EU states tell Zelensky they won’t hand over draft dodgers
RT | September 13, 2023
The Czech Republic announced on Wednesday that it would not send military-age men who arrived as refugees back to Ukraine to be conscripted. Germany, Austria and Hungary have already made similar declarations.
European conventions exclude extradition for charges such as desertion or draft evasion, Czech Justice Ministry spokesman Vladimir Repka told the outlet iDnes. However, he added that if Ukraine files individual extradition requests citing a specific criminal act they may have committed, Prague may give them more consideration.
Hungary has ruled out any extraditions outright.
“We are not investigating any Ukrainian refugees to determine if they have been called up for military service. Hungary will not extradite them to Ukraine,” Deputy Prime Minister Zsolt Semjén told the outlet ATV on Wednesday. “All refugees from Ukraine are safe in Hungary.”
German officials who spoke to state broadcaster Deutsche Welle earlier this week said that Berlin did not intend to send draft-eligible refugees back, since desertion and draft evasion are not crimes under German law. There are over 123,000 Ukrainian men of military age who are in Germany as refugees, according to official estimates.
Austria was the first to refuse extradition of military-age men. There are about 14,000 potential draftees among the 101,000 Ukrainian refugees in the country.
“That would be a massive encroachment on our statehood, we would never do that,” a spokesman for the Interior Ministry told the outlet Exxpress on September 7.
On the other hand, Poland has already begun sending some Ukrainian men back, according to Hungarian media reports.
A senior lawmaker from President Vladimir Zelensky’s ruling party said in late August that Ukraine might seek extradition of draft-dodgers from the EU. The government in Kiev recently announced another round of mobilization in order to make up battlefield losses, which Russian President Vladimir Putin estimated at over 70,000 in the past three months of heavy fighting.
Zelensky fired all draft commissioners last month and ordered a review of all medical exemptions from military service, citing widespread corruption. New rules were adopted allowing for the conscription of people with mental disorders, chronic diseases, tuberculosis and HIV.
The New York Times Confirmed That Russia Is Far Ahead Of NATO In The Race Of Logistics
BY ANDREW KORYBKO | SEPTEMBER 14, 2023
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg belatedly admitted in mid-February that his bloc is in a “race of logistics”/“war of attrition” with Russia, and over half a year later, the New York Times (NYT) just confirmed that Moscow is far ahead in this competition. Here are the relevant highlights from their latest article about how “Russia Overcomes Sanctions to Expand Missile Production, Officials Say”, which will then be analyzed to update readers about the latest dynamics of the NATO-Russian proxy war in Ukraine.
———-
* Russia’s military-industrial complex is performing better than ever
– “Russia has managed to overcome sanctions and export controls imposed by the West to expand its missile production beyond prewar levels, according to U.S., European and Ukrainian officials, leaving Ukraine especially vulnerable to intensified attacks in the coming months.”
* Its military-intelligence services are responsible for this astounding success
– “Russia subverted American export controls using its intelligence services and ministry of defense to run illicit networks of people who smuggle key components by exporting them to other countries from which they can be shipped to Russia more easily. “
* Ukraine should brace itself for a nationwide missile onslaught
– “Officials fear that increased missile stocks could mean an especially dark and cold winter for Ukrainian citizens…Ukraine does not have enough air defense systems to cover the entire country, and must pick the sites it defends. An increased barrage of missiles could overwhelm the country’s air defenses”.
* Russia has successfully transitioned to a wartime economy
– “Today, Russian officials have remade their economy to focus on defense production…The senior Western defense official said that Russia had reallocated nearly a third of its commercial economy toward arms production.”
* Its artillery production is a whopping 7x more than NATO’s
– “As a result of the push, Russia is now producing more ammunition than the United States and Europe. Overall, Kusti Salm, a senior Estonian defense ministry official, estimated that Russia’s current ammunition production is seven times greater than that of the West.”
* And its shells cost 10x less to produce
– “It costs a Western country $5,000 to $6,000 to make a 155-millimeter artillery round, whereas it costs Russia about $600 to produce a comparable 152-millimeter artillery shell, he said.”
