[Sixstrings]

China Is Winning the Energy Race

Stop the presses. The United States is no longer the world’s biggest consumer of energy.

After topping the energy consumption charts for more than a century, the U.S. has been left behind as China leapfrogged past. According to the International Energy Association’s (IEA) latest report, China burned its way through 2,252 million tonnes of oil equivalent last year – about 4% more than the U.S.

(The oil-equivalent measure is a bundle of all forms of energy consumed, including crude, coal, nuclear, natural gas, and renewable resources.)

That’s an astonishing turnaround, according to IEA chief economist Fatih Birol, who noted that as recently as 2000, the U.S. consumed twice as much energy as China.



http://www.zerohedge.com/article/guest-post-china-winning-energy-race
http://www.caseyresearch.com/crpmkt/crpSolo.php?id=193&ppref=ZHB193ED0810A

Wow, that really puts things into perspective.. in 2000, the US used TWICE as much energy as China, and now in 2010 China has eclipsed us and is still growing while we're in sharp decline.

Not that using more energy is exactly a good thing, in the context of peak oil. But eyeballing that chart, looks like the US is more than twice as dependent on oil than China is. While oil is a huge portion of our energy mix, it looks like in China oil is about the same as hydro power.

[Sixstrings]

Shucks, I finally post something about energy and nobody's interested.

[americandream]

Tell us something we don't already know.

[IslandCrow]

I am not sure about the 'winning' part... I know China has huge currency reserves, but they will have to pay for the energy (either in $ or the life of their miners or....)

[Mesuge]

Nice to see it in this visual form, what this also brings forward is the fact, that the american way of using energy was a multi generational thing, while in case of china it's just freak spike, that has got many consequences. In any case the China question can be dealt with genetically matched bioweapons, which the U.S. posses, sooner or later it will be on the table, nukes are the least to worry about..

[dissident]

genetically matched bioweapons

Some war planners may dream of this but reality isn't so simple. The medical industry can't even custom engineer antibodies (growing them in vats of bacteria is hardly manufacturing) and supposedly some secret lab has. DNA is a set of constraints and not a recipe book (ever wonder how the children from the same parents can all be different). To actually target an ethnic group with some hypothetical bioweapon you need molecules to target. The problem is that ethnic groups don't have unique molecular compositions of their cell walls. If you want to attack the DNA directly, then I say you are SOL since no molecular construct can process the macroscopic features of the DNA. There are no ethnic group specific amino acids, just slight differences in their ordering.

Back on topic, the Chinese energy use history demonstrates that its GDP growth is real and not a fraud as claimed by various sore loser pundits in the west. These claims don't pass the simplest of plausibility checks. For example, the supposed massive real estate bubble in China. There is a solid base of demand for new housing in China which is not, like in the USA or Canada, some capital investment "plan". The Chinese demand is akin to the one after WWII in North America and nobody would call that one a "bubble".

[Mesuge]

That's fair comparison, the chinese housing market is certainly not a classic speculative bubble in the sense of empty skyscrapers in Quatar. But I was talking about something else, from these graphs you can see the new living standards/luxuries/energy usage are still novelty in their culture/society. In comparison in the U.S. it's a multigenerational thing, widespread phenomenon this high energy adoption process. Does it make any difference in terms of "fighting" for the status quo at all? I think so, the average american would nuke without mercy when forced to perform adjustments in his non-negotiable living standards, I'm not so sure about the chinese at this time, perhaps when their generation growing up since 1980s in steel/concrete/glass approaches 50yrs and occupy the key gov. positions it will be plus/minus the same..

[efarmer]

Oh no! China is winning the energy race. Does this mean that we now have the dreaded coal gap, and our energy penis has shriveled and is now in second place?

Quick, get a news helicopter up in New York and see if the Statue of Liberty has a tear running down her cheek. Her main man has combustile dysfunction.

