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Demand destruction will collapse profits and accelerate the oil/dollar downfall. Saudi Arabia can profitably pump oil probably under $10/barrel. If demand drops

Demand destruction will collapse profits and accelerate the oil/dollar downfall. Saudi Arabia can profitably pump oil probably under $10/barrel. If demand drops, thats where oil should be. China with [EVs|Solar|BESS|Turbines] will replace all of the fossil fuel countries (US, middle-east, Russia). This is probably the biggest transition in the history of mankind. This is energy production, storage and all the appliances that use electricity. After this, its incredibly hard for any other country to compete.

toomuchtodo 2mo ago
Saudi Arabia needs oil prices at ~$86.60/barrel to balance their budget, per Bloomberg. It is not the marginal cost to pump a barrel, but what a country needs to support their sticky spending from previously assured energy exports. Governments will collapse long before we approach low single digit oil prices on the global market. The World Is Awash With Oil and Prices Are Poised to Keep Falling - https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2025-global-oil-supply-prices/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2025-global-oil-supply-pr... | https://archive.today/hkhtI https://archive.today/hkhtI - December 18th, 2025 (Control -F "Crude Price Forecasts Are Below Levels Needed for Budgets") > China with [EVs|Solar|BESS|Turbines] will replace all of the fossil fuel countries (US, middle-east, Russia). This is probably the biggest transition in the history of mankind. This is energy production, storage and all the appliances that use electricity. After this, its incredibly hard for any other country to compete. Strongly agree. China is replacing petrostate economic demand with demand for their clean tech products, which keeps their deflationary economy afloat, provides them soft power, and will transition the yuan to a global reserve currency. Today countries by dollars to by petroleum ("petrodollar"); tomorrow, countries will want yuan to buy "manufacturing fiat," to trade with the world's factory (China is 1/3rd of global manufacturing capacity, as of this comment). Stocks of assets vs flows of energy.
- thelastgallon 2mo ago
  Indeed. Electricity will be the only abstraction layer of energy, all end uses (transportation, cooking, heating, cooling, appliances) will switch to electricity. Electricity can be generated from any source (dirty + clean), but the abstraction layer of electricity will allow the grid to continuously increase the clean fuels. It helps that the cleanest is also the cheapest. Solar panels are cheap as dirt. In 1975, a solar PV module cost $128.27 per watt. In 2026 it costs $0.1 - $0.2 per watt, a thousand times cheaper. In 1975, only satellites could afford solar. Today, its the cheapest source of energy. China will be an electrostate. Are there any other electrostates? Maybe Bhutan, Costa Rica, but they are too small.
  - toomuchtodo 2mo ago
    > China will be an electrostate. Are there any other electrostates? Maybe Bhutan, Costa Rica, but they are too small. China for sure. The rest will come as they replace the last of coal and fossil gas with anything low carbon, solar, wind hydro, as well as the necessary battery storage and transmission for energy orchestration and agility. Like Norway is already at 100% of EV sales and other countries are still close to 0%, we're simply observing a global energy transition horse race. Exciting time to be on the timeline imho. Ember Energy: Global Electricity Review 2026: Solar surge halts fossil generation rise as clean power meets all demand growth and renewables overtake coal - https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/global-electricity-review-2026/ https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/global-electricity-... - April 21st, 2026 The ‘profound’ global impact of China’s rise as an electrostate - https://www.ft.com/content/013e8a27-ade5-48ed-8f2e-ffbf70cc508c https://www.ft.com/content/013e8a27-ade5-48ed-8f2e-ffbf70cc5... | https://archive.today/J0bew https://archive.today/J0bew - October 10th, 2025
  - alightsoul 2mo ago