* Russia also now has more of some missile types than it did before the special operation
– “It does not have huge inventories of missiles, though they have more of some kinds — like the Kh-55 air-launched cruise missile — in stock now than they did at the beginning of the war, according to people briefed on intelligence reports.”
* Several backpacks’ worth of smuggled chips can make several hundred cruise missiles
– “In cases where Russia needs millions of one particular component, export controls can grind production to a halt. But the chips needed to make a couple of hundred cruise missiles would fit into a few backpacks, which makes evading sanctions relatively simple, Mr. Alperovitch said.”
* And only basic and widely available chips are needed, not high-tech and ultra-restricted ones
– “One of the challenges for the U.S. government is that Russia does not need higher-end chips that are easier to track, but commoditized chips that can be used in a wide range of things, not just guided missiles.”
* Russia is reportedly looking to North Korea to further bolster its arsenal
– “Even though Russia is on pace to produce two million rounds of ammunition a year, it fired about 10 million rounds of artillery last year. That has led Moscow to desperately search for alternative sources to increase its stocks, most recently by trying to secure a weapons deal with North Korea, U.S. and Western officials said.”
* That country or others could also theoretically help Russia procure additional materials
– “And although Moscow has been successful in smuggling processors and circuit boards, it is facing a shortage of rocket propellant and basic explosives, American officials said, material that can be harder to smuggle than circuit boards. Those shortages are likely to constrain Moscow if it tries to step up further production of ammunition, missiles or bombs.”
* North Korea can also help Russia fill potential labor shortages in its military-industrial complex
– “The country faces a labor shortage that could make further industrial gains harder to achieve too.”
———-
North Korea Can Make Everything Even Worse For NATO
The NYT’s latest report proves that the West’s sanctions policy failed to curtail Russia’s military-industrial production, which actually ended up surging over the past 18 months as a result of clandestine procurement and the successful transition to a wartime economy. Moreover, whatever gaps still exist in production, material, and labor can conveniently be addressed by North Korea, thus adding crucial strategic context to Kim Jong Un’s visit earlier this week.
The preceding hyperlinked analysis elaborates more on this in detail, but the pertinent takeaway to the present piece is that Russia appears willing to share high-level military technology with North Korea across a variety of domains from submarines to satellites in exchange for ammo, materials, and labor. Regarding the last-mentioned aspect of their potential deal, the NYT reported earlier this year that North Korean workers are performing various jobs in Russia’s Far East region.
The Argument For Importing (More?) North Korean Labor
They of course framed this a form of “slavery” that also violates UNSC sanctions, but in the event that there’s any truth to the gist of their report regarding the continued presence of these laborers in Russia, then it could set the basis for importing more to work in that country’s military-industrial complex. After all, some of the tasks required are rather menial, so any potential labor shortage could be filled by low-skilled foreign workers who don’t have to speak Russian to perform their jobs.
Professor Artyom Lukin from Russia’s Far Eastern Federal University hinted at this in his interview with Sputnik on Wednesday: “Lukin postulated that there is a considerable need of workers in the Russian Far East and Siberia, and that North Korea may provide a solution to this problem by supplying labor to Russia. ‘I would venture a guess that in the following months we may see North Korean workers at construction sites and in the fields in Russia.’”
UNSC International Obligations vs. Russian National Security
Even though he was talking about their involvement in other industries, the point is that this esteemed expert from one of Russia’s top universities specializing in regional affairs extended credence to the prediction that Kim Jong Un’s visit could lead to (more?) North Korean laborers in his country. As was earlier argued, they could easily be put to work in Russia’s military-industrial complex if needed, which would adequately address whatever labor shortages it might be experiencing right now.
Although President Putin and his spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia’s cooperation with North Korea will comply with the UNSC sanctions that Moscow previously approved, the case can be made that its international obligations won’t take precedence over national security needs. If the Kremlin concludes that ignoring those obligations could protect its people, help make progress on the special operation, and thus accelerate the global systemic transition, then it’ll cut “prohibited” deals with North Korea.
