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What Is Power Consumption Telling Us About The US Economy?
Submitted by Erico Tavares Of Sinclair & Co.
We track US power consumption on a weekly basis as reported by Barron’s, as we believe this information provides insightful – albeit sometimes "noisy" and seasonally unadjusted – clues about the performance of the economy over time.
The expectation is that a more robust economic environment requires more power, although factors like colder winters and warmer summers relative to the norm can greatly skew the analysis. With that in mind, let’s have a look at the weekly historical performance of this indicator going back to 1995 (in MM kWhs):
Many peaks and bottoms can be observed as power demand changes seasonally over the year. We have used polynomial smoothing to extract a trend line (in black).
Some quick observations:
- US power consumption peaked in 2006 (red line), approximately in line with the peak in the US housing market, and the trend line has flatlined since.
- By definition a peak in consumption means that any new capacity additions, for instance to accommodate incremental renewable energy production, will need to be made at the expense of existing production capacity, which in turn will affect plant efficiencies and so forth. That being said, there is a considerable amount of coal-fired capacity, possibly even nuclear, that will be coming off-line in the coming years mainly due to environmental regulations, so it will be interesting to see how all of this will play out in the US power markets.
- The last intra-cycle power consumption peak was recorded in 2011, broadly in line with the recent global peak in commodity prices. While most commodity price analysis commentary focuses on China as the “marginal” buyer, it seems the US still plays an important role not only as a supplier but also as a consumer.
Consumption peaks normally come in late July/early August, so it is still a bit early to gauge how 2014 is shaping up. However, in the grand scheme of things and despite the limitations of this indicator, historical kilowatt consumption suggests that the US economy at best continues to muddle along, despite an unprecedented amount of policy stimulus – some of which may even be curtailed before the end of the year.
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I tried that excuse on my wife. She didn't buy it.
Center.... I think you’re up to something here… C’mon, tell us straight.
Reduced electricity consumption seems a good positive leading indicator for sustainablity.
Decline is ALWAYS sustainable...just like falling. Well, sustainable until the end point! Then that sudden deceleration catches up with you.
I always thought of that flat line as meaning your dead.
Electricity prices are going much higher. Demand will go lower. Obamacare costs and higher electricity prices will destroy many small businesses. Forward!
http://nypost.com/2014/05/21/your-electric-bill-will-skyrocket-with-new-...
Correct, Comrade! We cannot achieve full soviet until all private enterprise is eliminated.
This is the goal of the Hope and Change voted for by our wise proletariat!
Yes! All hail the wisdom of the proletariat!
Sarc
global warming has me using less ac this summer. funny how that works.
It truly is funny how Global and Local are two different things, when they are two different terms ...
I would like to see Colorado and Washington state rise in electricity use.
per capita power consumption would be more informative.
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/POPTHM
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uD5OJ-NlIl0/UT98uGGsMeI/AAAAAAAAByo/rAbYfS6YNw...
(2nd graph from top: http://davidappell.blogspot.com/2013/03/energy-miracles-and-energy-effic...
current per capita energy usage at or near all-time low going back to 1973)
or broken down to industrial vs. residential..........or by net worth of county
Uhh...hmmm.
So energy usage per unit of productive output is static over time?
No, sorry, not buying the idea.
I agree the economy continues to muddle along, but just because energy usage is flatlining or declining in the midst of belt-tightening does not mean things are necessarily bad or getting worse (though in this case I probably agree, I just think this is a bad indicator).
Since 2010, at home and at work, I have been seeking to reduce energy usage. My office, installed motion sensor lights in every office over a 3 year period. We installed PCs that turn themselves off (not just sleep) after several hours of non-use. I came aboard my new job in the midst of upgrading facilities for the last 5 years to have devices which use less energy in general while installing products which help reduce AC/heating bills.
At home, I've been doing similar things. When I was laid off (for a year) in 2009, I quickly streamlined my home's energy usage to reduce our bills and saved over $300 in the first year, and have continued to see my usage decline (and bills climb!) each year.
I think the indicator isn't less usage. It's bills which, today, are as high or higher for energy usage while usage is down. We are doing what we can and must do in tough times - save costs while producing the same or more. So usage is a misreading of potential while costs is not...at least from where I stand.
Nobody every "conserved" their way to prosperity. Your own experience holds that to be true: you only bothered to take steps to reduce your consumption when you were not producing income.
The fact that are energy usage turned down in 2007 isn't a positive indicator. The fact that it happened in 2007 tells you everything you need to know. If this was such a positive indicator, why didn't it happen in, say, 2004? Or 1997?
Technology and ROI, not EROI.
1st 90% of gains are the easiest.
