsource manufacturing, much like how China fills that role now. Shipbuilding got too expensive in England, so the folks on the Clyde provided a better deal. It was how globalisation got started.

I have heard it said that Scottish people invented 'everything', and, after a tour of the museum full of ships, trains, trams, bicycles, cars and much else, I am not going to object to the wild claim, particularly since I am outnumbered up here. Scotland is a very friendly place, but I tell people I am from this little country that can be found south of the border, asking them not to judge me!

[evolighting]

subsidize ?

no all that shit just not worth that much;

The profit marginsof these industries are ridiculously high, to the point that if you’re willing, you can manufacture many useful, high‑quality products.

only when China could build them, there are real "free" market

[javcasas]

And the US subsidizes corn and attacks other oil producers. And Korea puts tariffs to benefit their local technology industry.

Welcome to the real world. Whoever isn't cheating is losing.