A couple of years ago I caught a mention that China was full of “empty office buildings” – due to rampant speculation that was racing far ahead of the economy. I have no idea if it was accurate – it’s just that I was reminded of it by this;
A sudden and mysterious drop in China’s oil consumption helped to push down the International Energy Agency’s estimate on Wednesday of global demand for this year.
After growing 11 percent in 2003 and 15.4 percent last year, China’s overall oil use declined 1 percent in the second quarter from the comparable quarter a year earlier, the agency said.
The drop is the latest in a series of unclear and often conflicting indications about whether the Chinese economy is still growing strongly. Top officials of the agency said in interviews they believed that the decline was temporary and that they expected Chinese demand to rebound in the second half of the year, but added that world oil prices could take a heavy blow if Chinese use did not increase.
Curious.
Maybe the decline in oil consumption is the result of the coal fired asia-powercor plants coming on line….good thing that China is exempted from Kyoto or Moe Strong’s cartel, that invested in 3rd world coal mines (which were depressed as a result of Kyoto/UN sanctions), would be without a client to consume their wares in the coal fired energy technologies they sold them…wink wink, nudge nudge.
China?
Former USSR: “The Five Year Plan”; “We will bury you” Khruschev; the lies, damned lies, and statistics; quid nunc? What’s new?
>>>>>>>> “under reporting” communism/socialism are all lies; ask AdScam Martin. Has Great Leader Martin ever told the truth? Lies, truth; both the same to Great Leader Martin.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Coal mine company hid bodies
BEIJING (AP) – The managers of an illegal coal mine in China hid the bodies of 17 dead miners after a gas explosion earlier this month so they could under-report the death toll, the official Xinhua news agency said Thursday.
cnews (Pravda aka, the Truth)
Well consider that Vancouver and Campbell have both declined to have a new Walmart in their communties. That may be it.
Well, consider this … Both Campbell River and Vancouver BC have refused to allow Walmart to open new stores in their communities. Could that have something to do with it?
Ok I can add with some authority on this one..
(I work with climate change, energy consumption etc for one of the big oil majors)
There’s a couple things at work in China here.
Mackenzie answered one. China’s preferance for energy consumption is Coal. They only purchase oil to offset any demand differences in thier coal production and energy generation.
There’s quite a bit more to it than that however. What China’s actual coal production is is highly suspect. My companies estimates very clearly state that China’s actual hydrocarbon based energy production numbers are unconfirmed and unsubstantiated when compared to 1st world accounting pracites. So we don’t really know 1 year to the next why China’s doing certain things.
My guess? China’s government is pissed at OPEC and the West that world oil prices have gone so high and are making a deliberate attempt to shift thier dependance to other energy sources in the short term to force prices back to a “reasonable” level. People tend to forget that a commodity is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. If the Chinese central planners think they are paying too much for oil then they won’t buy it.
Not to mention the fact that if it is impossible to get where you are going in your car, and there is no place to park it when you get there, then why bother putting fuel in it?
I’d heard their long-term plans are to move away from coal-powered plants to LNG powered plants, although that’s likely 10-15 yrs out (it takes 3-4 yrs to build an LNG plant, and they’ve stated plans to build 10-12). There are only a few companies in the world with the capability to bring one on line, so no matter how much cash they can throw at a project, they are still limited by capabilities. And LNG plants aren’t like pop-bottling plants – if you don’t build it right, it explodes, so they can’t just ‘build it anyway’ as they may have done with other enterprises.
More nuclear plants coming online perhaps?
I think Sierra above is correct. The Chinese are wise to develope alternate energy sources so as to conserve oil for the manufacture of added value products rather than just burning it.
We in North America should have a much wider development of aternate energy available at gas stations by now. True we do have a propane alternate in place but that is based on the same fosssil base as gas and oil.
There are hydrogen fueled vechicles on the market at about five thousand more per car.
That price difference is still a bit wide, but it is the lack of fuel-up places that keeps hydrogen car sales down. 73s TG
P.S. I heard the Oil Giants were planning to build two more refineries. Today’s costs for a refinery are astronomical. Lotsa unionized pipe-fitting and plumbing y’know.