You got it BB
The true extent of slowdown in the world economy can be judged by the data points which are not subjected to adjustments by the government. Eg. Change in Electricity and Fuel consumption, Ratio of working population to the total population of a country, Miles driven, Baltic Dry Index, Change in commercial Rental Rates etc.
There is no economic recovery because all the efforts of politicians, government, central banks etc are focused on saving banks instead of targeting job creation which is the only way economy can recover.
The weakness in the democratic process ensures the victory of the Wall Street over the Real Economy for the foreseeable future. Things are definitely going to get much much worse before they get better for the real economy i.e. for more than 90% of the population.
www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article40231.html
I agree.
But the bigger point is that the government is involved at all. Killing some parts of the economy at the expense of others (namely, banks). Central planning at its very worst.
Why does it ever have to get better?
Anarchy will be a massive improvement over the centrally planned Republik that we have now.
Imagine Amish communities instead of the Jetson's : )
Future
Todd Rundgren
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrZRYzZsOOs
US power consumption has declined being 2.269 MtoE in 2000 and in 2013 was 2,187 MtoE. 3.6% decline in 13 years.
While China power consumption has risen from 1,161 MtoE to 3,013 MtoE in 2013. Increase of 159% during the same period.
http://yearbook.enerdata.net
China is simply growing at a ridiculuos pace!
Another statistic....China has added more power production in less than 2 decades, than United States has done in the entire century. (has to do with something called population!).
How unfortunate that outside of global trade China cannot feed all those people.
Don't even have enough water...
4% of the world's grains are directed to China. China's imports of all agri products is rising at a massive rate.
http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2014/05/china-us-food-pork-wine-...
We have yet to hear of malnutrition or famine at the scale of India, from China.
Better than India at 43.5%., China stands at barely 3.5% for its largest population on the planet. Germany at 1.1% and USA data is not reported. I dont think China has a problem of malnutrition or food etc. http://kff.org/global-indicator/child-malnutrition/
Its unfortunate that China gained so much at the expense of so many workers in the US
It should be noted that the US adds about 3 million new people to the population every year.
So, since the peak in 06, we've added around 24 million people.
That means that units of energy per person is down quite a bit.
24 million Mejicans and South Amerikkkans agree: cooler here all year long. Turn the A/C off Maria.
I switched back from electric shavoer to blade in 2011.
Or could be the weather?
I think some of the drop can be attributed to the retrofitting of existing buildings and construction of new buildings to meet LEED standards. I operate a 20 story building where every circuit has an IP address that reports back to the energy management system. Unnecessary loads are.automatically shed and intake and exhaust air passes thru heat recovery wheels which add greatly to operating efficiencies. These are just a few improvements of many I've seen over the years.
Agree. I was alluding to that in my post.
What have you done with lighting controls? I'm sure the F-40 and F-96 T12 are long gone. I'm old enough to remember the GE Powergroove that provided a 10 foot tube in a 8 foot lamp. Lighting is constantly being more efficient from Roadway lighting to compact fluorescent lamps. As LED lighting gets into the system energy usage will go down even more.
Indoor lighting is controlled via tod schedule set in the BAS. Garage core lighting is on at all times but exterior zones go.off for daylight harvesting but is overridde by photocell if the weather gets sour.
All hvac chillers have magnetic levitation bearings which does away with the oil circuit which means no motor friction while the refrigerant efficiency is increased due to no oil mixing. All pumps and fans are VFD driven so always have soft starts.and only run at the needed speeds to support load.
We have a mix of T8 and led lighting.
HVAC install and repair business here in the south are in trouble. People have stopped installing or repairing central heating and cooling systems. People here are putting in window type air conditioners and only cooling single rooms instead of the entire house. The same thing is happening with heat. This is happening in new home construction as well. People are installing whole house fans which were common prior to the wide spread use of central heating and cooling systems. If you don't know what an whole house fan is follow this link.
My whole house ventilation system is fully automatic. At night the system turns on and draws cool night time air into the house and my thermal sink. When the outside temperature exceeds the interior temperature the system shuts down and closes outside vents. Because I have a heavily insulated home it will remain cool throughout the day. A thermal sink built into the foundation helps keep the house cool in the summer and warm in the winter. My heating and cooling bill is a fraction of what it would normally be.
Long-John-Silver
Interesting observation... but not a surprise.
So where in the South do you live? Kenya?
Probably Arizona.
I call bullshit. Obama was just saying the other day things are fine. He warned us there would be cynics.
In an oligarchical fascist kleptocracy this pattern GUARANTEES 5-8% price increase starting now through 2017. Since corporations are "people" and have most of the money, and pay the least taxes, they simply hand a check and a draft of some legislation to their reprehensitive in CONgress.