The Rationale For Russian-North Korean Strategic Relations
Kim Jong Un’s proclamation that “Relations with the Russian Federation is the main priority for our country at present” strongly suggests that he shares this view, which is likely why he made his trip in the first place. The North Korean leader knows that China won’t risk the threat of Western sanctions by going against its UNSC obligations to give him the high-level military technology that he needs, but Russia has nothing to fear in this respect and is therefore open to a deal if he helps meet its needs too.
Circling back to the NYT’s piece, Russia’s commanding lead in its “race of logistics” with NATO will grow even further in the event that a “prohibited” military deal with North Korea results in addressing whatever production, material, and/or labor gaps might still exist. Should that happen, then Russia would be in the best possible position to launch another ground offensive in the coming future and/or resume last fall’s strategic strike campaign aimed at crippling Ukrainian infrastructure.
Concluding Thoughts
The purpose in doing so would be to maximally pressure the West into forcing Zelensky to agree to freeze the conflict or formally return to the peace talks that they sabotaged in spring 2022, which he already fears that they might do as evidenced by an analysis of his latest interview with The Economist. If they refuse to comply with Russia’s implied demand, then they’d risk the scenario of it achieving a breakthrough sometime next year powered by the support that Pyongyang might soon provide.
Despite this drastically raising the odds that their proxy war on Russia will end in an Afghan-like disaster, the US’ liberal–globalist policymaking faction might still refuse to settle for a ceasefire, thus either making the aforesaid breakthrough a fait accompli or prompting them to unprecedentedly escalate. It remains to be seen which of these two scenarios will unfold, but either way, Russia’s lead in its “race of logistics” with NATO will continue growing and ultimately be a game-changer one way or the other.
US offers to pay Polish media for Ukraine coverage
RT | September 13, 2023
The US Consulate General in Krakow is soliciting Polish outlets to write about Ukrainian refugees “returning and rebuilding,” it emerged on Wednesday. Washington is offering $50,000 for the year-long project.
The project “to promote coverage in Poland by local and regional media representatives of stories in Ukraine” was first spotted by a Telegram channel based in Belarus. It can be found at the website of the US embassy in Poland, under the designation WAW-NOFO-FY23-05.
It was unclear when the solicitation was originally posted. However, the deadline for submissions is end of the day Friday, September 15.
According to the post, the goal is to “promote in-depth reporting by local and regional Polish media of the return of Ukrainian families from Poland to Ukraine and their social and physical rebuilding efforts, particularly those built on partnerships between Poles and Ukrainians.”
The articles should fuel “public understanding of the challenges and opportunities faced by Ukrainians” as well as interest in Ukrainian “efforts to return and rebuild” and the “enduring impact of support provided by Polish society to Ukrainian refugees.”
The solicitation suggests the project would actually be given to a Polish NGO, with US embassy staff having “substantial involvement in the grant implementation, including reviewing and approving selection of participants, trainers, and award decisions within the project.”
The NGO would get a grant of $50,000 (about 215,500 zloty at the current exchange rate) and then have Polish journalists compete for portions of the money. The embassy would evaluate their success by the “quality and reach of reports generated.”
The project also includes at least one workshop teaching the reporters “culturally sensitive and trauma-informed manner and how to create compelling human-interest stories in this context,” taught by “experts in the intersection between mental health and journalism in war zones” and others with the relevant experience.
The entire project is slated to run for a single year, though Washington reserves the right to extend that if it’s judged to be “in the best interest of the US Department of State.”
There are approximately one million Ukrainian refugees in Poland at the moment. Multiple surveys of those who settled in EU countries show that more than 40% do not intend to return even if the conflict with Russia ends. Warsaw has reportedly already started sending men of military age back, even as other EU members have refused to do so on human rights grounds.
Life Not so Peachy for Biden as Impeachment Looms
By James Tweedie – Sputnik -13.09.2023
Joe Biden is now facing a congressional probe into his alleged influence-peddling abroad. Ted Harvey, a former senator in the Colorado state legislature, said the allegations were more damaging than impeachment proceedings would be.
Moves to impeach US President Joe Biden will undermine his political support and leadership of the Democratic Party, says a former state legislator.
Republican House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced a formal impeachment inquiry into Biden’s involvement in his son Hunter’s shady business dealings abroad — including in Ukraine during Biden’s time as vice-president to Barack Obama.
