Bolivia: The next Saudi Arabia

Here’s a little tidbit from the “I Did Not Know That” file: Bolivia sits on top of 70 to 80% of the world’s supply of lithium.

And this is important to know…why?

Take a look at the batteries in your mobile phone and laptop. I’ll bet dollars to your donuts they’re both lithium batteries.

Take a look at the specs of the soon-to-be-in-production Chevrolet Volt. It is powered by, you guessed it, lithium batteries.

It turns out lithium holds an electric charge longer than any metal yet discovered. It will be THE most sought-after element there is in our upcoming (and can’t come soon enough) move from fossil fuels to electricity (generated by…nuclear fission? wind? tide? fusion? all of the above?).

And here’s little, third world, basically socialist Bolivia, sitting on a whole shed load of it. Bolivia, right next door to Hugo Chavez’ Venezuela, where the nation’s most precious commodity (oil) has been nationalized.

The Bolivians are not oblivious to their impending good fortune. They are currently discussing the “To Nationalize or Not To Nationalize” question. They are distrustful of the US, mostly because of our past unwelcome interference in South American politics. Thus, the French, South Koreans, Japanese and, you better believe, the Chinese are swarming all over La Paz, President Eva Morales, and anyone with a smidge of influence in the Bolivian government.

The lithium is found primarily on the high Andean plain, in an area historically dirt poor and currently almost completely isolated from the rest of the world. Which all sounds a lot like the Arabian Peninsula in the 1930s or so, when the oil companies started to move in and build infrastructure.

The Bolivians are taking careful notes on just how the Arabs and their mates next door in Venezuela have managed to hang on to a substantial chunk of their oil revenues, and looking askance at countries like Mexico which have managed to screw themselves out of most of their own windfall. Expect the Bolivians to be pretty stiff negotiators. Further expect a lot of environmental hand-wringing and Power-To-The-People-style sentiment regarding the indigenous dirt farmers. And, since it’s the third world, expect a bit of Wild West – lots of corruption, violence, and double-crossing.

While the demise of oil spells doom for the Arabs, at least as a political force in this world, someone is going to take their place. At this point, Bolivia seems to be the odds-on favorite to be the power behind the soon-to-be-convened OLEC (Organization of Lithium Exporting Countries).

China: Xinjiang goes "boom"

In case you've been living under a rock for the past 4 or so days, ethnic tensions in the far western Chinese province of Xinjiang have boiled over in the most serious of manners.

Its still down to who you listen to regarding causes and exactly who has done what to whom. However, it's safe to say the indigenous Uighurs (Muslims with ethnic and religious ties to other Central Asians like the Tajiks, Kyrgyz, and Kazakhs) and the relatively-recent immigrant Han (the majority ethnicity in the rest of China), who have been sorta grinding up against each other for years, and not in a good way, have finally blown off a lot of steam. Mob violence seemed to rule the streets of Urumqi, the capital city of the province, earlier in the week. State media reports 150+ killed, thousands arrested, and who-knows-how-much property damage.

The images coming out of Urumqi this week are some of the scariest you will ever see.

This first YouTube clip is not for the faint of heart. Lots of blood and bodies; you get some sort of sense early in the clip of the chaos of the street. I'm not sure where this comes from; the text on the screen looks to be Korean, but I am no Asian language scholar. Anyone with any more info, please chime in:



From MSNBC, a recap of sorts:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

The Beeb, always the best bet for international news from obscure places, has this bit of reportage from Quentin Sommerville, a good, kilt-wearing, caber-tossing Jock sent off to the far reaches of Asia. If you troll through the BBC site, you'll find a good deal more from wee Quentin and others.

We've mentioned the ethnic situation in Xinjiang here before. It's not at all clear whether ETIM or any of their fellow Muslim travelers are involved here. Certainly, they are in the neighborhood and watching closely, if nothing else. This sure looks spontaneous, but it's impossible to tell anything from 7000 miles away and no access to anything other than general media reports.

The question I've got is how did it start? Perhaps street protests are routine in Urumqi. A name being tossed about by the Chinese as a possible instigator is one Rebiyah Kadeer, a rather vociferous Uighur critic of the Chinese. Ms. Kadeer has spent some time in the Chinese clink, and is currently in exile in the US. Hard to see how she's encouraging mob violence from the other side of the planet, but they said the same thing about Khomenei in the 70s and look how that turned out.

