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The Forum > Article Comments > Predicting the 'Super GFC': two very different views > Comments

Predicting the 'Super GFC': two very different views : Comments

By Syd Hickman, published 25/3/2014

The key problem we now face is not that energy sources are going to suddenly disappear but that the surplus energy after extraction is already declining rapidly and will certainly decline faster in coming years.

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It baffles me that here in Australia we are on the verge of total collapse and not one pollie is prepared to even talk about it.
We import 91% of our oil at this time.
By 2020 it will be up to 100%.
The price of fuel by then could be as high as $8 per litre. This will collapse the economy because we are so totally dependent on diesel to move our vital goods.
We could prepare for this by a blitz on shipping gas to the major seaside cities and organizing a distribution network for our truck fleet.
It is just not happening.
When the crunch comes it will be devastating.
I can only surmise that our pollies are hoping that when the music stops, they will be able to sit it out and the incumbents will cop the flak.
Posted by Robert LePage, Tuesday, 25 March 2014 8:57:53 AM
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We continue to reward risk and maximized profits, when what we need is probity, caution and longevity of income streams, backed with a govt guarantee!
At the end of the day, 50% of something beats the hell out of 100% of nothing!
We are finding quite large reserves of oil in our central deserts, one reportedly, as big as those we used to find in Texas!
And we still own a resource, that may be as large as the combined middle east reserves, under or near, the Great Barrier Reef, much of which is already dead, and could hardly be further harmed by a proper seismic survey, and even a few test holes.
The amazing thing about traditional Australian sweet light crude, is it leaves the ground as a virtually ready to use diesel, needing only a little insitu chill filtering, to remove some sand particles, and a soluble wax content, that creates dense black smoke, and or, chokes the injectors on cold and frosty mornings.
All NG wells produce gas that exits the well head at sub zero temperatures, which needs a little warming to ensure valves etc, don't freeze up; and, we could take advantage of this chill factor, to treat our oil, to remove the soluble wax content, without providing or paying for any energy component!
And as a virtually ready to use product, in common use, produces 75% less total carbon, from well head to harvester.
Yet we continue to import much much dirtier fuel, and continue to pay an economy/farm destroying premium for it!
Just what are the greens trying to stop, atmospheric carbon or the economy? That facts stridently suggest the latter!
That said, we do need to crack on with very high speed rail options, given it is only a matter of time, before we run out of transport fuel, or it is priced way out of Joe average's reach!
And with those increases, introduce yet another GFC!
So, it is just not us, that needs less expensive options, but the rest of the world!
Rhrosty.
Posted by Rhrosty, Tuesday, 25 March 2014 11:42:52 AM
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Some pollies insist we need to import some heavy crude for industrial lubricants and bitumen, well we can and should recycle current bitumen, recycle waste tyres, which currently, could add as much as 50,000 barrels of heavy crude to our essential reserves. Ditto most plastics, some of which could even replace coal in steel smelting. And the currently wasted slag from steel smelting, could replace lime in our cement products, which would reward us with a much longer life cycle.
The problem with most of our pollies, is that that are either clueless numskulls totally dependent on advice, and great script writers, or they are scientifically illiterate?
If that is not the case, then why do we continue to import products at great cost, (around 26 billion per) when we have a virtual hydrocarbon bonanza under our feet or Continental shelf.
Even the oil companies hire the necessary expertise to extract and process these products, we could also, if our pollies were better informed, and or, not totally dependent on bright young things or the ill-informed, to do all of their critical thinking for them?
Every western style economy, rests on just two critical support pillars, energy and capital! And we have plenty of both!
We or rather our clueless pollies seem to want to fully import both, [oil and foreign investment capital,] and in so doing, make we Australians, tenants or virtual slaves in our own land! Which can be the only possible result of the wholesale fire sale, of our own economic sovereignty!?
Rhrosty.
Posted by Rhrosty, Tuesday, 25 March 2014 12:07:17 PM
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I think Syd should understand that in the US the banks swopped their rubbish assets for newly printed US dollars at their asked for value. Obama then gave the rubbish to the US taxpayer and the banks continued with their bonuses.
Kevin Rudd also kow-towed to our banks instead of explaining that in the event of a collapse the bankers would be individually bankrupted and would face jail time.
Obama and Rudd were cowards and sold us out.
Forget this crisis rubbish just explain to the bankers if you go down you will be facing many many years in jail and when you come out its off to Centrelink.
Our laws should reflect that fraudulent valuations are just that fraud!
Everyone seems to forget the GFC was mirrored in Victoria in the early nineties. All I hear from the ABC is how bad Kennett was, not what caused his actions.
We get the politicians we deserve. We deserved the worst Victorian Premier in John Cain and the best in Geoff Kennett.
Posted by JBowyer, Tuesday, 25 March 2014 7:25:14 PM
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The Central Bankers own and control us by creating new money as debt.

Tony Abbott informs us that our Govt debt not not $300 billion but $667 billion or an additional $120,000 debt each household must now pay off.

If we still had the Commonwealth Bank as a Govt entity, we would not be the trouble we now face.

The World debt is now $40 trillion and most of this money has gone into bailing out banks and inflating the share market. The next collapse will be the biggest ever and there will be no solutions unless we gate back to Govt banks for the creation of new money.

Private banks should not be allowed to create money from nothing and Govts should not be allowed to go into debt.

See http://www.cecaust.com.au/ Learn how the banks and Govt are planning to steal your deposits via " bail in".
Posted by Arjay, Wednesday, 26 March 2014 10:34:35 AM
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There are many parallels in history. Pre-revolutionary France springs to mind. A failed bankrupt systems continues to sputter along, no one any longer believes in it and therefore everyone that can is exploiting every last drop before the music stops.

When it finally stops, the guillotine will be rolled out as usual. Then the recent normalisation of extra-judicial action, torture and pre-emptive strikes won't look like such a smart idea for our current monarchs. It won't look like a very smart idea at all in a global village with no where to hide.

Suddenly the Murdoch editorials, should they still exist, will espouse the rule of law and primacy of civil rights, Geneva conventions, amnesty... Suddenly, all the hawks will become doves.

And then we start again absent some hubris and a few heads.
Posted by YEBIGA, Wednesday, 2 April 2014 9:49:21 AM
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