7 ms·

Most People Are Not Prepared for the Extent of the Energy Crisis

26 points by RadixDLT 4y ago

RadixDLT 4y ago
What happens when that many people aren't able to collect a paycheck for months at a time? What type of animalistic caveman shit are we about to see unleashed on the world?
- paulkrush 4y ago
  For sure cats living with dogs, etc etc... https://youtu.be/-sED4fzIV0k https://youtu.be/-sED4fzIV0k
- noneeeed 4y ago
  I feel fairly confident we in the UK are heading into a deep and long recession/depression. I really hope I’m wrong, but I really don’t see how we get out of the current situation quickly.
  - shapefrog 4y ago
    While I am confident that there will be a recession, indeed probably already in one, I suspect it will only really impact the poor and brexity parts of the country.
superchroma 4y ago
In my opinion, if you have a business running consistently without any slack, you don't have a real business, it's a zombie business. It's a risky gamble on whether things may improve. Sure, you're paying the bills, today, but when something happens you're toast, and unfortunately, things do tend to happen. I'm not sure it's possible to gesture to many times in history where there wasn't changes occurring, and that's not even factoring in people's personal turmoils either. And I do think governments have a direct role they can play here, but, maybe also, something that they don't do much of is messaging. I wonder if there's a place to reach out to people running businesses like these and provide some sort of free business counselling, advice or guidance. Maybe some of these business owners would benefit from being reminded about their situations. Many won't, as they have emotional investments in their businesses and probably won't want to hear bad news, but maybe some can be helped? My impression of Americans is that many of them truly believe themselves to be temporarily embarrassed millionaires and also believe that rewards and stability come through the liberal application of enough hard work and years of unrewarded effort. Sometimes that is true, but there are scores who don't achieve what they're after with these methods, particularly because failure is basically invisible (!). Generally I think that it may be time to look at retiring these memes.
- AndrewKemendo 4y ago
  How do you define "slack?"
  - superchroma 4y ago
    The obvious one is a financial buffer, as you can pave over many issues with money, but there are other factors like having some free personal time, friends to be able to reach out to, etc, that are equivalently valuable in a pinch.
- physicsguy 4y ago
  With super low interest rates for a long time and government financial support during COVID, the number of zombie businesses surviving longer than they probably should has been enormous. But with that said, it’s not something to celebrate, people’s lives are hugely affected when they lose employment.
  - superchroma 4y ago
    Absolutely, I am hugely sympathetic because a lot of people who invested everything they have and got emotionally invested are going to lose their shirts if things get worse.
  - imtringued 4y ago
    Zombie companies die the moment they have to compete over employees.
- rezbull 4y ago
  You would be surprised to learn that majority of small businesses that you buy from on a daily basis operate on razor thin margins.
  - superchroma 4y ago
    I'm not, and it's not ok they do, either. I'm not condemning the way they run, I'm sad we as a society cut everything so close to the bone that this became normal.
EricBurnett 4y ago
> My mum owns a small café in Leicester. Her electricity bill has just jumped from £10k ($12k) a year to £55k ($64k) a year. > Callum's mum may try to avoid shuttering her doors by raising her prices by more than 5x but that will result in $13 chocolate crossiants and $20 iced lattes. What kind of flawed reasoning is this? The net prices will only have to go up 5x if the price is the product originally was 100% covering the cost of electricity. In practice, it'll probably need to go up something <2x to maintain the same profit margins, with other costs (e.g. wages, property) trickling up at a slower pace (years) as the overall economy adjusts. Which is material, no doubt, but let's not lose ourselves to hysteria here.
- LatteLazy 4y ago
  Brits love a good moan, and exaggerating issues by at least 10x is standard. Source: I live here. :(
  - shapefrog 4y ago
    Chocolate crossiants and iced lattes in Leicester - is she having a laugh ...
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    The UK is getting hit much harder than other countries. People talk about Germany being dependent on gas but for heating I think they're about 50% gas while in the UK it's more like 80% and the UK is far behind in insulating homes to be cheaper to heat. Combine with a government that doesn't actually want to help (which may explain why the houses are so expensive to heat in the first place) and it'll hit much harder. Combine with a political system designed to let a minority keep control plus Brexit and things could get bad. Note, I don't think the problem is unsolvable, I just think a lot of the people responsible for solving it will be looking for ways to make themselves money from the chaos.
    - LatteLazy 4y ago
      Yeah, I find the whole nations issues sort of confusing though. We have spent the last 10-15 years voting to make things worse. Our political systems are shit, and we decided NOT to change them. Our PM is a joke and won by a landslide. Now everyone is acting surprised that the place is getting worse, the government are incompetent and nothing can be done about it. I am sorry for people who didn't vote for this (including myself), but I have to admit we are a minority and we should really just emigrate...
robertlagrant 4y ago
Hopefully the first people to use less energy will be bitcoin miners.
- superchroma 4y ago
  Yes that was my first thought too. It's unfortunate that this parasitic class who made the energy crisis worse is now being vocal in this way, but I tried to accept it at face value and engage with the content.
- imtringued 4y ago
  They do because the price dropped.
yawnxyz 4y ago
Ok is the embedded Tiktok video of a "Linkedin employee's day" satire or what it's actually like to work at Linkedin? I honestly can't really tell...
- pcthrowaway 4y ago
  Linked on twitter as satire, but I think the Tiktok account it's sourced from is actually not intentionally satirical (though I'm aghast that someone could be so clueless) The referenced tweet for those wondering: https://twitter.com/coldhealing/status/1541826643681058817 https://twitter.com/coldhealing/status/1541826643681058817
ornornor 4y ago
Underwhelming article. Says nothing of substance, materially wrong (5x increase in electricity bill doesn’t mean you have to 5x your prices), with a little libertarian sparkled throughout.
w______roy 4y ago
> Slowly but surely, decision after decision, cut by cut, the insatiable desire of central authorities to stick their fingers in every part of your life has led to the brute forcing of encroachments on the free market that has given a very select group of people control over money, energy, food, healthcare, and your "civil liberties". Insanely naive libertarian point of view with an axe to grind. Honestly kind of embarrassing, reads like it was written by a teenager. And implying the 2020s are a disappointment compared to the roaring ‘20s is really telling.
mikewarot 4y ago
If the situation in Russia goes poorly, the gas wells will be allowed to freeze, and all that production goes offline, effectively forever. At the same time, large methane leaks form from all the cracked well casings and pipes. It would be the worst of both worlds, forced to cut consumption (and standard of living), while creating an actual ecological disaster. Energy Blindness[1] is a huge problem right now, people have no idea how much energy is used in all the goods and services common in their lives. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T19tHn_LA80 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T19tHn_LA80
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  We're just entering an era where tracing methane leaks down to individual city dumps or cattle feedlots is possible, so Russia's gas wells freezing and then them being forced to capture the methane leaks would probably be an overall good thing.
  - mikewarot 4y ago
    How can they capture the methane leaks, if they can't even repair the wells in the first place? They don't have the logistics to do so.
    - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
      They can pay someone to do it.
      - karottenreibe 4y ago
        That sounds unlikely
heynowheynow 4y ago
Climate change emergency being played out around the world as storms, fires, and famines enters the chat. In terms of priorities: shelter, food, and water are more important than having a tiny shop with large utility bills. Pakistan, India, Somalia, Ethiopia, and so on are dealing right now with life-and-death consequences of using the sky as a sewer.