    You are assuming that carbon negative countries are all electrostates. That's not true at all. Buthan and Panama which are carbon negative are very far from being electrostates. Costa Rica is not even carbon negative nor an electrostate. Carbon negative countries and Costa Rica due to their low GDP are very far behind on electrification. Just look up the percentage of new car sales that are electric on each of those countries. It's around 5%. The reason? They cost 35,000 dollars at the low end even for a Chinese SUV whereas the average new car uses gasoline and costs 16,000 dollars for a Chinese SUV. according to these countries' censuses, Cooking with electricity and drying clothes in a clothes dryer are rather rare too, around 10% or lower. although clothes dryers are more common in apartment buildings, apartments are only around 10% of all houses. Most people cook with small government subsidized 25 pound LPG tanks. Water heaters are used by 5% of the population because the water is actually desirable cold and not hot because the air is hot instead of cold and there is no winter. They are carbon negative because their population is small enough to have most of the country still covered in virgin jungles and forests. They are big enough to offset the carbon emissions of their small populations. The ratio of forest to population works out to make the country carbon negative. Also due to low GDP, they don't consume much energy and houses are small. For example most people don't run AC most the time unlike the US or don't have AC at all. Houses are usually 50 to 100 square meters. Electric service is 120 amps at 120 volts split phase. That's just 14 kilowatts. Running AC even for 8 hours a day can cost half the average monthly wage. Everything is within walking distance and highly centralized in cities. Even suburbs are high density with almost no outdoor space.
- _DeadFred_ 2mo ago
  But China is already in decline before reaching this ascendancy. I think new models will result in new structures, not just a switch from the US to China.
  - toomuchtodo 2mo ago
    China's population is declining while building and operating the largest fleet of manufacturing robotics in the world. The US population is not declining as quickly while having limited capability to do anything. A recent example is $500M of taxpayer dollars spent on a munition manufacturing facility that did not build a single munition. The US has coasted just about as far as it can go on it's exorbitant privilege while failing to invest in the future. TLDR China builds, and will continue to build long into the future, the US prospers (for now) from financialization but cannot build, nor has the will to attempt to. China Makes AI-powered Robots Core of National Strategy: China´s 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030) marks pivot to innovation - https://ifr.org/ifr-press-releases/news/china-makes-ai-powered-robots-core-of-national-strategy https://ifr.org/ifr-press-releases/news/china-makes-ai-power... > Frankfurt, May 05, 2026 — China has launched its 15th Five-Year Plan by placing robotics at the heart of its modern industrial system. The aim is to pivot its AI research towards physical applications with robots as main drivers for economic growth. This is a next step in the country´s strong automation development: China´s manufacturing industry already has an operational stock of around 2 million units — approximately 4.5 times more than the global no. 2, Japan. 54% of annual industrial robots installed worldwide were deployed in China. This is according to the World Robotics 2025 Report, presented by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR). General Dynamics Failed to Build Artillery Shells for the Army - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49281711 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49281711 - August 2026 Wikipedia: Exorbitant privilege - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exorbitant_privilege https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exorbitant_privilege
    - Danox 2mo ago
      That sounds like a wish? China has 1.3 billion people in an area the size of 1/3 of the United States (basically the area from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi river Florida to Maine). Imagine if the United States had 1.3 billion people just in that area with the rest of the country being the equivalent of the Tibetan Plateau). One could argue that you would need/want to have fewer people not more.
- wbl 2mo ago
  If you buy yuan just to turn around and spend them you aren't holding the yuan.
- Danox 2mo ago
  China is currently pursuing all types of energy/solutions. They are not stuck on any particular one, is that because they’re run by engineers instead of lawyers/MBA’s…
  - toomuchtodo 2mo ago
    [dead]
- rasz 2mo ago
  >Saudi Arabia needs oil prices at ~$86.60/barrel to balance their budget They can always cut down on candles, they will be fine.
samrus 2mo ago
> China with [EVs|Solar|BESS|Turbines] will replace all of the fossil fuel countries (US, middle-east, Russia) I dont agree with china having the same position as the FF exporters. Simply because with renewables, you export the means to produce energy rather than the energy itself. So in terms of monetary value, china will be selling alot less panels than the FF countries sell oil. And other countries can also manufactor renewables tech themselves, while with oil they couldnt materialize it under their feet Basically i think the paradigm of the energy trade being cornered for politcal controll wont exost with renewables. Renewables are decentralized and so not controllable