Files on Hunter Biden’s abandoned “laptop from hell” and testimony by whistleblowers indicate that the Democrat president sat in on online meetings with his son’s partners where payments in return for political influence were negotiated.
Fellow Republican Ted Harvey told Sputnik that the three main grounds for impeaching a president were “treason, bribery or high crimes and misdemeanors,” and there was copious evidence Biden was guilty of “one of the top two, bribery.”
“The more that comes out about what then Vice President Joe Biden did and his son did and his family did, it rises to the level of bribery and there’s bank statements that show the money coming in,” he pointed out. “There’s bank statements showing that they were distributing the money to various family members.”
“Though most speakers don’t want to do an impeachment, I think that the evidence is getting to a point where they have no other choice than to at least do a very serious investigation and all of the subpoena powers that come along with that,” Harvey said. “And I think it’s only going to get worse for Biden and the Democrats as this unfolds over the next year.”
The pundit argued that Biden’s grip on power was looking more tenuous as Democrats were now “getting very nervous with where the president is in his poll numbers.”
“And then he goes on his trip to Vietnam and Asia, and he is embarrassing not only the country, but he’s embarrassing himself,” Harvey said. “I’m as a partizan of a Republican as you can get, but I felt sorry for the president. Our country is in a terrible position right now where somebody who is obviously lost his cognitive abilities is leading the free world.”
He said Democrats were reluctant to “throw him overboard” before the next election as “Kamala Harris isn’t much better, and it puts their party in even worse position from a public polling perspective.”
But McCarthy continues to drip-feed damaging information on the Biden family to the media — a move seemingly focused on attacking Biden politically, not legally.
“It’s good politics to not provide all of the information that they have on the president until it gets closer to the election, and puts the Democrats in a bind where they already have their horse that they’ve chosen to ride into the 2024 election” Harvey said. “And I think he’s going to be a very compromised the more information that comes out.”
An impeachment may backfire, especially as the Republicans lack the numbers in the Senate to carry it through.
“You don’t want to strengthen Joe Biden. If you look at Bill Clinton when he was impeached, he left office as the most popular president ever and still is the most popular president ever from a polling perspective,” Harvey noted. “Look at Trump — he was impeached twice, and now he’s winning the Republican nomination by 60 percent and he’s beating Joe Biden.”
White House tells media how to cover Biden impeachment
RT | September 13, 2023
White House lawyers have reportedly written a letter directing CNN, the New York Times and other US media outlets to scrutinize Republican lawmakers more aggressively as they try to impeach US President Joe Biden.
CNN and other recipients of the letter acknowledged getting the missive on Wednesday. “It’s time for the media to ramp up its scrutiny of House Republicans for opening an impeachment inquiry based on lies,” Ian Sams, a spokesman for the White House Counsel’s Office, wrote in the letter. He added that the impeachment efforts should “set off alarm bells for news organizations.”
US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) launched the impeachment effort on Tuesday, directing committees of the Republican-controlled House of Representatives to open a formal inquiry. He said allegations of influence-peddling and solicitation of bribes by the Biden family “paint a picture of a culture of corruption.”
Even before receiving any guidance from the White House, some US media outlets already appeared to be trying to protect the president. CNN and Associated Press, for instance, suggested that Republicans were trying to prosecute Biden without having evidence to justify their investigation.
Those outlets apparently ignored such evidence as the sworn testimony of IRS whistleblowers and the records of bank transfers that lawmakers have already revealed. By launching impeachment proceedings, congressional committees will gain more power to subpoena documents that could help prove or debunk the allegations.
Veteran US journalist Matthew Keys, who has worked for such outlets as Reuters and Fox News, said the White House directive on impeachment coverage was “not OK.” He added, “The White House should not be encouraging, influencing or interfering in the editorial strategies of America’s newsrooms, including CNN and the New York Times.” The letter could backfire, Keys said, because “any time the media does try to hold Republicans to account, those lawmakers can simply counter by questioning whether it’s actual journalism or something encouraged by the Biden administration.”
Legal scholar Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University, said the directive “has an uncomfortable feeling of marching orders to the media.” By trying to influence coverage of the impeachment inquiry, he argued, the administration “removes any pretense of separation between the Biden personal legal team and the White House Counsel’s Office.”