See, it IS the weather! (sarc)
Or, "Peak Power".
Intel SpeedStep whitepaper released 2004? CRT TVs and monitors transitioning to LCD? I don't know what % of electricity produced goes into running PCs and TVs but they have gotten to be much more efficient over the last decade. I imagine that other technologies have also.
from Wikipedia "A test in 2005 revealed computer power supplies are generally about 70–80% efficient....Standard PSUs sold for server workstations have around 90% efficiency, as of 2010."
LED lightbulbs.
Chevy Volt
I feel so sinful watching my plasma TV.
I believe the power consumption Savings by those devices since 2000 was erased by the increase in shear numbers of devices since 2000.
The savings was spent by the two or three extra devices people have acquired since 2000.
Dup
Honey, pretty soon, your plans will leave no electric power in America.
We'll have a generator, Reggie. Cum here, worrywart.
chinas power consumtion has risen, and americas has drop, not a suprise, follow production.
This tells me that the weather is to blame last winter.
I know I'm consuming less: 64F. in winter and 78F in summer. Since the wife ran off I can keep the home cooler in the winter, but I'm not sure what the point is anymore; might as well just it all off, except these GA summers will wear you out, so i can't go much higher than 78F.
Well, the data is noisier than it used to be. CFL and LED bulbs, and newer appliances, save a lot of power. And home solar power also makes overall consumption look smaller, it has become a significant factor. OTOH a few plug-in electric cars can use up all those savings just like that. Elon Musk is a parasite on the grid - do any municipal utilities give a price *break* for electricity used to recharge cars?
...
It's impossible to differentiate energy efficiency and self-generation from economic effects in this data.
These data.
Data can be a singular group.
The problem with this analysis is also the power consumption could be leveling off from companies switching to laptops over desktops, consumers moving to tablets, efficient servers, and efficient heating/cooling systems. In the RTOs that we wheel and deal in, we saw a lot of industrials consumption move up while commercials residential fell. Without being able to separate the data out by type, it becomes difficult to glean any idea what is economically driven vs weather / efficency improvements.
We need a barcode on every Watt!
Quick, pass the necessary legislation.
Hey, I do barcode my cords of wood, each piece by #btu...
Just wait until the Carbon Taxes kick in.
"Energy Efficient" appliances (primarily HVAC), better insulation required in Building Code, energy-use planning in design of buildings (e.g. window directiion and shading) and more efficent consumer products (e.g. those ugly last-forever light bulbs) , and "progressive electricity cost" w. surcharges for higher use... all together have reduced electrical power consumption. Impossible to say by how much. Seems like it would be at least a factor of two overall, easy.
Jevons says not.
We should sometimes remind ourselves that when we look at the time we live in now and the living standard that most of us enjoy in the USA and a lot of western countries is way above what could be achieved by the average person throughout history. ( Help me out here Falak) Of course it could and should be a whole lot better and certainly we should plan ahead more for a more sustainable use of resources, but has there ever been a time where Joe the plumber had the choice of even hamburger or hotdog for lunch? More likely it was thin soup and a hunk of bread on a good day.
way above what could be achieved by any person throughout history.
This is an illusionary view of history. In order to do hard manual labour for 10 hours per day, 6 days per week, men needed to consume 3500 calories per day.
The coal miners had big fudge squares or Nanaimo Bars as snacks with their lunches, because you cannot shovel 16 tons of coal on thin soup and a hunk of bread.
Last month I paid 9.06 cents per kWh for the first 450 kWh/month.
Anything over that cost 13.07 cents per kWh.
That's 44% premium on "top line" but effective premium more like 50% because of a "Cost-Effective Energy Saving" rebate for low total usage..
We claim the lowest price in NA and I paid 7.04 cents a kW.h plus a 7 dollar service charge.
So what your saying in fact is your one kwh cost you $7.07.
Maybe you'll get a discount if you use more.
(s)
Peak electrical. We're going to spend 20 billion in the next 10 years on new hydro-dams for future export of clean power. We're already 30 billion in debt and there are only 1 million of us. That's socialism. I paid 21 dollars last month for 176 kW.h of electricty.
Grow house usage in SoCal.
That chart shows a slow burn decline. 2010 was the hottest summer in a long time.
When you look at refiner data on auto gasoline demand it is down more than 50% from 2007.
cobra1650
No, it's not. Its' down from 395 million gallons daily, to about 325.
The peak was in 2007, if I remember correctly.
One thing I'm sure of: Planned obsolescence has got to go.
The main reason we have planned obsolescence is because of the choices consumers make.
I have an English garden spade (Spear & Jackson) that I bought about 23 years ago for $20 on sale. It's in almost as-new condition after a lot of use for chopping tree roots and digging heavy clay soil. All in all, an excellent purchase.