- rzerowan 2mo ago
  ACtually no , even with the export of primary goods that go into the manufactue of renewables like solar the price differential still favours China. A recent example is the boom of local solar manufacture in India whil relies on solar modules imported from china.The assembled panes are still 2X the price of a similar fullly aseembled one from China. And not due too subsidies of labour - a lot of the value chain is highly automated and densely colocated diffrerent from other industrail setups where complimentary industries are geographically separeted which increase final costt by adding unreliable transport and delays into the mix. So at scale and with high volume will continue to be the dominated by China , wear and tear even with renewables will continue to favour the first mover as tech evolves over time.The solar modules/batteries of 10-15 years ago are not the same effficency as those of today.
  - yorwba 2mo ago
    China indeed makes very cheap solar panels, inverters and batteries, but that just means that they take up a smaller share of the cost of a complete installation, which also includes labor and additional hardware for the mounting system. So solar panels doubling in price won't double the cost of new solar capacity, let alone the cost of electricity from existing installations. That reduces the political leverage a lot compared to oil, where a supply disruption affects prices on fairly short time scales.
    - 2mo ago
soco 2mo ago
But, how much of the extracted oil becomes ICE fuel? Because other transports cannot be converted that quick (air, sea...) and most if not all petrochemical industries will still need to exist even if all cars drive electric. So how big will be the effect of crashing fuel demand?
- Symbiote 2mo ago
  25% of oil production is for cars 16% for trucks and buses 7% for aviation 4% for shipping 2% for rail and domestic waterways 25% + a chunk of the 16% (city buses, shorter distance or smaller trucks, etc) is a good amount. https://www.statista.com/statistics/307194/top-oil-consuming-sectors-worldwide/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/307194/top-oil-consuming...
  - soco 2mo ago
    You mean a good amount of the 46% consumed by road transports. So my napkin says, when we all switch to driving EV the oil demand will drop by 15%. It's something for sure, but not overly dramatic (to me).
    - realityking 2mo ago
      Trucks and buses are starting to be electrified as well. Some boating as well but that‘s a rounding error.
    - toomuchtodo 2mo ago
      Every 24 months of EV production in China destroys 1 million barrels a day of global oil demand, as of this comment, at current rates of EV production. We should expect these rates of production will continue to increase. Total annual light vehicle sales are ~90M units. Globally, over 1-in-5 (22%) of new cars sold were electric in 2024. This share was 92% in Norway, and in China, it was almost 50%. In 2025, it was 1-in-4 (25%). The world has 20-30M units/year of EV manufacturing capacity, as of this comment. Light vehicles and heavy vehicles are solved for with battery electric, I argue, based on all available data. Aviation and petrochemical use cases are unlikely to disappear in our lifetimes, but that is a small slice of today's oil demand (lets call it ~15-20% for the sake of argument), and will be the remainder as renewables and batteries eat global energy demand. ~40% of marine shipping disappears when you're not moving energy around the world, the remaining half can burn renewable energy produced ammonia or methanol for fuel. Like bankruptcy, the change happens slowly, and then all of a sudden. China now has more power than OPEC because of the facts in this comment and their vast strategic petroleum reserves. It is understandable to say "this flywheel is spinning slowly" before it is spinning very fast, while you're watching it spool. How China became the world’s great oil power - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49238158 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49238158 - August 2026 Laos went 100% electric vehicles overnight with a drastic approach [Bans Fossil-Fuel Car Imports] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49040819 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49040819 - July 2026 Electric Vehicle Sales Boom as Ethiopia Bans Fossil-Fuel Car Imports - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068567 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068567 - February 2026 Norway EV sales and related data - https://robbieandrew.github.io/EV/ https://robbieandrew.github.io/EV/ Our World In Data: Tracking global data on electric vehicles - https://ourworldindata.org/electric-car-sales