The violence looks like it's been shut down by a massive influx of state security forces - everything from riot-shotgun-toting police to what appears to be platoons of People's Liberation Army infantry. However, the underlying tensions aren't going away any time soon. Given the People's Republic's usual ham-fisted manner with its own civilians, especially the minority groups, along with Xinjiang's importance both as an oil-producer and a buffer against the really scary Muslims in Pakistan, don't expect the Chinese to scale back the influx of Han or yuan any time soon, and don't expect this to be the last time you see violence in the streets of Urumqi.

The official party line from the Chinese government makes all the right noises as far as the domestic audience is concerned, and actually represents a signficant departure from the normal internal and external news blackout we've come to expect from Beijing. Worth a look:

Saturday morning scattershooting

Scattershooting while wondering whatever happened to Tony "Thrill" Hill...

- Some poor bastard got "Cincinnatti Who'd" at a Wal-Mart in Valley Stream NY yesterday. Then the crowd got pissed because the store was closing. Suburban NY is not for the faint-of-heart, man.

- Speaking of sorry, sorry humans, those a-holes who shot up Mumbai seem to have finally lost. I guess blasting away in the sub-continent allows Muslim fanatics to check a lot of items off their lists: Jews? Check. Western tourists? Check. Cow-worshipping heathens? Check. Sowing third-world panic? Check. What a bonanza, huh?

- Around the Horn of Africa, Somali pirates are still at it. Most recent victim is a chemical tanker. I just find it hard to believe these characters are as effective as they are. How do a bunch of frickin' goat herders in speedboats capture a super-tanker? Shouldn't the tanker driver be able to floor it and keep going? Boarding a ship in-motion on the high seas is not an easy thing to do, or so I've heard. If said ship is doing 15 knots and throwing up a massive wake, it seems like it would be pretty near impossible, wouldn't it. I guess the threat of an RPG through the windshield is somewhat intimidating, but those things aren't easy to fire from a bobby little speedboad either. Just don't get it.

- In yet more happy Africa news, Nigerians are killing each other yet again. This time it's over which religous-affiliated political party won elections. Good thing the world economy doesn't depend on Nigeria for oil or anything like that. Er, wait a minute...

- On a much lighter note, there's yet ANOTHER monster college football game in the Big 12 tonight. OU vs. Okie State has all sorts of possible ripple effects, and the entire south Plains will be tuned in, including usn's at the CIT Compound. This season, already the greatest ever, just keeps getting better.

The most important article you will read this decade

The headline is not hyperbole.

The cover story in this month's Wired magazine (the greatest magazine ever in the history of ever, but that's another story) is about a man named Shai Agassi and his company, a little outfit called Better Place.

You need to know about this guy. You need to know about this company.

Agassi and Better Place are going to break our dependence on fossil fuels. And they're going to do it soon.

Better Place is involved in electric cars. No, they're not building souped-up golf carts. They're not even building the cars. Better Place is going to build the new paradigm.

They are going to build charging stations, they are going to build battery swap-out stations. And they are going to sell you a service plan which allows you to drive your electric car, built by GM, or Nissan, or whoever, for as long as you want to. The service plan you buy will be a lot like your cell phone plan. You'll be billed for usage, or you'll pay a flat fee for X amount of electrons, or you'll buy a premium service plan which allows you unlimited juice and a new battery whenever you want it.

Better Place is going to be the company Exxon-Mobil should be.

Agassi has already signed deals with the governments of Israel and Denmark, which will give him and his company tax breaks to help build the infrastructure. The US is not too terribly interested at this point. But we will be.

Folks, it's coming. Agassi is handling the transportation/consumption end. Boone Pickens is evangelizing about the supply end. And My Hero Al Gore is keeping this stuff front and center.

My good, sweet Lord. I can't wait!

Daily YouTube: Big Al says drilling is stupid

I LOVE this guy!

Daily YouTube: Big Al gives us more on The Goal

Katie Couric did a LONG interview with My Hero Al, giving him the opportunity to expand on The Goal - generating all of our electricity using renewable sources within 10 years.

It's lengthy, and the end of the interview deals with unrelated nonsense, but its worth watching. This guy makes so much sense. I still think he would have been a lousy President (Worse than GWB? Um, er, let me get back to you on that one.), but he's found his way to contribute.

BTW, I went out and bought an "Al Gore is My Hero" T-shirt. I'm not making that up.

Today's WeCanSolveIt.org video

Each black balloon represents 2 ounces of greenhouse gas, blah blah blah. This is nothing new.

