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Energy Discussion

robav8r said:
This is a problem starting to rear its ugly head in Virginia . . .
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I tell my students that will listen that the world fundamentally is built up of matter, energy, and information. The three are totally interconnected because you can’t move one without using the other two.

I continue to be baffled by the extraordinary value of information. 🤨 I mean like, holy shit.

I have a theory about the universe, intelligence, and emergent complexity. The universe will slowly but inevitably sag into heat death, and the purpose of intelligence is to make it happen quicker. It is the steeper gradient on the path. ⛷️

Somewhere a lump of coal was sacrificed supporting this post.
 
taxi1 said:
I tell my students that will listen that the world fundamentally is built up of matter, energy, and information. The three are totally interconnected because you can’t move one without using the other two.

I continue to be baffled by the extraordinary value of information. 🤨 I mean like, holy shit.

I have a theory about the universe, intelligence, and emergent complexity. The universe will slowly but inevitably sag into heat death, and the purpose of intelligence is to make it happen quicker. It is the steeper gradient on the path. ⛷️

Somewhere a lump of coal was sacrificed supporting this post.
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Well that’s an argument for anti-intellectualism if ever I heard one. How depressing.

You know, I can do with 12W what AI companies can only approximate with 2.7GW. Good luck replacing that.
 
sevenhelmet said:
You know, I can do with 12W what AI companies can only approximate with 2.7GW. Good luck replacing that.
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My daughter works for Tiktok in content moderation and emergency response, and she (12W) is getting laid off and replaced with AI functionality.

Sigh
 
taxi1 said:
My daughter works for Tiktok in content moderation and emergency response, and she (12W) is getting laid off and replaced with AI functionality.

Sigh
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My niece worked for TikTok doing content moderation last year until she quit. As much as I don't want to see anyone's job involuntarily replaced with AI, seeing that much violence and horror is not good for the psyche long-term.
 
sevenhelmet said:
Sorry to see that. AI is certainly accelerating the “anti-human” aspects of corporate culture, particularly in tech.

I think a lot of people are going to regret that.
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I had to call USAA about the fact that I paid back the gov't shutdown loan but the loan was reflecting open with a $0 balance (which means it would still reflect as outstanding on my credit report) and I almost raged at the AI filter. It wouldn't accept 'representative.' But here's the thing - it also couldn't understand the issue that I needed resolved. I tried using the keyword prompts and got into a do loop of it repeating my loan balance and still wouldn't accept representative when it asked 'do you need anything else', so I had to hang up and try again.

It took me 7 minutes of trial and error to get through the AI prompts and get it to pass me through to a rep. The rep answered the phone 60 seconds later and had my problem resolved in 2 minutes.

When I call customer support, it's because it's complicated and not because I have a basic problem an AI bot can solve.

I get it, when I turned my XFinity gear in coincident with a PCS, I witnessed like 5 old ladies walk in with questions that were easily answered on the website or by an AI bot, and paying people to answer basic questions like 'how do I turn on my modem' or 'how do I login to my email' is not a good use of resources.

But just using this example - AI is not replacing the performance of a human being. Not even close. If companies writ large are going to rely on AI to supplant paying human beings, good luck to them. Capitalism will do its thing over the long term, but it's gonna be a bumpy ride along the way.
 
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Spekkio said:
I had to call USAA about the fact that I paid back the gov't shutdown loan but the loan was reflecting open with a $0 balance (which means it would still reflect as outstanding on my credit report) and I almost raged at the AI filter. It wouldn't accept 'representative.' But here's the thing - it also couldn't understand the issue that I needed resolved. I tried using the keyword prompts and got into a do loop of it repeating my loan balance and still wouldn't accept representative when it asked 'do you need anything else', so I had to hang up and try again.

It took me 7 minutes of trial and error to get through the AI prompts and get it to pass me through to a rep. The rep answered the phone 60 seconds later and had my problem resolved in 2 minutes.

When I call customer support, it's because it's complicated and not because I have a basic problem an AI bot can solve.

I get it, when I turned my XFinity gear in coincident with a PCS, I witnessed like 5 old ladies walk in with questions that were easily answered on the website or by an AI bot, and paying people to answer basic questions like 'how do I turn on my modem' or 'how do I login to my email' is not a good use of resources.

But just using this example - AI is not replacing the performance of a human being. Not even close. If companies writ large are going to rely on AI to supplant paying human beings, good luck to them.
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Vote with your feet. I’m considering dumping USAA over the teen driver premium. Have friends who are finding better rates elsewhere.

Customer service is a factor, and having the ability to say “this is non-standard, I need a human”- and actually get one quickly- is important.
 
sevenhelmet said:
Vote with your feet. I’m considering dumping USAA over the teen driver premium. Have friends who are finding better rates elsewhere.

Customer service is a factor, and having the ability to say “this is non-standard, I need a human”- and actually get one quickly- is important.
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Anytime I've shopped around, other insurance companies can only slightly beat USAA and when I read the fine print it's only an introductory offer and the real rate is somewhere between 10-15% higher.