My stapler I bought used about 45 years ago. I read somewhere, an example of it is in the Smithsonian Museum of Industrial Design. A beautiful heavy tool.
I am old enough to remember many quality products, such as bicycle parts, that have deteriorated to complete garbage and are actually MORE expensive now because of poor consumer choices made years ago.
Today there're many examples of products available new, that consumers simply refuse to buy because it's simply more expensive than shoddy products.
I remember when we fixed our electronics instead of dumping and buying new again. I fixed a lot of walkmans' back when among other things.
I can't fix my 100 dollar Chinese toaster. One of the circuit boards failed, I think, and I'm not a computer expert. No more toast for me except from the oven broiler.
In an inflationary environment it's better to buy a cheaper poorer quality product now than it is to wait and save up for the more expensive longer lasting quality product. In a deflationary environment it is better to save for a better quality product. So the overall trend in an inflationary environment is to cheaper poorer quality products and in a deflationary one the trend is to better quality longer lasting products.
This is even more true when the labour force's income does not match the level of inflation.
Put another way, inflation causes a disposable culture.
@css1971 This is a good point and something I hadn't really thought about...THANK YOU!
My father bought a self-propelled Toro Lawn Mower in 1975 for $500 (an enormous sum back then). I am still using it every week to cut my lawn. Starts on the first pull. All I do is change the oil and sharpen the blade.
My central air conditioner is SEER 10 (energy efficiency). In my province the minimum legally allowable new ones are SEER 13. Also, they just outlawed (haha) incandescent bulbs - so people have to switch to florescent or even led. LED TV's and much more efficient computers, appliances etc etc. Some studies say we will use 2% less electricity per year for next 20 years as this trend continues. In the meantime expect to pay more in both real and absolute terms though. Plus as manufacturing moves to lower wage countries expect reductions in commercial electricity usage in western countries.
I think all the empty strip malls might be affecting the overall power usage, but I feel like such a racyst pointing that out.
..ten hail marys and sin no more- I know the drill..
I think I peaked around '96 too.........bummer.
Late 2013 I started to a trend in the prices of the utility stocks; they were starting to slowly drop. As utility stocks are usually considered to be safe and therefore what investors move into when they get nervous, I questioned why they were dropping.
About a month ago my question was answered when I read an article about the large numbers of home-owners and small businesses who are starting to generate their own power by using solar cells and windmills. Most are still on the grid but some are getting completely off the grid. Although the number of KW hours being produced this way is still very small, the numbers are rapidly increasing with the thought that in 10 years it will start to make a significant impact on the profits and viability of the large utility companies.
Looking at my own utility bills (I do not produce any of my own power), about 10-15% of my bill is actual usage; the rest is the "extras", transmission fees, administration costs etc. I can see many customers getting put off by this as there's absolutely no incentive to cut back use if you'll only save perhaps 50 cents on a $200 electric bill. Rather, the incentive is to eliminate the bill altogether by getting off the grid.
Overall, I believe this is a good and healthy trend.
No it is NOT a healthy trend. Using solar for power generation is one of the most inefficient ways. However solar for heating water is much, much more efficient.
For instance, adding 500 KW of solar electricity to the grid also requires 500 KW of hot standby backup power available for fluctuations, such as clouds or day/night situations where this additional energy has to be replaced in order to stabilize the electrical grid.
This hot standby generation has to come from somewhere, be it hydro, gas ,coal or nuclear, but it must be available at all times to soak up the slumps from naturally fluctuating energy sources, like solar or wind.
That is a definite cost. Germany has learned this hard lesson and is now adding more coal fired power plants to make up for the solar/wind installations it so blindly funded.
Then, if you are concerned about greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) , you must also take into account the amount of GHG produced for the production of things like PV cells or the steel and concrete required for wind turbines.
For example, solar cell manufacture requires use of hexaflouroethane (C2F6), nitrogen triflouride (NF3) and sulpher hexafluoride
(SF6). Which are 12,000, 17,000 and 23,000 times more warming than CO2.
In addition, there is a maintenance cost.
While PV cells and associated electronics are manufactured with a Mean Time Between Failure (MBTF) measured in decades, the
actual life of these combined products can vary from just a few months to more than several years, but never even approaching a multi decadal level of reliance.
Another “cost” to consider is the usefulness or value of the
land which has been taken out of service in order to be blanketed by arrays of PV installations. For example, the land could have been used for producing food instead of being laid fallow for decades or it could have been used to grow trees, which not only sequester Carbon, but are also used for structural and energy needs.
The “cost” of decommissioning these PV arrays should also be
considered. They contain a variety of very toxic metals which have to be recycled at some cost.
