"The physical world, not theories based on wishful thinking, have always determined the outcome of economic life on Earth. There are 7 billion people on Earth all seeking to thrive. Even if these new economies are 40% more efficient that the US and Europeans in their marginal energy use...their demand for physical material and energy will be far larger than anything humans have experienced in the past. The current Anglo-Euro fantasy for energy efficiency (wind and solar) will work to an extent, but requires so much land use, that it is impractical at scale in the population density of Asia (passive solar and geothermal is different). Current Euro fantasies of running all of Europe from solar farms in war-torn Africa....are....well.....let's say "curious". The reality is that 7-9 billion humans, in order to avoid war, will need high density, transportable energy at much larger volumes than at present.
"Oil" is slow motion, genetically modified biomass. (Dead dinosaurs). It was genetically modified, slowly, by many microorganisms over millions of years. The same process can can now be done in hours with lab-level technology. Given that the entire infrastructure of the world economy already has an established "bio fuel" system in operation...known as "the oil industry"...new bio forms of matter-to-energy-to-matter conversion can be better applied to...oil...than to millions of hectares of hard-to-recycle solar panels and wind farms. These genomic solutions are already scaling globally in human waste treatment and e-waste systems."
"As for Donald Trump’s argument during the presidential campaign that America’s richer allies should pay adequately for their protection, it was a fair point in principle, but a fatal thing to say in public. It made clear that America’s commitment to NATO would not be unconditional under President Trump; and if America’s commitment is not unconditional, then fairly obviously it will not extend to nuclear war. The cat is out of the bag. Seen from Moscow, the West has not been in such inviting disarray since the Suez crisis of 1956. Whatever constraints Putin may now feel upon his land-grabbing instincts, they must be entirely domestic in nature. NATO is no longer one of them."
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/201
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