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"exporting your own oil and gas to be able to have a 'clean' (and up to recently heavily subsidized) transportation network is in a way just a gigantic bookkeep

"exporting your own oil and gas to be able to have a 'clean' (and up to recently heavily subsidized) transportation network is in a way just a gigantic bookkeeping trick" How so? If every oil exporter used some of their oil revenue to switch to EVs, that would, all things equal, hasten the transition to EVs. The U.S. is not doing that.

yndoendo 7mo ago
I still find it funny when it comes to oil between the USA and Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia started moving the electrical system to renewables where USA is doubling down on fossil fuels. Saudi Arabia is the drug dealer that knows you don't consumer your own supply unless you must were the USA consumes the crack they sell. My next vehicle will 100% be pure EV, not Tesla.
- appreciatorBus 7mo ago
  > the drug dealer that knows you don't consumer your own supply unless you must So true. There's nothing incompatible at all with: a) realizing that earth has gifted you with a valuable but limited & polluting energy source b) realizing that you'd be foolish to get you own country hooked on it, but it's not a bad business if you can get other countries hooked on it. Instead we get oil rich areas seemingly determined to show off how much of their oil they can waste.
  - rob74 7mo ago
    Wow, so now the US oil barons who lobbied Trump to kill renewables and EVs are even worse than Mohammed "Bonesaw*" bin Salman Al Saud? That's really something, if you look at it that way... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Jamal_Khashoggi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Jamal_Khashog...
    - jacquesm 7mo ago
      Either you're too smart for me or I just can't follow you, but could you please expand a bit on your comment? I find it hard to link it to the parent, but I realize that may be on me.
      - rob74 7mo ago
        Sorry, it was referring more to the grandparent comment, that referred to Saudi Arabia behaving more responsibly than the US, and Mohammed bin Salman is of course the crown prince and prime minister of Saudi Arabia.
        svpk 7mo ago
        They're comparing Saudi Arabia to a drug dealer; I don't think they're ascribing any moral virtue to the Saudi regime. They just believe the Saudis are acting more intelligently.
    - Retric 7mo ago
      How you use worse implies a wider judgment than how someone behaves on a single issue. Real people are more complicated than Disney characters.
    - raw_anon_1111 7mo ago
      How many people have Trump’s wars in Venezuela and Iran killed?
    - deaux 7mo ago
      Yes? I don't think you can argue in good faith that the latter causes more total harm and damage than the former. It's really quite something to look at it in a different way..
- bluGill 7mo ago
  The US is moving the grid renewable. The guys at top might not think so and yell loudly not to, but they can't stop things, only put the brakes on a little.
  - ourmandave 7mo ago
    They've pumped the brakes pretty hard by cutting EPA standards, subsidizing coal, suing to stop wind and solar projects, cutting green energy grants by $8B, yoinking solar tax credits, trying to rewrite the Clean Air Act to block states from regulating emissions, shield Big Oil from litigation for climate deception, and repeating Big Oil's lies and disinformation.
    - jdlshore 7mo ago
      The economics are against them nonetheless. Solar + battery is seeing massive rollouts.
      - deaux 7mo ago
        Those rollouts are seeing massive cutbacks from what I've read, as half the country is straight up banning new solar. Good luck ever getting that off the books.
        bluGill 7mo ago
        I don't think it will be that hard. Banning solar is a feel good thing now that doesn't affect many people - but that means when the next election is gone it won't be opposed when lobbyists (and greens) try to roll it back. Of course each state is different, so some it will take more than a few elections. In some states solar is already widespread enough that you can't ban it because too many people already have it and know enough about it to tell their friends. Those friends who live in other states will start to ask why they don't. Remember you need to keep the 20 year plan in mind. If you only look to the end of 2026 things are hopeless, but look to 2050 (and compare to 2000) and things look much better.