However, the most obvious “cost” is the subsidy which has been paid by the tax payers to the corporation which financed the PV
installation.
The corporation was provided a publicly funded discount for use of it’s capital, this discount should be remunerated to the public over the project life.
This is anything BUT healthy.
You're a shill for the Utility Industry, arncha?
Astute observation. The above review was for a a Photo Voltaic system feeding the Grid.
If you want to use the same to go off the Grid, then you need a new set of cost analysis.
First is the cost of your energy battery, could be thermal, lead acid battery, whatever.
Cause when you go off the Grid, the cost of maintaining your lifestyle depends on a battery of some kind.
Think of the Grid as your original "battery". Now you want to go off the Grid. Access to that "battery" is gone.
You still need a battery of some kind. Plus now you own it and maintain it.
The cost of YOUR battery includes the cost of producing it, maintaining it and absorbing (recycling) it when it ceases to function.
Doesn't matter if the "battery" is from the Utility Industry or your own back yard. There is a still a cost.
You may opt for no "battery" and live in darkness, lack of water, disease, etc.
That is your choice.
Hope you realize that my remark was a lower form of an attempt at humor:
It was meant, <sarc on>.
Yours is a very well thought out analysis, the only possible deduction from it being that there is, "No Exit".
Totally agree, also the raw materials for the semiconductor crystals in PV panels come from large non-environmentally friendly mines and close to half of the refined product is wasted when it's sawn up into wafers. A PV panel will never generate the amount of electricity it cost to make it in the first place. The PV boom is more about keeping up appearances of being "green" (by govt.).
That said they are useful in for powering up small installations in remote areas a long way from transmision lines.
I think we could make a long term solution utilising geothermal on a large scale, however those sort of solutions tend to tread on the toes of big oil and gas.
|Another “cost” to consider is the usefulness or value of the land which has been taken out of service|
What? You mean like the almost 5000 sq/ft of roof on my house, or all the impervious ground cover in all the parking lots and roads in the country??? Or the roofs of all the buildings in the country that could have solar and wind generators mounted on them. Why do you assume that "farmland" has to be sacrificed????
The effing public utility commissions and the industry players have conspired to make it very difficult to create an amorphouse distribution system simply to maintain the effing status quo. Fucking risk averse asshats!!!!
For myself, I would love to have covered parking everywhere I go.
Doesnt show much.
I work in this industry. Yes, consumption growth is down. C&I has figured out to cut back on consumption. Good example: ten years ago you could never convince a plant manager to curtail for a demand response event. It had nothing to do with savings. It just had to do with comfort around how to curtail. Now it's easy to ask "why aren't you doing DR?
If you push the consumption data up against what the feds rell us about is inventory build in GDP, you'd say "where?"
But the older coal plants need to go. They hurt people and they damage property. End of story. Like some people will say "make a credits system". Total dogshit. It's paying off the cops to hurt people and they're everything that's wrong with "environmental policy" in this country. You can hurt people so long as you've paid off the right people.
What!? If could understand you I might agree, but your posting is so full of industry jargon and abbreviations most people, outside of your industry, do not understand half of your posting.
Try making your point in language that most readers can understand.
By Jove, I've got it. Most of it.
DR - Demand Response
GDP - Gross Domestic Production
C & I - Consumer and Industry
Now, wait a minute. Are they not retrofitting existing coal plants with scrubbers or some sort of similar technology which make emissions clean? How much of a environmental problem is it ... really?
I live in a city with a plant that has nat gas and coal. Both. I think they turn if from one form of energy to the other depending on price, but am not sure. Do you fear that a plant that runs on nat gas alone -- won't these plans have costs that fluctuate as wildly as the gas prices, that is, go up in the winter? Or am I wrong, here.
Really don't know
i would imagine power consumption is dependent on disposable income and wealth, so, at the luxury margin, it is a substitutable expense.
a Vegas waitress would have given two shits about power consumption where her zero dollars down 500,000 condo was going up at 10% per annum.
similarly, any family that has rising disposable/household income is going to be less concerned with power bills.
when you are paying higher city taxes, obamacare costs, higher food prices, people will "hunker down" and cut power usage.
the question that should be being asked is how much is power consumption down because banks need to be bailed out. the government/treasury made that decision - better for 300 million people to pay more for power than to reduce bankster salaries/bonuses and profits of banks (who in turn are continually gouging customers and providing zero utility to the broader economy).
Here is a pic of my furnace on Christmas eve,Each one of the power meter reads 10 times the previous, so we were heating the place up real good. We were waiting for Santa Claus, going to whack him real bad cause he had run up our debt so high...
http://second-reel.blogspot.com/2010/07/homage-reference-and-free-associ...
