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The end of oil

GOVERNMENTS ‘FIDDLE’ AS OIL SUPPLY BURNS

The world’s oil supply is under siege on all sides.

Not only has the market lost 3 million barrels a day of Russian oil due to sanctions, we have seen a string of fires, explosions, supply breakdowns and strikes take out oil refineries worldwide.

On Monday, South Africa declared a ‘force majeure’ at Naref, its last working oil refinery, due to ‘delivery delays.  That means SA’s whole refinery fleet is out of action.

In, Libya, oil production has collapsed from 1.2 million barrels a day to 100,000 barrels, while in the US, Executive Orders have closed the Keystone Pipeline and major fields off the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska Inlet.

Biden is now desperately releasing a million barrels a day from America’s strategic oil reserve, which fell to its lowest level since 1985 this week.

Nearly 1 million bpd of oil refining capacity has been lost in the US since 2020, with five refineries shut down and more closures planned.

Chevron’s CEO told Bloomberg recently: ‘there will never be another new refinery built on US soil’.

In Australia, Chevron announced the closure of WA’s largest oil field by 2025.  This follows the closure of two refineries and dozens of offshore oil fields including shutdowns at the Curtis Island project in Gladstone.

New Zealand protestors, meanwhile, have been camped at Bream Bay for 100 days calling on the government to reopen NZ’s sole oil refinery at Marsden Point.

The whole world, meanwhile, has stopped investing in oil.

Today, there are just 507 oil fields producing more than 500,000 bpd. Most are 50+ years old with 60 percent decline rates.

Replacing these fields will take years and trillions of dollars but despite the surging demand and exploding price, there is no sign anywhere of governments preparing to invest in exploration.

Oil investment peaked in 2015 at a trillion dollars, falling to 583 billion in 2016.

Funny that.

2015 was the year governments worldwide signed on to Agenda 2030 and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals?

What are the odds that hundreds of billions of oil investment were then cancelled or postponed?

Without oil, the world would grind to a halt.

Factories would stop running, Ships, trucks, cars, tractors and airplanes would all sputter to a standstill and rust.

It is the indispensable energy that powers everything from industry, agriculture, transportation and construction.

So where are the oil ‘resilience plans’ or ‘emergency preparedness strategies’?

There aren’t any.

We don’t even have the baseline analysis needed to prepare such a thing.

The one bright spot is that people are finally waking up to the fact that ‘green tech’ won’t save them.

The ‘Green New Deal’ is NOT working.

Just ask all those Germans madly chopping firewood to prepare for winter!

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Smart Cities

RELAX, IT’S ALL PART OF THE AGENDA …

Over the last twenty years, a “planning revolution” has taken place in Australia.

A revolution brought to you courtesy of ICLEI – (International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives – Local Governments for Sustainability) – an international association of local councils, committed to implementing the UN’s Agenda 21/Sustainable Development at the local level.

What bothers me the most about ICLEI, is that it is an international NGO made up of local governments that hold private meetings on council policy that aren’t open – or accountable – to the people of Queensland.

Members are given webinar training sessions, regional workshops, international peer networking opportunities and a library of local government model ordinances, policies and resolutions.

ICLEI also represents Australia’s local governments at the UN’s Climate Conferences.

According to Australia’s Constitution, local governments are not supposed to engage in foreign policy.  That includes forming international alliances, treaties and/or agreements.

But, I’ve noticed that Australia’s Constitution no longer seems to be enforced.  Governments just do what they want regardless.

In any event, ICLEI initiatives have transformed Queensland radically on the principle that all human habitation must be restricted to land within the “Urban Growth Boundaries” of our cities, or “human settlement zones”.

Under ICLEI’s guidance, councils have revised zoning laws to allow high-density and small-lot development in urban areas, while imposing more and more restrictions on land uses in non-urban regions.

They want people off the land and into cramped, overpriced inner city apartments on the train line, where there’s no yard, no privacy and no parking.

At the policy level, rural and remote regions are being starved – or drip-fed – the revenue they need to maintain infrastructure and services.

Council roads are not maintained, parks and sporting facilities are left to rot, while police stations and hospitals are shut down.

Monies are instead diverted into ‘sustainability initiatives’ and ‘inner-city revitalisation’ programs.

Call it Smart Growth.  Call it Sustainable Development.  Call it Green Zoning, Capacity Building, Catalysing Change, Creative Pathways or whatever you like – it all amounts to one thing: a top-down, authoritarian agenda, with no input from the public.

Everything is done using phony neighbourhood groups and paid facilitators, trained at presenting a range of choices geared towards a pre-determined outcome.

It is only the illusion of ‘public buy-in’ they want.

Meanwhile, they have created so many planning boards, commissions, regional agencies, non-profits, roundtables, panels and committees, it is impossible for anyone to keep up with what is going on.

One thing, though, is unmistakable.

Everything that is happening, was meant to happen.

The plan is to restrict your choices, limit your funds, increase your anxiety, narrow your freedom and take away your voice.

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