The climate crisis part of the message is huge, and I totally support it. However, the part of the We campaign that really resonates with me is the part about getting away from fossil fuels. The enviros will tell you its to save the planet, and it is, in part. The other part, the part that I really like, is taking oil and its evil out of the national security equation. So many problems either vanish or become inconsequential if we don't need the oil...

Anyway, we'll keep posting We videos here now and then, just to keep the issue top-of-mind, and top-of-blog.

Today's WeCanSolveIt.org video

It's the same cause we've been railing about here at CIT for three years, but with a bit more oomph...

THE quote to remember

From My Hero Al's speech (below):

"We are borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn in ways that destroy our planet. Every bit of that has to change."

Al Gore: Now my hero! (not kidding)

Ex-senator, ex-vice president, ex-presidential candidate, and current Nobel laureate Al Gore recently made a speech, typical of many of his other speeches, which I find to be an absolute treasure trove of good sense.

In said speech, delivered in Washington and down the street from the White House, Gore challenged the US to abandon electricity generated by burning fossil fuels, and to do it within a decade.

Of course, the critics are coming out of the woodwork to point out how completely impossible this is, how trillions of dollars of infrastructure can't be made obsolete in a decade, blah, blah, blah. I know there are legitimate points being made here, and I know this wouldn't be easy, inexpensive, or trauma-free.

But it can be done. More so, it HAS to be done.

Oil and fossil fuels are evil in so many ways - 75% (I'm guessing, but I bet I'm close) of our environmental problems come from fossil fuels, our foreign policy is massively restricted because of our oil dependence, our economy is held hostage by our oil suppliers who, in more than a few cases, hate us and want us dead. The roots of many of our problems lie right here, in our total dependence of this stuff.

It's so obvious to me, and I have been saying it for a long time: We MUST get away from fossil fuels. Wind, solar, tidal, geothermal, hydro, all nice little niche sources. But nuclear - here's our short term answer. We know how to do this, we know how to do it safely. Is it perfect? Hell no - we still don't know what to do with the waste. But is that more dangerous than continuing to burn coal and fuel oil? I don't think so.

Gore is right, man. We can do this, and we can do it in a decade if we REALLY want to. NOW is the time.

What a shocking turn of events: Al Gore is now the Official Hero of this blog! Here is the speech, and the wecansolveit.org Web site.

Iran: Are we approaching nut-cuttin' time?

Recent days have seen some very, very sobering news from both Iran and Israel, and a mounting sense of tension between the two countries. The US can't help but be drawn into the escalating rhetoric as well.

This is potentially very bad news. VERY bad.

The Iranians, of course, have been working on a nuclear program at some level for some time. The US and the Euros have been trying to head this off through diplomacy and some relatively mild sabre rattling, to no avail. Israel cannot, and has stated they will not, stand by and let a country who's leader has repeatedly called for its (Israel's) destruction arm itself with nuclear weapons.

The Israelis, last week, held a military exercise which was pretty clearly intended to prove out, for themselves and the world, they could, if necessary, strike Iran from the air. Sure, it's provocative. But what else can they do? The Israelis are starting to get nervous, thinking that the rest of the world isn't showing enough of a sense of urgency about the situation. Can you blame them? There's no telling what happens to US policy regarding this matter in January.

So, in response, the Iranians stage a test of medium range missiles the other day. It's lost on no one, least of all the Israelis, that these missiles can reach Tel Aviv. Whether the test was as successful as the Iranians would like for us to believe is in question, and is also completely besides the point.

The facts, from the Israeli perspective, are this:

- Iran's President has publicly and repeatedly called for Israel's destruction.
- Iran is working on a nuclear program of some sort.
- Iran has missiles which can reach Israel.
- The US military is over-extended.
- The future of US attitude regarding Iran and Israel is not certain.

The Israelis are going to look out for themselves, and they have proven time and again that they will strike first (a lesson well and truly learned in the Six-Day War and reinforced by the Yom Kippur War - don't wait for the other guy to be ready), and to hell with world opinion. When pretty much everyone in your neighborhood wants you dead, and has tried a few times to kill you, you can never be paranoid enough.

Oh boy. Oh dear. This. Is. Tense.

I don't begin to know what the answer is here. What I do know is this needs to be front and center for us all, right now. Stop whining about $4 gas - if Iran and Israel start shooting at each other, you'll look back on $4 gas as the good old days.

We do have some leverage. The Arabs are scared to death of Iran. But they're also anti-Israel and, increasingly, anti-American. And we can't piss off the Arabs because of the aforementioned $4 gas.

It keeps coming back to that, doesn't it? Take oil out of the equation, and this stuff gets a whole lot less complicated.