Sams, who also serves as a senior adviser to Biden, claimed that Republicans had failed in nearly nine months of investigation to “turn up any evidence of the president doing anything wrong.” He added that impeachment is “grave, rare and historic,” and the press must treat the claims of Republicans with “appropriate scrutiny.” The White House official attached a 14-page appendix to his memo providing talking points to address Republican “lies.”
Democrats previously controlled the House and twice impeached then-President Donald Trump.
Threads Is Already Blacklisting Covid Terms From Search, As Part of New Censorship Campaign
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | September 12, 2023
Meta is once again up to its old tricks. The new social networking app Threads, which was marketed as an alternative to the platform formerly known as Twitter, is now limiting access to information and prohibiting searches related to key terms such as “coronavirus” and “vaccines,” as revealed by the Washington Post.
Despite only being a couple of months old, the platform has already been observed to deliberately muzzle certain search terms in its novel search functionality.
Meta has previously implemented search blackouts around Covid-related terms due to combating what it says is “misinformation.”
Offering an explanation for the obstruction, Meta conceded to the Washington Post, “The search functionality temporarily doesn’t provide results for keywords that may show potentially sensitive content.”
They assured that they would reinstate search results for these terms when they believed the content quality was up to their standards. However, they declined to disclose a complete list of obstructed search terms, leaving users guessing.
Apparently, Meta has opted for strict keyword censorship, instead of engaging in complex debates about what content concerning the Coronavirus should be permissible.
This move is suggestive of their unwillingness to disclose more internal correspondences, many of which came to light during the ongoing inquiries on censorship stemming from COVID-related discussions.
CDC Recommends New Covid Boosters to Everyone Over Six Months of Age
eugyppius: a plague chronicle | September 13, 2023
While Europe has now largely confined Covid vaccination to older and vulnerable groups, the American Centers for Disease Control have chosen a different path. Yesterday, they accepted the advice of an advisory panel and recommended the XBB.1.5 jabs to everyone six months and older. They insist that “the benefits of vaccination exceed the risks for everyone,” and hope vaguely that their “universal recommendation” will “ease the rollout of the vaccine and improve access and equity.”
“Let’s keep America strong, healthy,” said Dr. Camille Kotton, a panel member who voted in favor of the recommendation and who is an infectious disease specialist at Harvard Medical School. “Let’s do away with COVID-19 as best we can by prevention of disease through vaccines. Let’s make things clear.”
The argument is not easy to parse. First, the vaccines are alleged to be universally beneficial, although no studies beyond a “CDC analysis” exist to support this broad claim. Second, the universal recommendation is necessary to ensure “equity” and “make things clear.” In other words, more targeted recommendations would sow confusion and limit their uptake among those groups who would benefit from them. Finally, our Dr. Kotton still hopes that the vaccines can “do away with COVID-19.” Either she knows better or she is stupid, but once again, in the striving after an upside beyond benefits to the individual, we see an implicit acknowledgment that the vaccines aren’t universally beneficial after all.
An important consequence of the pandemic in the United States has been the alienation of a great part of the population from the project of public health in general on the one hand, and the overt politicisation of the CDC on the other. Before 2020, American medical mandarins at least claimed to work on behalf of society as a whole; now and again, they even found occasion to worry about how their recommendations would effect their credibility among the entire population. They have since abandoned this mission, adopting a narrow, much more politicised hygiene extremism. Now they have dropped all pretence, appealing only to the highly radicalised Covidians and the pharmaceuticals. Thus their rhetoric and their advice grows steadily more divorced from reality and reason, even as the actual threat of Covid recedes.
Ironically, the radicalism of the CDC arises from the success of the pandemicist opposition in the United States. America was one of the few Western countries that saw genuine resistance to the lockdowners and the vaccinators, extending even to elements of the political establishment. This opposition did serious damage to the entire enterprise of public health, and now millions of Americans will never care what the CDC says about anything ever again. In Europe, the mainstream parties formed a united front in support of the hygiene dictatorship, permitting our public health institutions to retain some claim to social consensus, however tenuous. On this side of the Atlantic, they still have something to lose, which is an incentive towards moderation.