26 points by RadixDLT 4y ago

What happens when that many people aren't able to collect a paycheck for months at a time? What type of animalistic caveman shit are we about to see unleashed on the world?

paulkrush 4y ago
For sure cats living with dogs, etc etc... https://youtu.be/-sED4fzIV0k https://youtu.be/-sED4fzIV0k
noneeeed 4y ago
I feel fairly confident we in the UK are heading into a deep and long recession/depression. I really hope I’m wrong, but I really don’t see how we get out of the current situation quickly.
- shapefrog 4y ago
  While I am confident that there will be a recession, indeed probably already in one, I suspect it will only really impact the poor and brexity parts of the country.

superchroma 4y ago

In my opinion, if you have a business running consistently without any slack, you don't have a real business, it's a zombie business. It's a risky gamble on whether things may improve. Sure, you're paying the bills, today, but when something happens you're toast, and unfortunately, things do tend to happen. I'm not sure it's possible to gesture to many times in history where there wasn't changes occurring, and that's not even factoring in people's personal turmoils either. And I do think governments have a direct role they can play here, but, maybe also, something that they don't do much of is messaging. I wonder if there's a place to reach out to people running businesses like these and provide some sort of free business counselling, advice or guidance. Maybe some of these business owners would benefit from being reminded about their situations. Many won't, as they have emotional investments in their businesses and probably won't want to hear bad news, but maybe some can be helped? My impression of Americans is that many of them truly believe themselves to be temporarily embarrassed millionaires and also believe that rewards and stability come through the liberal application of enough hard work and years of unrewarded effort. Sometimes that is true, but there are scores who don't achieve what they're after with these methods, particularly because failure is basically invisible (!). Generally I think that it may be time to look at retiring these memes.

AndrewKemendo 4y ago
How do you define "slack?"
- superchroma 4y ago
  The obvious one is a financial buffer, as you can pave over many issues with money, but there are other factors like having some free personal time, friends to be able to reach out to, etc, that are equivalently valuable in a pinch.
physicsguy 4y ago
With super low interest rates for a long time and government financial support during COVID, the number of zombie businesses surviving longer than they probably should has been enormous. But with that said, it’s not something to celebrate, people’s lives are hugely affected when they lose employment.
- superchroma 4y ago
  Absolutely, I am hugely sympathetic because a lot of people who invested everything they have and got emotionally invested are going to lose their shirts if things get worse.
- imtringued 4y ago
  Zombie companies die the moment they have to compete over employees.
rezbull 4y ago
You would be surprised to learn that majority of small businesses that you buy from on a daily basis operate on razor thin margins.
- superchroma 4y ago
  I'm not, and it's not ok they do, either. I'm not condemning the way they run, I'm sad we as a society cut everything so close to the bone that this became normal.