https://ourworldindata.org/electric-car-sales Global oil price stuck in triple digits. Goldman Sachs says it may stay there for years - https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/20/energy/oil-gas-prices-intl-hnk https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/20/energy/oil-gas-prices-intl-hn... - March 20th, 2026 Electric Cars Pass a Crucial Tipping Point in 23 Countries - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-28/electric-cars-pass-a-crucial-tipping-point-in-23-countries https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-28/electric-... | https://archive.today/e8XSt https://archive.today/e8XSt - August 27th, 2023 Almost 40% Of All Ship Cargoes Are Oil, Coal And Gas - https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-of-all-ship-cargoes-are-oil-coal-and-gas/ https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-... - January 12th, 2022 https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en.pdf https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en...
4gotunameagain 2mo ago
If the price were to drop all the way down to $10/barrel, demand would skyrocket. The future where oil demand is so low and and will remain low even after low prices is much further ahead I'm afraid.
rsanek 2mo ago
China is much more of a "fossil fuel country" than the US. They've got a ways to go to even catch up. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=stacked-discrete-bar&stackMode=relative&time=latest&country=CHN%7EUSA&source=total&metric=by_source https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=stacked-di...
- dopa42365 2mo ago
  87.5% vs 83.1% Renewables have to go up by 10x (or more, with electrification of all the things) everywhere pretty much in the coming decades.
- scottLobster 2mo ago
  Uh, that chart shows they source a greater percentage of their power from renewables than we do with the exception of nuclear and biofuels. Their wind, solar and hydropower bars are all wider, and they're building more nuclear. They just don't have our easy-access shale fields. If it wasn't for fracking our coal percentage would likely be just as high
- pnut 2mo ago
  I think you're not telling the full story with that chart. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=line&stackMode=relative&country=CHN%7EUSA&source=renewables&metric=total https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=line&stack...
- Danox 2mo ago
  Thorium Reactors? Look closely at China, they are pursuing all forms of energy Solar, Wind, Gas, Oil, Nuclear and even new Thorium reactors (Courtesy of Oak Ridge, Tennessee) and all forms of batteries Lithium/Sodium ion they are not resting on their laurels anywhere they are willing to use anything, and are open to any solution that works. https://www.neimagazine.com/news/china-refuels-thorium-reactor-without-shutdown/ https://www.neimagazine.com/news/china-refuels-thorium-react... https://china-environment-news.net/2025/06/01/world-first-chinese-scientists-refuel-thorium-reactor-without-shutdown/ https://china-environment-news.net/2025/06/01/world-first-ch... The Chinese are not limiting themselves to just one solution or two they are pursuing all types of technology all types of energy they seem to have an open mind is this where/becuase the oligarchs don’t get to call the shots in their system?
bobthepanda 2mo ago
This is actually not the first major energy transition. The world moved from coal to oil for transport and shipping fairly quickly due to the higher energy density and significantly easier handling of liquid vs solid fuels. Using pipes and tubes was a huge labor savings compared to having people shovel coal into a hard to control boiler.
- SoftTalker 2mo ago
  Automatic mechanical stokers replaced people with shovels long ago. Nobody has shoveled coal in a boiler room since the era of the Titanic. Oil is still easier to handle in ships (or really any transport) though.
  - rsynnott 2mo ago
    Were these ever particularly common on steam ships? They were definitely a thing on trains, but I thought they more or less only showed up as the transition to oil fired boilers was getting going anyway.
  - bobthepanda 2mo ago
    Even with mechanical stokers you still needed a dedicated fireman making sure the proper amount of coal was making it in. Nothing like a modern liquid fuel engine where you can just drive yourself without manually adjusting the amount of fuel burn by hand.
PowerElectronix 2mo ago
Saudi Arabia can profit at those prices, but it can't sustain its living standards at those prices unless they pump like crazy. I recall reading that it was around 40 bucks a barrel where things would start looking not ideal for the princes.
Danox 2mo ago
Oil and gas is more valuable for other uses besides burning it up into thin air. Humans have just been pretty sloppy any country that has plenty of oil and gas won’t go broke.