No wonder gas prices are up. At this rate, those refineries will be almost pre-paid.
China believes in keeping workers fit. More production and all that good stuff. Their health centre exercise bikes have generators attached. All that energy is fed to the grid, thus lower oil consumption. 73s TG
Nuclear Power Plants coming online,
Exactly; read somewhere 40-45 plants in the works in the not to distant future.
Lesser known fact: hydrogen is made with natural gas.
Same thought Kate, wherever the hydrogen comes from, there is a fuel cost for the energy needed to separate the H2 from its source compound.
It is pie in the sky until we get serious about standardized current generation nuclear. The Chinese are planning to use pebble bed reactors which are massively simpler, safer, and less expensive. I was reading about that design 20 years ago here in the States from a major manufacturer- but no one has acted on it yet!
Whatever is happening in China, I think that the cause is not technology but the economy, as in, the horrendous centralized mismangement of.
How severe this depression will be, will critically depend on two developments. First, how much longer the Chinese government will pursue the inflationary policy, and second how doggedly it will fight the bust. The longer it expands and the more its fights the bust, the more likely it is that the Chinese Depression will turn into a Great Depression. Also, it is important to realize that just like America�s Great Depression in the 1930s triggered a worldwide Depression, similarly a Chinese Depression will trigger a bust in the U.S., and therefore a recession in the rest of the world. China’s Great Depression
I can’t recommend highly enough that you take this author’s advice to read Rothbard’s America’s Great Depression as well. It will make your parents’ and grandparents’ stories about the 1930s suddenly snap into sharp focus, when you understand the incredibly incompetent and malicious mismanagement that our politicians foisted on our nations. And it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to connect the dots between unfettered and unjustified lending to German state and municipal governments in the 1920s, followed by a horrendous financial crash and the rise of Hitler.
Very strange. Someone somewhere has been cooking the books on one end or the other.
A couple points to clarify…
Propane is primarily a byproduct of Natural Gas production, not oil Production, although there is some propane generated from Oil wells.
Hydrogen as a practical fuel is likely still 20~30 years away… Fuel cell technology is still at least 10 years away form being economic, and the first phase of marketable Hydrogen will likely be generated by stripping the hydrogen atoms from Natural gas, which does not reduce total CO2 emisions. (it does get rid of Nox and Sox emmisions though so it is better than the current situation.) Until there is a large surplus of non-hydrocarbon generated, ( meaning renewable or nuclear sources, both likely still decades away) source of electricity Hydorgen is not much of an answer.
Chinese long term plans still are using a significant amount of coal… the planned Nuclear and LNG recieving stations may address the increasing demand in China but will unlikely replace coal in the forseeable future.. Hense why China is reluctant to agree to any Climate Change treaties.
AAHhh, the flow of enlightenment is sooo satisfying.
Twenty or thirty years ago we used to often read that Canada’s supply of natural gas was virtually limitless. The supposed fact was often stated as, *Canada has enough natural gas reserves to satisfy all potential need for well beyond the next hundred years.*
That kind of expansive claim is no longer seen in print. I suspect the reason is so that natural gas prices can be raised to cover pipeline costs and feed reserves for future projects.
Also read that Italy uses hard steel bottled gas to fuel much of their truck and auto transportation. Those containers are similar to our cylinders for compressed welding gases.
I thought those containers were too bomb like for safe use, but I’m told the safety record is excellent.
There may be technical reasons why our abundance of natural gas may be less than ideal for Hydrogen fuel production.
Any further insights Sierra? 73s TG
PS, You know, I was just kidding about the exercise bike magnetos feeding the energy grid in China above… eh? 73s TG
Perhaps China has been developing a strategic reserve that inflated their consumption while being filled. Once full, demand will take a right angle turn south.
Cooking the books, a reserve, or a new Oil for the Dear Leader initiative. With China who could tell. Whatever they are doing it guaranteed sucks for freedom loving men.