EricBurnett 4y ago

> My mum owns a small café in Leicester. Her electricity bill has just jumped from £10k ($12k) a year to £55k ($64k) a year. > Callum's mum may try to avoid shuttering her doors by raising her prices by more than 5x but that will result in $13 chocolate crossiants and $20 iced lattes. What kind of flawed reasoning is this? The net prices will only have to go up 5x if the price is the product originally was 100% covering the cost of electricity. In practice, it'll probably need to go up something <2x to maintain the same profit margins, with other costs (e.g. wages, property) trickling up at a slower pace (years) as the overall economy adjusts. Which is material, no doubt, but let's not lose ourselves to hysteria here.

LatteLazy 4y ago
Brits love a good moan, and exaggerating issues by at least 10x is standard. Source: I live here. :(
- shapefrog 4y ago
  Chocolate crossiants and iced lattes in Leicester - is she having a laugh ...
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  The UK is getting hit much harder than other countries. People talk about Germany being dependent on gas but for heating I think they're about 50% gas while in the UK it's more like 80% and the UK is far behind in insulating homes to be cheaper to heat. Combine with a government that doesn't actually want to help (which may explain why the houses are so expensive to heat in the first place) and it'll hit much harder. Combine with a political system designed to let a minority keep control plus Brexit and things could get bad. Note, I don't think the problem is unsolvable, I just think a lot of the people responsible for solving it will be looking for ways to make themselves money from the chaos.
  - LatteLazy 4y ago
    Yeah, I find the whole nations issues sort of confusing though. We have spent the last 10-15 years voting to make things worse. Our political systems are shit, and we decided NOT to change them. Our PM is a joke and won by a landslide. Now everyone is acting surprised that the place is getting worse, the government are incompetent and nothing can be done about it. I am sorry for people who didn't vote for this (including myself), but I have to admit we are a minority and we should really just emigrate...

robertlagrant 4y ago

Hopefully the first people to use less energy will be bitcoin miners.

superchroma 4y ago
Yes that was my first thought too. It's unfortunate that this parasitic class who made the energy crisis worse is now being vocal in this way, but I tried to accept it at face value and engage with the content.
imtringued 4y ago
They do because the price dropped.

yawnxyz 4y ago

Ok is the embedded Tiktok video of a "Linkedin employee's day" satire or what it's actually like to work at Linkedin? I honestly can't really tell...

pcthrowaway 4y ago
Linked on twitter as satire, but I think the Tiktok account it's sourced from is actually not intentionally satirical (though I'm aghast that someone could be so clueless) The referenced tweet for those wondering: https://twitter.com/coldhealing/status/1541826643681058817 https://twitter.com/coldhealing/status/1541826643681058817

ornornor 4y ago

Underwhelming article. Says nothing of substance, materially wrong (5x increase in electricity bill doesn’t mean you have to 5x your prices), with a little libertarian sparkled throughout.

w______roy 4y ago

> Slowly but surely, decision after decision, cut by cut, the insatiable desire of central authorities to stick their fingers in every part of your life has led to the brute forcing of encroachments on the free market that has given a very select group of people control over money, energy, food, healthcare, and your "civil liberties". Insanely naive libertarian point of view with an axe to grind. Honestly kind of embarrassing, reads like it was written by a teenager. And implying the 2020s are a disappointment compared to the roaring ‘20s is really telling.

mikewarot 4y ago

If the situation in Russia goes poorly, the gas wells will be allowed to freeze, and all that production goes offline, effectively forever. At the same time, large methane leaks form from all the cracked well casings and pipes. It would be the worst of both worlds, forced to cut consumption (and standard of living), while creating an actual ecological disaster. Energy Blindness[1] is a huge problem right now, people have no idea how much energy is used in all the goods and services common in their lives. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T19tHn_LA80 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T19tHn_LA80

ZeroGravitas 4y ago
We're just entering an era where tracing methane leaks down to individual city dumps or cattle feedlots is possible, so Russia's gas wells freezing and then them being forced to capture the methane leaks would probably be an overall good thing.
- mikewarot 4y ago
  How can they capture the methane leaks, if they can't even repair the wells in the first place? They don't have the logistics to do so.
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    They can pay someone to do it.
    - karottenreibe 4y ago
      That sounds unlikely

heynowheynow 4y ago

Climate change emergency being played out around the world as storms, fires, and famines enters the chat. In terms of priorities: shelter, food, and water are more important than having a tiny shop with large utility bills. Pakistan, India, Somalia, Ethiopia, and so on are dealing right now with life-and-death consequences of using the sky as a sewer.