[hillsidedigger]

Note from the charts that China is burning over twice as much coal as the U.S. and of course they don't mind burning relatively dirty coal nor do they care to cost themselves extra money by installing smokestack scrubbers so it's safe to say that China is putting more than 3 times the coal ash, soot and smoke into the atmosphere as does the U.S..

[Sixstrings]

America may be $$ bankrupt, and at a hard- strech could become self sufficient (SUV has to go !!), but China will quite literally explode from within, and soon.

I don't know about that.. why would they "explode from within" now, when even if they have a major downturn living standards there are still miles ahead of what they've ever been in the past? Remember, this is a country that had mass famine under Chairman Mao and yet there was no revolution or civil disorder (that the government couldn't stamp out anyway).

[oddone]

Note from the charts that China is burning over twice as much coal as the U.S. and of course they don't mind burning relatively dirty coal nor do they care to cost themselves extra money by installing smokestack scrubbers so it's safe to say that China is putting more than 3 times the coal ash, soot and smoke into the atmosphere as does the U.S..

Don't forget they're burning that dirty energy for us, so we can have the stuff we "need" as cheap as possible.

With the regulations on pollution and wages in the western world, forget any locally produced goods in your shopping trolley

[Ludi]

With the regulations on pollution and wages in the western world, forget any locally produced goods in your shopping trolley

Some of us can find domestic products.

http://www.madeinusaforever.com/

http://www.sasshoes.com/main/our_factory.php

[Sixstrings]

With the regulations on pollution and wages in the western world, forget any locally produced goods in your shopping trolley

Some of us can find domestic products.

http://www.madeinusaforever.com/

http://www.sasshoes.com/main/our_factory.php

Good links, Ludi. But boy there is a cost difference.. this T-shirt for example:



That's one T-shirt for $15.95 (plus shipping and handling I assume). Whereas I think I can get a pack of 4 or 5 at Walmart for about $10.

[Pretorian]

China produces a shitload of food. They dont need anybody to feed them. In fact I am pretty sure their food exports exceed their imports. From what I remember, they produce 80% of all world's garlic, well over a half of watermelons and a ton of other stuff. Being world's number one producer of wheat, rice, potatoes also helps. Sorry to burst your dream-bubble. What Britain will eat is more interesting question, by far.

[Ludi]

Good links, Ludi. But boy there is a cost difference...

Yes, I guess it depends on your priorities. We drive about 45 miles to the SAS factory to buy a pair of shoes each once or twice a year. We buy no other shoes.

People have chosen cheapness over maintaining manufacturing in the US, in general. That was their priority - lots of cheap stuff rather than a few items of high quality.

[Sixstrings]

Yes, I guess it depends on your priorities. We drive about 45 miles to the SAS factory to buy a pair of shoes each once or twice a year. We buy no other shoes.

The problem though is that not even the wealthy buy American. There was a news story about a week ago about John Kerry buying a new yacht that was made in New Zealand. Kiwis are great people and all, but a yacht purchase like that could have provided work for an entire town in Massachusetts. And then to rub salt in the wound, he tried to dock it in another state to skip out on taxes!

So what you're doing is admirable Ludi, but the rich will continue to invest their money in China, they'll continue to buy imports, and they'll continue to ship jobs offshore.

[Rod_Cloutier]

China's food production is mostly dependant on fossil aquifiers, which are being depleted at an alarming rate:

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100713/ ... 6308a.html

Just like human's reaped the bounty of fossil carbon, fossil water also has limits and real time/capacity issues with the rate of recharge of these aquifiers. When the fossil water is gone so goes China's food production.

[Pretorian]

China's food production is mostly dependant on fossil aquifiers, which are being depleted at an alarming rate:

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100713/ ... 6308a.html

yes but that is the case pretty much worldwide. Meantime, I'll be surprised if China doesn't feed an ungodly amounts of millions of people outside their borders. Just look up anything and look how much of it is produced in China.