China releases ‘blueprint’ for integrating with Taiwan
RT | September 13, 2023
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has pitched an economic-integration plan for Taiwan, while at the same time deploying a historically large fleet of warships and aircraft surrounding the self-governing island.
Released on Tuesday by the CCP’s Central Committee and Beijing’s State Council, the proposal was touted as a “blueprint” for Taiwan’s future development. Under the plan, the coastal province of Fujian would become a “demonstration zone” for the integrated development of Taiwan.
The proposal calls for allowing Taiwanese residents to live, work, and study on the mainland, initially in Fujian. Taiwanese businesses would also be allowed to hang a shingle in the neighboring province and would be encouraged to list their shares on Chinese stock exchanges.
Tensions in the Taiwan Strait have escalated in recent years amid rising concerns that China will attack the island. Washington has ramped up weapons sales to Taipei, and US politicians have made controversial visits to the island. China, which claims sovereignty over Taiwan, has vowed to reunify with the breakaway province – by force if necessary. Only 13 nations recognize Taiwan as a sovereign country.
“Solving the Taiwan issue and realizing the complete reunification of the motherland is the unswerving historical task of the Communist Party of China, the common aspiration of all Chinese people, and the inevitable requirement for realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,” the CCP said in its proposal.
Taiwanese MP Wang Ting-yu, a member of the island’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, called the integration blueprint “ridiculous.” Speaking in a video message on Wednesday, he said, “China should think about how it can take care of its bad debts, but not how it can conduct united-front work against Taiwan.”
Dozens of Chinese military planes and warships, including an aircraft carrier, were deployed in the Taiwan Strait this week. The display of military might was reportedly one of Beijing’s largest in recent years.
The inevitable EV implosion
By Ron Ross | American Thinker | September 12, 2023
The electric vehicle honeymoon is over. Don’t expect the marriage itself to last much longer either.
The mass conversion from internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEs) to electric vehicles was never more than a Democrat/environmentalist hallucination anyway. It was the most ill-conceived government policy objective in modern history.
The transition should have been a non-starter. It’s riddled with numerous deal killers. It’s like having a dozen fatal diseases all at the same time.
Any goal as massive as a total conversion from ICE vehicles to EVs requires careful planning and infrastructure preparation. It would necessitate a rapid doubling of electricity generation and grid expansion. In today’s world that’s impossible.
EV promoters could never deliver on their promises. Their grandiose assurances were nothing more than wishful thinking.
There was no market research. Hmm — I wonder why. There were no feasibility studies. Hmm — I wonder why. Did they actually believe everyone would tolerate spending hours to charge their vehicles rather than the minutes they were accustomed to?
Car dealers are resisting further deliveries of EVs because of swelling inventories. Avis and Hertz can’t even get people to rent EVs! Yet, manufacturers are ramping up production just as consumers are balking. Something will have to give, and soon. EV makers and their shareholders will tire of pouring money down a rathole.
We are spending trillions of dollars on a fabricated dream, all for imaginary payoffs decades in the future.
When the EV house of cards collapses what will the reaction be? Ordinarily, for normal persons, it would be a time for regret, rethinking, and humility.
It would be good if the Democrat/environmentalist true believers learned something from the EV debacle. However, the same utopian blindness that caused this fiasco will prevent any lesson-learning on their part. We are more likely to see them doubling down instead.
Ron Ross Ph.D. is a former economics professor and author of The Unbeatable Market. He resides in Arcata. California and can be reached at rossecon@aol.com.
His website is rossecon.com.
The Elites Directing The Energy Transition Really Have No Idea What They Are Doing
By Francis Menton | Manhattan Contrarian | September 06, 2023
We are on our way to Net Zero by 2050. It must be true because everybody says so. The entire $6+ trillion per year federal government is committed to the project, which obviously would not be the case if the whole thing were impossible. Equally fully committed are essentially all of the colleges and universities, where all of the smartest people are to be found. As well as every other elite institution of every kind and sort.