Gee,it almost looks as if,since the democrat party entered power,there has been no growth in the US economy.That is a shocker.
Who would have guessed?
You racist!
(sarc)
These numbers are racist ones. Clearly people are cutting their power usage in an attempt to make Obama look bad.
The chart reminds me of my broke-dick dog that is whimpering away under the porch.
this is awesome - gewbamints survive on percentages - this is why these folks work so hard to drive inflation
so the way to stomp gewbamints is to stop spending on everything but essentials
alcohol, cigarettes and energy - biggest gewbamint tax grab - stop using them
I love this comment from the article on LinkedIn: "I like how you linked power consumption to U.S. Economy health ... But lets not forget that nowadays money is created from thin air , the US depends on its financial sector and the trust of foreign investors in the US dollar to strengthen its economy ( i.e. The US doesn't need to be a goods producer consuming electricity to have good economy as the classical economical models suggest)..."
Domestic NSA spying has consumed the power grid.
Energy efficient devices have become the norm over the last decade. LCDs replaced CRTs, smartphones, tablets & laptops displacing PCs, LEDs & fluorescents replacing bulbs & tubes. Plus personal solar.
Jevons paradox says that efficiency increases are consumed by increased consumption.
The debt of the utility needs to be paid so efficiency is met with increased price and consumption goes down in a closed loop. They can't make me heat the house.
Geez,....that's a paradox.
And Jevons paradox held true until the year it didnt.
Multigeneration family member are living together now to afford a place to live.
Additionally there are vacant homes everywhere going to rack and ruin.
Less houses, less need for power.
The unused surplus will be taken up by bitcoin transaction processing when our brand new digital economy kicks in and deletes this old debt based dinosaur.
How is a parasite supposed to earn a living under BTC?
Parasites don't earn a living. Parasites will be forced to become either wealth creators , innovators , artists , philosophers etc - or be deleted. Absolutely no room is available for thieves tyrants quangoes or any form of muppetry in the New Digital Order
Simple.
You invite people to create a Bitcoin account with your institution and you offer them some interest on the account. People deposit bitcoins with you.
You allow them to spend bitcoins using your Visa Bitcoin card.
You begin loaning out Bitcoins in parallel with the deposit accounts. The debtors get a Visa Bitcoin card they can use to spend the bitcoins,
You reserve the bitcoins 10:1 and loan out 10x more bitcoins than were deposited with you.
As long as people use the Visa Bitcoin cards, or account -> account transfers it doesn't make a blind bit of difference if there are any real bitcoins behind it.
Fractional Reserve banking began with gold. Gold doesn't solve the problem. Bitcoins can be fractionally reserved in exactly the same way gold or any currency can and Bitcoin doesn't solve the problem either.
Bitcoin, is a waste of everybody's time. Red Herring. Probably created with the support of the banks to make sure the heat is directed elsewhere.
You are a clueless fool. How can you lend out bitcoin that you do not hold ? If you have 10 bitcoins in your digital wallet and you then lend out your 10 bitcoins from your digital wallet you will have zero bitcoins in your wallet and none available to spend or lend. You cannot lend out 100 bitcoins from 10 , it's technically impossible. Bitcoins cannot be created from thin air like dollars or Euros etc. You think bitcoin is like a Fiat currency that can be fractionally reserved. There is currently 12 million bitcoins in existance. The blockchain will tell you the location of every single bitcoin in existance , they cannot be spent twice or exist in more than one wallet at any one time. Do you homework you muppet.
From what airless space were 12 million bitcoins created.?
You need to read up on and understand what Fractional Reserve Banking and credit are.
Gold cannot be created from thin air either but once you understand how FRB and credit can function with respect to gold (and it works just fine with gold) then you will understand that Bitcoins are no different and can be fractionally reserved also.
Do you think that the bank has your USD notes sitting in a bank vault? When you spend money using a credit or debit card what exactly do you think is actually happening?
I gave you an up but people who know more than me will find flaws in your reasoning. From what I read, bitcoins cannot be contre-faconed.
They don't need to be forged. You are spending bank credit, not bitcoins. The bank has the bitcoins/gold/USD/EUR not you.
Seriously people?
You don't get that when you use a credit or debit card you are spending private "credit" money created by the bank? It's a bank book keeping entry you are spending not US dollars or Euros, or even Bitcoins.
The bank then manages the movement and distribution of the real currency in the background on an as needed basis. It's the bank's job to make it's own credit appear as much like the real thing as possible.
I fear bitcoin is a fantasy-like tulip bulbs or south sea property.
BTW-how do you transact bitcoin if the power grid is down and you can't use electronic devices???
From that flat plot, I guess the only "growth" is the devaluation of the yankee dollar.