Although my kids don't drive (yet) and I've heard from many sources that USAA's insurance prices are only competitive for commissioned officers.

I have also always been impressed with USAA's customer service reps (and still was in this case, once I got to one) and I doubt that the grass is actually greener with another financial institution.
 
Spekkio said:
Anytime I've shopped around, other insurance companies can only slightly beat USAA and when I read the fine print it's only an introductory offer and the real rate is somewhere between 10-15% higher.

I have also always been impressed with USAA's customer service reps (and still was in this case, once I got to one) and I doubt that the grass is actually greener with another financial institution.
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All that is fair, and why I haven’t changed vendors yet. I just had a pretty major no-fault-of-mine claim on my truck with USAA, which was handled very well, so the business end of their insurance still works.
 
sevenhelmet said:
All that is fair, and why I haven’t changed vendors yet. I just had a pretty major no-fault-of-mine claim on my truck with USAA, which was handled very well, so the business end of their insurance still works.
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I had an instance many moons ago where their insurance customer service was too good.

Do home inspection. Landlord seems satisfied and says I'll send you your deposit by mail to your new address. Two weeks go by and nothing,* so I email and ask about it. Landlord responds by claiming damages on a wall along with other stupid nickel and dime shit like a $50 'disposal fee' for the snow shovels we left in the garage to potentially save the next tenants a few bucks. Sends me a painting estimate for the entire premises for $5,000 and says "I'm keeping your $1900 deposit, you should be thankful." Even though her husband literally built the place with his son and did all of the maintenance on it, so if we wanted to call it damages she should be charging me $50 for a can of paint.

They also wanted me to pay to have their driveway re-done because the moving truck spilled a couple drops of oil on it after the trucking company told them to just wash it and pound sand.

Since I thought I'd have to go to small claims court to get my deposit back, I figured a denied insurance claim would help support my case.

They paid the landlord her painting estimate plus all the nickel and dime stuff within 48 hours, no questions asked. I got my deposit back, but my insurance went up.

*Idiot me didn't look up landlord / tenant law until there was a dispute. One more week and per the law, I was auto-owed the deposit back and she would have needed to sue me to get paid for the 'damages,' which I'm 100% sure she wouldn't have done.
 
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WhiskeySierra6 said:
Not so much in China (or India for that matter) .

www.wilsoncenter.org

Chinese Coal-based Power Plants

www.wilsoncenter.org www.wilsoncenter.org

Xi's dubious 2020 pledge aside, I think this excerpt from the article illustrates that coal probably isn't going anywhere anytime soon at least from a global perspective.

"When Xi Jinping surprised the world with his 2020 pledge for carbon neutrality by 2060, China’s economy was stronger than it is today and the top-down crackdowns on existing coal plants were real. Fast forward to today and the drive to restart its economy after COVID-19 lockdowns has pushed Chinese policymakers to prioritize energy security and economic growth over carbon reductions. The foundation for China’s clean energy transition still exists, but these new coal plants mark a sobering lock-in of high-carbon energy."
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Happened to see this chart in Bloomberg on coal use: (I keep hearing “coal is going away”)

CHART OF THE DAY: Global coal demand rose to an all-time high in 2025, up 0.5% y-on-y to 8,845 million tons (also,
@IEA
revised up 2024).Now, IEA says 2025 will mark a peak, with consumption dropping over the next 5 years. Time will tell, but previous peak forecast were off.
Image
 
Randy Daytona said:
Happened to see this chart in Bloomberg on coal use: (I keep hearing “coal is going away”)

CHART OF THE DAY: Global coal demand rose to an all-time high in 2025, up 0.5% y-on-y to 8,845 million tons (also,
@IEA
revised up 2024).Now, IEA says 2025 will mark a peak, with consumption dropping over the next 5 years. Time will tell, but previous peak forecast were off.
Image
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In the game of rates, coal is falling as a percentage overall power production. The increase in consumption is due to overall production going up much faster, and coal being accessible. I contend this indicates coal is being used as long as it continues to be cheap and (reasonably) accessible.

Interestingly, nuclear has fallen more as a percentage, despite being much less carbon-producing. Cost and psychology are probably dominant factors there. Ecology be damned- we probably won't adopt nukes on a bigger scale until coal and gas get expensive enough that the economics are too hard to ignore.

1766152774809.png
 
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sevenhelmet said:
In the game of rates, coal is falling as a percentage overall power production. The increase in consumption is due to overall production going up much faster, and coal being accessible. I contend this indicates coal is being used as long as it continues to be cheap and (reasonably) accessible.

Interestingly, nuclear is falling faster, despite being much less carbon-producing. Cost and psychology are probably dominant factors there. Ecology be damned- we probably won't adopt nukes on a bigger scale until coal and gas get expensive enough that the economics are too hard to ignore.

View attachment 44137
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Good points, I would add storable. Wind and solar are intermittent and can not provide baseload 24/7 on a national scale that is affordable - the exorbitant electricity rates in Germany being a prime example.
 
Equally interesting to see the same information focused down to the U.S. where there is a clear shift away from coal. As noted here, the future appears to be in energy “storage” alongside production.

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