toomuchtodo 2mo ago

Saudi Arabia needs oil prices at ~$86.60/barrel to balance their budget, per Bloomberg. It is not the marginal cost to pump a barrel, but what a country needs to support their sticky spending from previously assured energy exports. Governments will collapse long before we approach low single digit oil prices on the global market. The World Is Awash With Oil and Prices Are Poised to Keep Falling - https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2025-global-oil-supply-prices/ https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2025-global-oil-supply-pr... | https://archive.today/hkhtI https://archive.today/hkhtI - December 18th, 2025 (Control -F "Crude Price Forecasts Are Below Levels Needed for Budgets") > China with [EVs|Solar|BESS|Turbines] will replace all of the fossil fuel countries (US, middle-east, Russia). This is probably the biggest transition in the history of mankind. This is energy production, storage and all the appliances that use electricity. After this, its incredibly hard for any other country to compete. Strongly agree. China is replacing petrostate economic demand with demand for their clean tech products, which keeps their deflationary economy afloat, provides them soft power, and will transition the yuan to a global reserve currency. Today countries by dollars to by petroleum ("petrodollar"); tomorrow, countries will want yuan to buy "manufacturing fiat," to trade with the world's factory (China is 1/3rd of global manufacturing capacity, as of this comment). Stocks of assets vs flows of energy.