        7mo ago
- ericmay 7mo ago
  The oil market is global and the US is a big part of that but it’s not the only one. You can always make changes to energy sources later and as new technologies are unlocked perhaps we can even skip some headaches now. Obviously there’s the geostrategic angle now which you see play out in Iran and Venezuela. As other countries move to reliance on Chinese rare earth processing for renewable technology, it drives their oil and gas consumption down which means more oil and gas for those who are still using it. If you really want to look at this analogy about drug dealers then really what you see is that America is the big boss here and an energy and military super power, and Saudi Arabia is just another dealer under American protection and if they don’t do what we tell them to do they’ll get the boot.
- spicymaki 7mo ago
  Like the drug dealers where I grew up they are making the neighborhood a really terrible place to live. They might have a nice house right now, but the homes around them are burning.
- laughing_man 7mo ago
  Transitioning to renewables makes economic sense for the Saudis because they make more money selling a barrel of oil for transportation fuel and generating power with wind and solar. The US has vast reserves of coal and natural gas. We generally don't use oil to generate power either -- oil is something like 0.4% of the total power generated, because we have vast amounts of natural gas and coal to use instead. The situation isn't the result of some crafty master plan on the part of the Saudis. It's jusut what makes sense.
  - ZeroGravitas 7mo ago
    But in the context of the current topic, USA could be demonstrating their technical prowess and running EVs off this amazing coal and gas bounty. Instead they seem to be in a cycle of buying massive inefficient vehicles and then getting annoyed at gas prices. Oil is 2/5ths of US energy use.
- Tagbert 7mo ago
  The funny thing is the US doesn’t really consume much Saudi Oil. The US is a net exporter of oil, though they do import some specific types of oils and export more of others. The US’s interest in the Middle East oil is a lot about stabilizing oil prices. At least it used to be when there was a rational policy and competent executors.
  - deleted 7mo ago
    [deleted]
- kortilla 7mo ago
  The electrical system is unrelated to oil for transportation.
jasonfarnon 7mo ago
"If every oil exporter used some of their oil revenue to switch to EVs, that would, all things equal, hasten the transition to EVs." The premise is all things aren't equal. The oil Norway would have used just gets used somewhere else so what difference does it make what Norway does instead. I don't know if that's the reality of the situation but if it is just an offset, it does sound like a bookkeeping trick doesn't it?
- blargey 7mo ago
  Norway switching from ICEs to EVs objectively reduces global oil consumption+burning by exactly that much. Norway exporting oil increases oil supply, but doesn't increase consumption. The world's oil consumers are not supply-constrained; the producers are not running at 100% capacity, and they'll happily pick up the slack if Norway just stopped exporting oil for no reason. And there's a large amount of consumption that can't be offset by electrification in the first place (petrochemicals, long distance flight, etc) so there's not even a theoretical future end-state where they require a non-EV-using counterparty to buy their oil to fund their EV usage. Calling it a "bookkeeping trick" is just verbal sleigh-of-hand.
  - patmorgan23 7mo ago
    Increases in supply also increase consumption, we use lots of cheap stuff, but not very much of expensive stuff.
    - jonasdegendt 7mo ago
      This would be true but you're not accounting for OPEC and other groups (e.g. historically the Texas Railroad Commission in the United States, not sure how relevant they still are) to balance production and price per barrel to what they think is agreeable. Oil hasn't been supply constrained since the 50's, it's price is largely based on what producing countries agree on, as well as geopolitics. Additionally, governments levy a decent amount of taxes on certain end products such as gasoline. They might very well, as they have in the past, decide to simply up their tax revenue as prices of crude and derivatives go down.