Can't go that way without blowing up. Game over time.
Long live Pittsburgh.
the academics and intelligentsia gave up
questioning the significance and meaning
of "economy" long before the notion of ecology
existed, it spells doom this moronic presumption.
you can see it everywhere on the street to the
halls of congressional disappointment where the
reps recline and commit fraud using your language
to return to their constituents to apologize for
the screwing they must deliver due to the adherence
to the criminal and fraudulent money system based
on constituent enslavement and usury, not to mention
resource stripping and environmental degradation,
all paid for by you and your slave children offspring.
have a nice day and do try to get rich quick.
What is the off grid power use I wonder? No mention of that but is it one cause of less consumption?
Decentralization scares the fascist oligarchy.
The number doing that wouldn't even get above the noise level on the graph?
LED Bulbs use 90% less power, CFL's use 50% less
Laptops use 60% less power
New cable boxes use 50% less power
Energystar appliances use 20% less power
Low household formation means more people per roof
Vacant office building use 99% less power as do vacant factories.
Unemployed people drive less.
The roads are congested as ever. All these gen Y kids somehow can afford (thru a lease or mommy paying) BMW's, Infinity G37s or Acura MDX's..
Vacant office buildings?? where are these vacancies?? maybe in some parts of the pioneer valley of MA near Springfield but in the greater Boston area (or east of I 495) there is so much activity both commercial & residential and companies expanding. All along Rt 128 & I 495 technology companies are expanding same in the Cambridge area.
Cable boxes use 'less power'?? Not really and most people have several (at least 5 -- the cord cutting like the 'less driving' is a myth told my bleeding heart CNN). Most households have like 10 gaming consoles and don't forget around surround sound systems and pool filtration systems....
There are 20-30 cities more immune from the economy-- Boston is one of them. NYC and DC are bulletproof. The rest of the country not so much. Newer cable boxes use much less power than those 5 years ago, call your cable co and upgrade. Same with gaming consoles xbox 360 uses 175W Xbox slim uses 115W.
I would be interested in the true number of the population in the US. I recalls reading numerous articles about illegal hispaic immigrants returning home for lack of work. If enough people left you could detect on average a decrease if fuel and power consumption. In addition, the high cost of fuels and loss of jobs resulted in demand destruction. Peoples will think twice about buying that extra plasma tv, puter, and other appliances.
The way to throttle the economy is by the cost of fuel. Keeps transportation costs and prices of may goods high enough to keep demand low, even though prices on those products decreases. I heard on the radio the F150 can be had with $8k off from various manufacturer incentives. But, its a gas guzzler, so who is going to buy it?
You 'heard' on the radio that the F150 can be had with 8K off from various manufacturer incentives off what price the MSRP OR the DEALER POSTED PRICE ???? Tell me exactly what you need to do to get these incentives?? Are they coupons or something to show the dealer before they rape you with the "Dealer Posted Price"?? I also heard on the radio that you can lease (note lease not purchase) a Honda Accord LX for 'only' $99 a month with '$2,999' cash or trade thru either IRA Or Boch Honda here inthe Boston area but you can be as sure that the sun will rise that You WILLL NOT be paying just $99 a month AND you will be putting an outlay of closer to $4,000 for the 'cash or trade' needed for this Honda Accord on a lease of course
My business partner in NYC leased a loaded 2015 Jeep Grand Cherokee (that he won't shut up raving about) for 'only' $650 a month PLUS insurance of $181 a month. In the Bronx (one of the other 4 boros of NYC) insurance isn't cheap for various reasons.
But tell me what exactly you have to do to pay less than that window sticker price of a new car you see at the dealership??? They say most don't pay the MSRP (or the dealer posted price since MSRP is the "SUGGESTED PRICE")
$8,000 off a ford F150????? Which dealership in the greater Boston area should I visit to try to obtain this deal????? Anyone? anyone?? And being living in NYC for 32 years I can detect bullshit a mile away and not shy about calling people out on it
I was a bit befuddled when I heard it. Given your interest I did a quickie Start Page search and and found...
"Incentives worth up to $8,000 for the top-selling Ford F-150 truck have been reported. “Chevrolet will run a national promotion in March offering supplier pricing on all Silverado pickup models,” Automotive News said. It will be “the second straight month of beefed-up incentives from General Motors”.
link https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/2014/02/ford-gm-offer-big-incentiv...
The article is from February, but I just heard it on the radio yesterday. Not going to buy one for $15K off, just not what I am looking for.
I have a suggestion: Fuch the car dealers. The last time I did business with a car dealer was 1986. You can add to the scum stack coin and gun dealers. As a matter of fact pretty much all "dealers" can KMA!!!