thelastgallon 2mo ago
Indeed. Electricity will be the only abstraction layer of energy, all end uses (transportation, cooking, heating, cooling, appliances) will switch to electricity. Electricity can be generated from any source (dirty + clean), but the abstraction layer of electricity will allow the grid to continuously increase the clean fuels. It helps that the cleanest is also the cheapest. Solar panels are cheap as dirt. In 1975, a solar PV module cost $128.27 per watt. In 2026 it costs $0.1 - $0.2 per watt, a thousand times cheaper. In 1975, only satellites could afford solar. Today, its the cheapest source of energy. China will be an electrostate. Are there any other electrostates? Maybe Bhutan, Costa Rica, but they are too small.
- toomuchtodo 2mo ago
  > China will be an electrostate. Are there any other electrostates? Maybe Bhutan, Costa Rica, but they are too small. China for sure. The rest will come as they replace the last of coal and fossil gas with anything low carbon, solar, wind hydro, as well as the necessary battery storage and transmission for energy orchestration and agility. Like Norway is already at 100% of EV sales and other countries are still close to 0%, we're simply observing a global energy transition horse race. Exciting time to be on the timeline imho. Ember Energy: Global Electricity Review 2026: Solar surge halts fossil generation rise as clean power meets all demand growth and renewables overtake coal - https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/global-electricity-review-2026/ https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/global-electricity-... - April 21st, 2026 The ‘profound’ global impact of China’s rise as an electrostate - https://www.ft.com/content/013e8a27-ade5-48ed-8f2e-ffbf70cc508c https://www.ft.com/content/013e8a27-ade5-48ed-8f2e-ffbf70cc5... | https://archive.today/J0bew https://archive.today/J0bew - October 10th, 2025
- alightsoul 2mo ago
  You are assuming that carbon negative countries are all electrostates. That's not true at all. Buthan and Panama which are carbon negative are very far from being electrostates. Costa Rica is not even carbon negative nor an electrostate. Carbon negative countries and Costa Rica due to their low GDP are very far behind on electrification. Just look up the percentage of new car sales that are electric on each of those countries. It's around 5%. The reason? They cost 35,000 dollars at the low end even for a Chinese SUV whereas the average new car uses gasoline and costs 16,000 dollars for a Chinese SUV. according to these countries' censuses, Cooking with electricity and drying clothes in a clothes dryer are rather rare too, around 10% or lower. although clothes dryers are more common in apartment buildings, apartments are only around 10% of all houses. Most people cook with small government subsidized 25 pound LPG tanks. Water heaters are used by 5% of the population because the water is actually desirable cold and not hot because the air is hot instead of cold and there is no winter. They are carbon negative because their population is small enough to have most of the country still covered in virgin jungles and forests. They are big enough to offset the carbon emissions of their small populations. The ratio of forest to population works out to make the country carbon negative. Also due to low GDP, they don't consume much energy and houses are small. For example most people don't run AC most the time unlike the US or don't have AC at all. Houses are usually 50 to 100 square meters. Electric service is 120 amps at 120 volts split phase. That's just 14 kilowatts. Running AC even for 8 hours a day can cost half the average monthly wage. Everything is within walking distance and highly centralized in cities. Even suburbs are high density with almost no outdoor space.
_DeadFred_ 2mo ago
But China is already in decline before reaching this ascendancy. I think new models will result in new structures, not just a switch from the US to China.
- toomuchtodo 2mo ago
  China's population is declining while building and operating the largest fleet of manufacturing robotics in the world. The US population is not declining as quickly while having limited capability to do anything. A recent example is $500M of taxpayer dollars spent on a munition manufacturing facility that did not build a single munition. The US has coasted just about as far as it can go on it's exorbitant privilege while failing to invest in the future. TLDR China builds, and will continue to build long into the future, the US prospers (for now) from financialization but cannot build, nor has the will to attempt to. China Makes AI-powered Robots Core of National Strategy: China´s 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030) marks pivot to innovation - https://ifr.org/ifr-press-releases/news/china-makes-ai-powered-robots-core-of-national-strategy https://ifr.org/ifr-press-releases/news/china-makes-ai-power... > Frankfurt, May 05, 2026 — China has launched its 15th Five-Year Plan by placing robotics at the heart of its modern industrial system. The aim is to pivot its AI research towards physical applications with robots as main drivers for economic growth. This is a next step in the country´s strong automation development: China´s manufacturing industry already has an operational stock of around 2 million units — approximately 4.5 times more than the global no. 2, Japan. 54% of annual industrial robots installed worldwide were deployed in China. This is according to the World Robotics 2025 Report, presented by the International Federation of Robotics (IFR). General Dynamics Failed to Build Artillery Shells for the Army - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49281711 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49281711 - August 2026 Wikipedia: Exorbitant privilege - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exorbitant_privilege https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exorbitant_privilege
  - Danox 2mo ago
    That sounds like a wish? China has 1.3 billion people in an area the size of 1/3 of the United States (basically the area from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi river Florida to Maine). Imagine if the United States had 1.3 billion people just in that area with the rest of the country being the equivalent of the Tibetan Plateau). One could argue that you would need/want to have fewer people not more.
wbl 2mo ago
If you buy yuan just to turn around and spend them you aren't holding the yuan.
Danox 2mo ago
China is currently pursuing all types of energy/solutions. They are not stuck on any particular one, is that because they’re run by engineers instead of lawyers/MBA’s…
- toomuchtodo 2mo ago
  [dead]
rasz 2mo ago
>Saudi Arabia needs oil prices at ~$86.60/barrel to balance their budget They can always cut down on candles, they will be fine.