yndoendo 7mo ago

I still find it funny when it comes to oil between the USA and Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia started moving the electrical system to renewables where USA is doubling down on fossil fuels. Saudi Arabia is the drug dealer that knows you don't consumer your own supply unless you must were the USA consumes the crack they sell. My next vehicle will 100% be pure EV, not Tesla.

appreciatorBus 7mo ago
> the drug dealer that knows you don't consumer your own supply unless you must So true. There's nothing incompatible at all with: a) realizing that earth has gifted you with a valuable but limited & polluting energy source b) realizing that you'd be foolish to get you own country hooked on it, but it's not a bad business if you can get other countries hooked on it. Instead we get oil rich areas seemingly determined to show off how much of their oil they can waste.
- rob74 7mo ago
  Wow, so now the US oil barons who lobbied Trump to kill renewables and EVs are even worse than Mohammed "Bonesaw*" bin Salman Al Saud? That's really something, if you look at it that way... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Jamal_Khashoggi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Jamal_Khashog...
  - jacquesm 7mo ago
    Either you're too smart for me or I just can't follow you, but could you please expand a bit on your comment? I find it hard to link it to the parent, but I realize that may be on me.
    - rob74 7mo ago
      Sorry, it was referring more to the grandparent comment, that referred to Saudi Arabia behaving more responsibly than the US, and Mohammed bin Salman is of course the crown prince and prime minister of Saudi Arabia.
      - svpk 7mo ago
        They're comparing Saudi Arabia to a drug dealer; I don't think they're ascribing any moral virtue to the Saudi regime. They just believe the Saudis are acting more intelligently.
  - Retric 7mo ago
    How you use worse implies a wider judgment than how someone behaves on a single issue. Real people are more complicated than Disney characters.
  - raw_anon_1111 7mo ago
    How many people have Trump’s wars in Venezuela and Iran killed?
  - deaux 7mo ago
    Yes? I don't think you can argue in good faith that the latter causes more total harm and damage than the former. It's really quite something to look at it in a different way..
bluGill 7mo ago
The US is moving the grid renewable. The guys at top might not think so and yell loudly not to, but they can't stop things, only put the brakes on a little.
- ourmandave 7mo ago
  They've pumped the brakes pretty hard by cutting EPA standards, subsidizing coal, suing to stop wind and solar projects, cutting green energy grants by $8B, yoinking solar tax credits, trying to rewrite the Clean Air Act to block states from regulating emissions, shield Big Oil from litigation for climate deception, and repeating Big Oil's lies and disinformation.
  - jdlshore 7mo ago
    The economics are against them nonetheless. Solar + battery is seeing massive rollouts.
    - deaux 7mo ago
      Those rollouts are seeing massive cutbacks from what I've read, as half the country is straight up banning new solar. Good luck ever getting that off the books.
      - bluGill 7mo ago
        I don't think it will be that hard. Banning solar is a feel good thing now that doesn't affect many people - but that means when the next election is gone it won't be opposed when lobbyists (and greens) try to roll it back. Of course each state is different, so some it will take more than a few elections. In some states solar is already widespread enough that you can't ban it because too many people already have it and know enough about it to tell their friends. Those friends who live in other states will start to ask why they don't. Remember you need to keep the 20 year plan in mind. If you only look to the end of 2026 things are hopeless, but look to 2050 (and compare to 2000) and things look much better.
      - 7mo ago
ericmay 7mo ago
The oil market is global and the US is a big part of that but it’s not the only one. You can always make changes to energy sources later and as new technologies are unlocked perhaps we can even skip some headaches now. Obviously there’s the geostrategic angle now which you see play out in Iran and Venezuela. As other countries move to reliance on Chinese rare earth processing for renewable technology, it drives their oil and gas consumption down which means more oil and gas for those who are still using it. If you really want to look at this analogy about drug dealers then really what you see is that America is the big boss here and an energy and military super power, and Saudi Arabia is just another dealer under American protection and if they don’t do what we tell them to do they’ll get the boot.
spicymaki 7mo ago
Like the drug dealers where I grew up they are making the neighborhood a really terrible place to live. They might have a nice house right now, but the homes around them are burning.
laughing_man 7mo ago
Transitioning to renewables makes economic sense for the Saudis because they make more money selling a barrel of oil for transportation fuel and generating power with wind and solar. The US has vast reserves of coal and natural gas. We generally don't use oil to generate power either -- oil is something like 0.4% of the total power generated, because we have vast amounts of natural gas and coal to use instead. The situation isn't the result of some crafty master plan on the part of the Saudis. It's jusut what makes sense.
- ZeroGravitas 7mo ago
  But in the context of the current topic, USA could be demonstrating their technical prowess and running EVs off this amazing coal and gas bounty. Instead they seem to be in a cycle of buying massive inefficient vehicles and then getting annoyed at gas prices. Oil is 2/5ths of US energy use.
Tagbert 7mo ago
The funny thing is the US doesn’t really consume much Saudi Oil. The US is a net exporter of oil, though they do import some specific types of oils and export more of others. The US’s interest in the Middle East oil is a lot about stabilizing oil prices. At least it used to be when there was a rational policy and competent executors.
- deleted 7mo ago
  [deleted]
kortilla 7mo ago
The electrical system is unrelated to oil for transportation.

jasonfarnon 7mo ago

"If every oil exporter used some of their oil revenue to switch to EVs, that would, all things equal, hasten the transition to EVs." The premise is all things aren't equal. The oil Norway would have used just gets used somewhere else so what difference does it make what Norway does instead. I don't know if that's the reality of the situation but if it is just an offset, it does sound like a bookkeeping trick doesn't it?

blargey 7mo ago
Norway switching from ICEs to EVs objectively reduces global oil consumption+burning by exactly that much. Norway exporting oil increases oil supply, but doesn't increase consumption. The world's oil consumers are not supply-constrained; the producers are not running at 100% capacity, and they'll happily pick up the slack if Norway just stopped exporting oil for no reason. And there's a large amount of consumption that can't be offset by electrification in the first place (petrochemicals, long distance flight, etc) so there's not even a theoretical future end-state where they require a non-EV-using counterparty to buy their oil to fund their EV usage. Calling it a "bookkeeping trick" is just verbal sleigh-of-hand.
- patmorgan23 7mo ago
  Increases in supply also increase consumption, we use lots of cheap stuff, but not very much of expensive stuff.
  - jonasdegendt 7mo ago
    This would be true but you're not accounting for OPEC and other groups (e.g. historically the Texas Railroad Commission in the United States, not sure how relevant they still are) to balance production and price per barrel to what they think is agreeable. Oil hasn't been supply constrained since the 50's, it's price is largely based on what producing countries agree on, as well as geopolitics. Additionally, governments levy a decent amount of taxes on certain end products such as gasoline. They might very well, as they have in the past, decide to simply up their tax revenue as prices of crude and derivatives go down.