Take the World Economic Forum. If there is a number one elitest among all elite institutions, this has to be it. At their annual confab in Davos, Switzerland, they gather the greatest of geniuses to instruct the very top government and business leaders how to run the world. Would you like to go? It will cost you $52,000 to join the organization, and then an additional $19,000 to attend the conference. Chartering a private jet to get you there will cost thousands more. Once there, you can hear the very smartest people imparting their thoughts on the most important topics of the day, like “The Great Reset,” “Emerging Technologies,” “Diversity and Inclusions,” and, of course, “The Net Zero Transition.”
Is it possible that these people are completely incompetent and have no idea what they are doing?
A reader has sent me the very latest from the WEF on how the world is going to get to Net Zero. The piece has a date of September 5, 2023, and is titled “How battery energy storage can power us to Net Zero.” The authors are three people from the World Bank, with the lead author being one Amit Jain, who is the Bank’s Energy Storage Program Lead. This is the guy on the receiving end of tens of billions of dollars of government money to pass out to make the energy transition happen throughout the developing world.
Now, it so happens that energy storage is something I know a little about, and in particular about the problem of trying to store enough energy to make an electrical grid work without full dispatchable backup. See my energy storage Report, dated December 1, 2022, at this link.
So let’s take a look at Jain, et al.’s, take on how battery storage will “power us to Net Zero.” First, some excited happy talk:
Across the globe, power systems are experiencing a period of unprecedented change. Low-cost renewable electricity is spreading and there is a growing urgency to boost power system resilience and enhance digitalization. This requires stockpiling renewable energy on a massive scale, notably in developing countries, which makes energy storage fundamental. . . .
Making energy storage systems mainstream in the developing world will be a game changer. Deploying battery energy storage systems will provide more comprehensive access to electricity while enabling much greater use of renewable energy, ultimately helping the world meet its Net Zero decarbonization targets. International organizations and development institutions are leading the way forward to enable this decarbonization. . . .
So OK Amit, how much storage are we talking about here?
In 2022, approximately 192GW (gigawatts) of solar and 75GW of wind were installed globally. However, only 16GW/35GWh (gigawatts per hour) of new storage systems were deployed. A recent International Energy Agency analysis finds that although battery energy storage systems have seen strong growth in recent years, grid-scale storage capacity still needs to be scaled up to reach Net Zero Emissions by 2050. . . . To meet our Net Zero ambitions of 2050, annual additions of grid-scale battery energy storage globally must rise to an average of 80 GW annually between now and 2030.
Holy underwear, Batman! Could this guy really not even know what units he’s talking about? Thinking his readers might not understand the abbreviation “GWh” he helpfully defines it as “gigawatts per hour”! Could he really be this clueless? And he had two co-authors to check him!
And then there’s the statement that to meet the 2050 Net Zero ambition, annual deployments of grid-scale batteries “must rise to an average of 80 GW annually.” Of course he is using the wrong units (and undoubtedly does not know that). But let’s give him the benefit of the doubt, and assume that he is talking about the standard batteries available today, which are 4 hour batteries, meaning that 80 GW would provide 320 GWh of storage. If the world would add that much capacity every year from now to 2050, that would come to 8,960 GWh of storage. How have Mr. Jain et al. come to the conclusion that this 8,960 GWh of storage will be enough to “meet our Net Zero ambitions of 2050”? The piece contains no quantitative analysis or backup of any kind to support the proposition that this amount of storage would be sufficient.
My own energy storage Report does contain backup and calculations, although only for certain countries rather than for the whole world. For example, for the United States, the figures cited in my Report are that it would take some 233,000 GWh of battery storage to fully back up the electrical grid, assuming current levels and patterns of usage. Since the U.S. is about 4% of world population, we can multiply that figure by 25 to get the storage requirement for the world (assuming that the world electrifies to the U.S. level by 2050). The total would be 5,825,000 GWh. In other words, Jain, et al., are off by a factor of about 650, give or take maybe a few hundred.
But it’s OK, because Jain and his colleagues have no skin in this game. They just babble some happy talk to get their hands on a few hundred billions of money from rich governments, and pass it out to build impressive-looking battery projects that are actually next to useless to provide reliable grid electricity. They can be very confident that no one in their circles will ever check the math to see if the numbers add up. When 2050 rolls around and the whole thing doesn’t work, they will be long retired on generous pensions.