There's your imperative. It's a longer-term action. What's to be done in the short term?

Buckle your seatbelts. This one has DANGER written all over it.

Not funny

Oil, again: Pemex, the left, and why we should care

As a follow-up to yesterday's post about $10/gallon gasoline, this morning's DMN business page has a column by Jim Landers regarding the condition and immediate future of Mexico's state-owned oil monopoly, Pemex.

Pemex is, in short, a disaster. At a time when the Mexican government should be rolling in tax pesos from it's abundant oil reserves, Pemex, which is the only company allowed to drill for and extract Mexican oil, can't find the resources to buy equipment or hire people. Years of mismanagement and lack of incentive have made it essentially impossible for Pemex, as it exists now, to drill in deep water in the Gulf, which is where any new production is going to come from.

President Felipe Calderón , who is fighting an uphill battle in so many areas, recently introduced legislation intended to start modernizing Pemex and make it competitive again. This legislation stops well short of allowing anyone else into the market - Pemex is a state-sponsored monopoly and is going to stay that way. But Calderón is at least attempting to get it moving, so that Mexico can start to realize the benefits of being an energy producer in this insane energy market.

But, this is Mexico, where no pro-business idea, no matter how good, gets by the rabid left unscathed.

Opposition leader Andres Manuel López Obrador, the man who narrowly lost the Presidential election to Calderón a few years ago and who nearly destroyed the country by refusing to concede, immediately shut down the legislature to protest. His claim: Calderón is trying to give away Mexico's sovereignty.

And you thought only college football fans could knee jerk that hard.

López Obrador, who never met a microphone he didn't like, has used the proposed legislation to propel himself back into the spotlight as the leader of the always-vocal opposition. But he really cares for the people of Mexico, don'tcha know?

I know, I know. Everyone does it. And I shouldn't let it exasperate me the way it does. But it just drains my life force the way politics gets in the way of actually getting things accomplished so often. López Obrador, like politicians of every stripe in every country, is, of course, FAR more interested in keeping his smiling mug on page one than he is in spreading Mexico's oil wealth among the people.

So, why do we care if Mexico can't get it's bleep together? Its not like this is new, right?

Did you know the US gets more if its oil from Mexico than anywhere else besides Canada and Saudi Arabia? Wouldn't you rather buy oil from Mexico than, say, Iran? Wouldn't our dough, if it's going to have to go out the door, be better spent in Mexico than in Russia, Sudan, or Venezuela? If the Mexicans can produce more, I'm all for buying it from them rather than (insert name of your favorite petro-fascist here). Conversely, if Mexican production continues to fall (and it has fallen dramatically since Pemex was nationalized), we're, at least for now, going to have to buy more from people who want us dead.

I really feel for the people of Mexico. They have been crapped on for centuries, and the people who claim to be looking out for them now are the worst kinds of demagogues; people who are far more interested in preserving their power than they are in actually doing something for their country and for the people the profess to care about.

Possible: $10/gallon gas?

The New York Sun runs an op/ed today speculating on the possibility of $10/gallon gas. With oil floating around the $120/barrel mark, Dan Dorfman poses the theory that $200/barrel is not out of the question, and it may happen sooner than you'd like.

Among reasons stated: Falling production in Nigeria and Mexico, massively increased global demand thanks to our friends in India and China, and the ever-present Russian Roulette played in the Middle East. Not even mentioned in the piece is the potential impact of a Gulf hurricane this summer. We've got off easy the past two years, but it's always a possibility.

Dorfman mentions that $7-$10/gallon gas in the US would merely bring us in line w/ what the Euros have been paying for years. That may be, but the shock here would be profound.

I say bring it. While $3.50/gallon gas is hurting us here at the CIT compound, and filling Mrs. Curmudgeon's land yacht now costs about $85, I still say this kind of spike is the only thing that's going to cause real progress on alternatives. And an alternative to oil, once we can manage to make it available enough to have an impact, is the cure for a great deal of what ails us. I've only been saying this since 2005. It'd be about time.

Four billion barrels of oil in North Dakota?

From an MSNBC story today: The US Geological Survey estimates that 4.3 billion (that's billion with a "B") barrels of oil may be trapped in huge shale formation under North Dakota, Montana, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba.

Some in the oil industry are skeptical, but you've got to love the optimism.

In a related story, the oil sands of Alberta are quietly becoming a major source of US oil imports.

I don't know if this is good news or not.

In the short term, obviously, major new sources of oil, especially if they are found under countries where there are not significant portions of the population who want us all dead or praying the same way they do, are welcome.