Let me introduce you to my BAD philosophy:
Brokers
Agents
Dealers
If you meet up with anybody that has any of these in their titles, hide your assets and hide them well.
Yeah I see this coming too. Damn glad I bought a single cylinder stationary diesel engine before the epa banned the model and linked it to a generator head. Worked like a champ thru Hurricane Ike. It will back up the solar panels/batteries on bad days.
A prior poster mentioned that the batteries are the thing that make.full solar.systems impractical and they.are.correct. I just happen to work at a place that has data centers, so I grab free.batteries during maintenance swap outs.
is "power" every really "consumed"?
just asking .....
.
no, power is never consumed, it is
refined, expressed and temporarily
stores carbon, nitrogen and other
"things".
.
power?
duuude, take your sunglasses off and see the light.
then do some basic physics
- Ned
consumption, a word with a definition
we do not agree on, power too.
man is not a wax candle, that is merely
an analogy my new meat friend. glasses
and or shades have nothing to do with it.
I moved to a affluent suburb northwest of Boston MA. Town has its own electric only 12KWH, down in NYC being raped by Con ED over 25 or more per KWH... On long Island, along with the annual property tax bill of $8,000 - $12,000 a year, LIPA charges close to the same around 20KWH. I usually have to goto the NYC area a few days or a weekend or two each month due to several businesses I am a partner or invested in. However, I couldn't live there now full time at least not without a Concealed carry permit....
The italians love to have to huge gawdy christmas light displays on Staten Island, Massapequa and Howard Beach
Anyone from the NYC metro area tell me why you choose to stay there?? Is it because you are making $150,000 a year, how much do you have left after paying the $3,000 + a month mortgage PiTi payment, LIPA, and the $250 a month for the LIRR to get to work??? Diversity is nice when you are in your 20's but if you have any sort of wealth or money people will try to screw you over any which way they can
People are leaving. I left. I know three friends who have left in the past month. Two went to NC and one to KC. You have to make 250K to live there. Place is dying and there answer is to raise prices. Glad you got out.
although the campaign against odourless, colourless, plant food has killed several hundred of quite clean power plants.
How can this be???
- Ned
There's no 'fun' in Fundermentals! We need to stop asking foolish question and BUY-BUY-BUY-BUY!
http://www.tcm.com/mediaroom/video/297120/Man-Who-Shot-Liberty-Valance-T...
.
Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, The - (Movie Clip) Western Law
Ranse Stoddard (James Stewart) begins the long flashback, recalling his arrival on the stagecoach and his first encounter with the bandit (Lee Marvin) in John Ford's The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, 1962.
This guy is making all of these broad and far-reaching conclusions based solely on this graph? Waste of time without more detailed info including more detailed info on power generation trends and sources.
Just stack both PMs and semi-precious (Lead and Copper) and hold on. Don't worry about the rest for now. Its done.
Just stack both PMs and semi-precious (Lead and Copper) and hold on. Don't worry about the rest for now. Its done.
To make more sense of this, gas, oil and coal consumption in BTU equivalents needs to be on the graph. In toto I think you would find a decline unexplained by anything other than lack of buying power.
You know whats comming. Don't be shy. It will happen. PMs and Lead. Good Luck.
You cant say the power consumption rate is directly linked to consumption thats stupid. You know what else happened in 2007? Congress passed a law requiring more energy efficient light bulbs. This could easily explain any decrease in energy use.
not only bulbs, most electric appliance require less power in 2014 than they used to in 1995
Marginal distributed generation like rooftop solar nibbles at the edges but energy eff appliances - even lightbulbs are trimming consumption. The breakeven energy savings on something as mundane as a clothes washer is 1 to 2 years. People don't throw out working appliances for energy savings but maybe they should. Big flat screen TVs sip energy compared to old CRT TVs.
People are substituting laptops for desktops and that saves 50-80% of the comparable desktop electric consumption.
These things add up - or should I say down!
The "sky is falling authors did not even bother to mention efficiency. The commentators who did mention it were --- well barely in the triple digit range for the most part. If Electric cars were a factor (knuckles) then energy consumption would have gone up no matter how efficient they were since they replaced gas powered cars. SDshack offers no supporting evedence for his statement that efficiencies are offset by larger units.
Larger computers?? really? Larger stereos? Larger AC units put into smaller houses that are better insulated? Maybe a larger TV, but not many since they tend to be quite expensive. Maybe a larger refrigerator, but not likely a larger electreic razor, or a larger dishwasher. But maybe a larger clothes washer since so many people are getting fatter :-)
In other words --- an idiot article, with idiot comments. Which is why I come here less and less. This site has degenerated to another one of those loony fear mongering places that panders to the ignorant.