samrus 2mo ago

> China with [EVs|Solar|BESS|Turbines] will replace all of the fossil fuel countries (US, middle-east, Russia) I dont agree with china having the same position as the FF exporters. Simply because with renewables, you export the means to produce energy rather than the energy itself. So in terms of monetary value, china will be selling alot less panels than the FF countries sell oil. And other countries can also manufactor renewables tech themselves, while with oil they couldnt materialize it under their feet Basically i think the paradigm of the energy trade being cornered for politcal controll wont exost with renewables. Renewables are decentralized and so not controllable

rzerowan 2mo ago
ACtually no , even with the export of primary goods that go into the manufactue of renewables like solar the price differential still favours China. A recent example is the boom of local solar manufacture in India whil relies on solar modules imported from china.The assembled panes are still 2X the price of a similar fullly aseembled one from China. And not due too subsidies of labour - a lot of the value chain is highly automated and densely colocated diffrerent from other industrail setups where complimentary industries are geographically separeted which increase final costt by adding unreliable transport and delays into the mix. So at scale and with high volume will continue to be the dominated by China , wear and tear even with renewables will continue to favour the first mover as tech evolves over time.The solar modules/batteries of 10-15 years ago are not the same effficency as those of today.
- yorwba 2mo ago
  China indeed makes very cheap solar panels, inverters and batteries, but that just means that they take up a smaller share of the cost of a complete installation, which also includes labor and additional hardware for the mounting system. So solar panels doubling in price won't double the cost of new solar capacity, let alone the cost of electricity from existing installations. That reduces the political leverage a lot compared to oil, where a supply disruption affects prices on fairly short time scales.
  - 2mo ago

soco 2mo ago

But, how much of the extracted oil becomes ICE fuel? Because other transports cannot be converted that quick (air, sea...) and most if not all petrochemical industries will still need to exist even if all cars drive electric. So how big will be the effect of crashing fuel demand?

Symbiote 2mo ago
25% of oil production is for cars 16% for trucks and buses 7% for aviation 4% for shipping 2% for rail and domestic waterways 25% + a chunk of the 16% (city buses, shorter distance or smaller trucks, etc) is a good amount. https://www.statista.com/statistics/307194/top-oil-consuming-sectors-worldwide/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/307194/top-oil-consuming...
- soco 2mo ago
  You mean a good amount of the 46% consumed by road transports. So my napkin says, when we all switch to driving EV the oil demand will drop by 15%. It's something for sure, but not overly dramatic (to me).
  - realityking 2mo ago
    Trucks and buses are starting to be electrified as well. Some boating as well but that‘s a rounding error.
  - toomuchtodo 2mo ago
    Every 24 months of EV production in China destroys 1 million barrels a day of global oil demand, as of this comment, at current rates of EV production. We should expect these rates of production will continue to increase. Total annual light vehicle sales are ~90M units. Globally, over 1-in-5 (22%) of new cars sold were electric in 2024. This share was 92% in Norway, and in China, it was almost 50%. In 2025, it was 1-in-4 (25%). The world has 20-30M units/year of EV manufacturing capacity, as of this comment. Light vehicles and heavy vehicles are solved for with battery electric, I argue, based on all available data. Aviation and petrochemical use cases are unlikely to disappear in our lifetimes, but that is a small slice of today's oil demand (lets call it ~15-20% for the sake of argument), and will be the remainder as renewables and batteries eat global energy demand. ~40% of marine shipping disappears when you're not moving energy around the world, the remaining half can burn renewable energy produced ammonia or methanol for fuel. Like bankruptcy, the change happens slowly, and then all of a sudden. China now has more power than OPEC because of the facts in this comment and their vast strategic petroleum reserves. It is understandable to say "this flywheel is spinning slowly" before it is spinning very fast, while you're watching it spool. How China became the world’s great oil power - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49238158 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49238158 - August 2026 Laos went 100% electric vehicles overnight with a drastic approach [Bans Fossil-Fuel Car Imports] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49040819 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49040819 - July 2026 Electric Vehicle Sales Boom as Ethiopia Bans Fossil-Fuel Car Imports - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068567 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068567 - February 2026 Norway EV sales and related data - https://robbieandrew.github.io/EV/ https://robbieandrew.github.io/EV/ Our World In Data: Tracking global data on electric vehicles - https://ourworldindata.org/electric-car-sales https://ourworldindata.org/electric-car-sales Global oil price stuck in triple digits. Goldman Sachs says it may stay there for years - https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/20/energy/oil-gas-prices-intl-hnk https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/20/energy/oil-gas-prices-intl-hn... - March 20th, 2026 Electric Cars Pass a Crucial Tipping Point in 23 Countries - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-28/electric-cars-pass-a-crucial-tipping-point-in-23-countries https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-28/electric-... | https://archive.today/e8XSt https://archive.today/e8XSt - August 27th, 2023 Almost 40% Of All Ship Cargoes Are Oil, Coal And Gas - https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-of-all-ship-cargoes-are-oil-coal-and-gas/ https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-... - January 12th, 2022 https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en.pdf https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en...