However, the long term answer to many of the worlds problems is going to be found in an alternative to oil. We've been saying it here for a long time.

Not exactly news: China is funding all sorts of unpleasantness in return for oil

Writing in the International Herald Tribune, Nicholas Kristof reminds us of some of the less-than-savory aspects of China's policies in Africa, specifically Sudan, and how we might see protests against those policies show up this summer in Beijing.

The main point of Kristof's column is China's support for the Sudanese government's war on its ethnic African population in Darfur. This support shows up in the form of arms, dough, and political air cover. In return, the Chinese get access to Sudanese oil.

I hope its not a surprise to you all out there that the Chinese are supporting all sorts of rotten behavior around the world in return for access to oil. The West buys the bulk of oil production from the "good guys" (comparatively speaking, of course) in the petro-world - the Saudis, Kuwaitis, and the others who are not actively engaged in napalming villages. That leaves the Chinese, who's super-hot economy is gagging for energy, to buy from the really foul bastards who have stocks of that black poison.

Don't forget, the Chinese don't listen to Greenpeace or Amnesty International very closely either.

The Chinese are making deals with a variety of devils, and you suspect it will come back to haunt them sooner or later. Of course, being a bit less restrained in how they respond when those devils get rowdy may help keep the lid on for a while. The Chinese are probably a bit harder to pressure than your average Western democracy, and are likely to respond somewhat more violently than we might when pushed.

Still, it's important for us to remember that we are not the only military and economic super-power out there on the world stage.

More regarding Iranian gasoline rationing

A few VERY interesting points in a BBC article this morning:

1. Up to 19 gas stations were attacked and burned in protests over Iran's surprise gas-rationing announcement.

2. The Iranian govt has banned local media from covering the story. Great idea, Mahmoud. That always works.

3. In addition, the govt shut down mobile text messaging in the capital last night to prevent organization of further protests. Yep, that usually works out well, too.

4. From the I-Did-Not-Know-That Dept: Iran's govt carries a substantial budget deficit largely caused by fuel subsidies. Gasoline for private use is heavily subsidized and costs the average Iranian consumer around $0.11 per gallon. No wonder they're pissed.

This is worth keeping an eye on, boys and girls.

Iran begins gasoline rationing. Wait. What?

Starting at midnight (local) on Wed - that's late Tues here in the good ol' US and A - Iran started rationing gasoline for private vehicles. The government announced the rationing about three hours before it went into effect.

My first reaction was "HUH?" After all, Iran is one of the largest producers of petroleum in the world. However, it turns out they have very little refining capacity, and are forced to import about 40% of its gasoline.

I had NO idea. What a lovely little bit of leverage this gives the world in the matter of Iran's rogue nuclear program.

Which is apparently what the Iranian govt is thinking, as well.

The move was greeted with some real resistance, with gas stations being burned, civilians and police mixing it up, and stone-throwing youths shouting catchy phrases like "Guns, fireworks, tanks, Ahmadinejad should be killed."

In spite of the obvious unpopularity of the move, the Iranians are trying to take the gasoline hammer out of the West's hands, so they can continue to thumb their noses at the UN, the US, and everyone else when it comes to their nuclear ambitions.

Chevrolet Volt is coming sooner

According to GM Chairman Rick Wagoner, the plug-in electric Volt is a top priority for the company. Wagoner went on to say that GM has let two contracts to battery suppliers in an effort to get the program moving.

As painful as $3+ gasoline is, here's a good example of why it's in our long term best interests to get reamed by Exxon right now. As gas prices climb, alternatives like the Volt, which, driven with some care regarding length of trip and speed, might never use a gallon of gas, start to look pretty darn attractive.

For me, if someone can build a reliable, 40 miles-to-the-charge, all-electric car and sell it for under $40k, I am totally in. It doesn't have to be a giant sedan or SUV. All I want is seats for four adults, a trunk big enough for a load of groceries, a four-speaker sound system, and decent enough craftsmanship and materials to last for five or six years. Producing a vehicle fitting this description for under $40k doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

If you can come up with that, GM (or anyone else), I'll take two tomorrow.

Are we one big storm away from $6 gas?

Several insurance industry modelers are predicting gas prices north of $6/gallon if the Gulf Coast gets clobbered by a true Cat 5 hurricane (which Katrina was NOT by the time it hit land) this summer. It's sorta shocking to read that the first time, but, when you stop and think for a minute, it's not that big a stretch.

Of course, the next question is: Would $6 gas be, in the long term, such a bad thing?