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How the occupied mentality syndrome works
Saudi Arabia on the American chessboard – Part 3
By B. J. Sabri | American Herald Tribune | June 27, 2016
Read part 2: “The occupied mentality Syndrome“
Previously I argued whether Saudi Arabia’s repeated involvements in U.S. interventions and wars stem from free national will or in response to a specific condition. For starters, in Saudi Arabia there is no national will. In Saudi Arabia, the national will is the will of the Al Saud clan. Still, when a major Arab state allies itself with a superpower that committed unspeakable crimes against humanity in almost every Arab country, then something is wrong. This fact alone should compel us to examine the U.S.-Saudi relation for one exceptional reason. As a result of the U.S.-Saudi wars, hundreds of thousands of people in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen, and Somalia have lost their lives. Millions became displaced in their own homelands. And millions more rendered refugees.
Attributing the Saudi policies to the bonds of “partnership” with the U.S. is frivolous. There are no bonds between these two thugs except those of business, military deals, secret plots, and wars. Proving this point, bonds such as these have no space for the American and Saudi peoples to share significant cultural or societal exchanges. If partnership is not the reason for the Saudi contribution to the U.S. strategy of empire and imperialism, then another reason must exist.
This leads to three possibilities. … continue
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- Hezbollah hits Israeli warship off Lebanon’s coast, sets it aflame
- Iran slams US strikes on B1 bridge, Mahshahr petrochemical plants as ‘blatant acts of state terrorism’
- In letter to UN chief, Araghchi warns of dire consequences of US-Israeli attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities
- Why the CIA conspiracy to invade Iran with Kurdish militias failed
- Why Are Upbeat US Claims About Mission to Rescue Pilot ‘Highly Questionable’?
- Aircraft destroyed during US ‘rescue’ of downed F-15 pilot cost more than $100 million each
- Washington University removes professor who condemned US-Israeli war on Iran
- Russia Warns of Retaliation as UK Authorizes Seizure of Vessels
- Serbia thwarts plot to bomb Russia-Hungary gas pipeline – Vucic
- If Americans Knew
- In Iran, Israel-US take aim at “reason, research, and freedom of thought” – Daily Update
- US loses planes over Iran, Israel downgrades Lebanon war goals – Daily Update
- Israel Is Blocking Palestinians from Easter at Church Where Jesus Resurrected
- Plot to assassinate Palestinian activist follows harassment campaign promoted by Zionist groups and elected officials
- Prominent New York synagogue hosts presentation on why U.S. Jews should support the ethnic cleansing of Gaza
- Tapper vs. Piker: Is the CNN Anchor Auditioning for David Ellison?
- Shouldn’t Democrats Be Able to Condemn Genocide?
- Israel-US kill negotiators, destroy civilian structures, but Iran’s military capabilities still largely intact – Daily Update
- ‘War crime’: Global condemnation as Israeli ministers celebrate death penalty law targeting Palestinian prisoners
- 7 Ways Israel Is Turning Lebanon Into Gaza
- No Tricks Zone
- An Inconvenient Tree: Uncovered In Alps… Europe Much Warmer Than Today 6000 Years Ago
- New Study Reports A 60% Slowdown In Greenland’s Ice Loss Rate In The Last Decade
- Low Intensity Tornado Wrecks Major Solar Farm, Creating A Potential Toxic Dump
- New Study Finds Warming Saves Lives…Cold Temperatures 12 Times More Deadly Than Excess Heat
- German Science Blog Accuses PIK Climate Institute Of Hallucinating Climate Tipping Points
- Devastating Assessment Of Comirnaty Vaccine By Former Senior Pfizer Europe Toxicologist
- New Study: CO2 Is ‘Effectively Negligible’ As An Explanatory Climate Change Factor Since 2000
- Former Pfizer Toxicologist Dr. Helmut Sterz Tells Bundestag Hearing Pfizer Vaccine Should Have Never Been Approved
- Energy Expert: Germany’s Nuclear Phaseout Was A “500 Billion Euro Mistake”
- New Research: South Australia’s Mid-Holocene Sea Surface Temperatures Were 4°C Warmer Than Today
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