4gotunameagain 2mo ago

If the price were to drop all the way down to $10/barrel, demand would skyrocket. The future where oil demand is so low and and will remain low even after low prices is much further ahead I'm afraid.

rsanek 2mo ago

China is much more of a "fossil fuel country" than the US. They've got a ways to go to even catch up. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=stacked-discrete-bar&stackMode=relative&time=latest&country=CHN%7EUSA&source=total&metric=by_source https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=stacked-di...

dopa42365 2mo ago
87.5% vs 83.1% Renewables have to go up by 10x (or more, with electrification of all the things) everywhere pretty much in the coming decades.
scottLobster 2mo ago
Uh, that chart shows they source a greater percentage of their power from renewables than we do with the exception of nuclear and biofuels. Their wind, solar and hydropower bars are all wider, and they're building more nuclear. They just don't have our easy-access shale fields. If it wasn't for fracking our coal percentage would likely be just as high
pnut 2mo ago
I think you're not telling the full story with that chart. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=line&stackMode=relative&country=CHN%7EUSA&source=renewables&metric=total https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/energy-mix?tab=line&stack...
Danox 2mo ago
Thorium Reactors? Look closely at China, they are pursuing all forms of energy Solar, Wind, Gas, Oil, Nuclear and even new Thorium reactors (Courtesy of Oak Ridge, Tennessee) and all forms of batteries Lithium/Sodium ion they are not resting on their laurels anywhere they are willing to use anything, and are open to any solution that works. https://www.neimagazine.com/news/china-refuels-thorium-reactor-without-shutdown/ https://www.neimagazine.com/news/china-refuels-thorium-react... https://china-environment-news.net/2025/06/01/world-first-chinese-scientists-refuel-thorium-reactor-without-shutdown/ https://china-environment-news.net/2025/06/01/world-first-ch... The Chinese are not limiting themselves to just one solution or two they are pursuing all types of technology all types of energy they seem to have an open mind is this where/becuase the oligarchs don’t get to call the shots in their system?

bobthepanda 2mo ago

This is actually not the first major energy transition. The world moved from coal to oil for transport and shipping fairly quickly due to the higher energy density and significantly easier handling of liquid vs solid fuels. Using pipes and tubes was a huge labor savings compared to having people shovel coal into a hard to control boiler.

SoftTalker 2mo ago
Automatic mechanical stokers replaced people with shovels long ago. Nobody has shoveled coal in a boiler room since the era of the Titanic. Oil is still easier to handle in ships (or really any transport) though.
- rsynnott 2mo ago
  Were these ever particularly common on steam ships? They were definitely a thing on trains, but I thought they more or less only showed up as the transition to oil fired boilers was getting going anyway.
- bobthepanda 2mo ago
  Even with mechanical stokers you still needed a dedicated fireman making sure the proper amount of coal was making it in. Nothing like a modern liquid fuel engine where you can just drive yourself without manually adjusting the amount of fuel burn by hand.

PowerElectronix 2mo ago

Saudi Arabia can profit at those prices, but it can't sustain its living standards at those prices unless they pump like crazy. I recall reading that it was around 40 bucks a barrel where things would start looking not ideal for the princes.

Danox 2mo ago

Oil and gas is more valuable for other uses besides burning it up into thin air. Humans have just been pretty sloppy any country that has plenty of oil and gas won’t go broke.