Diesel

... diesel, uh, up, you know, the liquid fuels are up about 50%.

Um, a lot of that's imported from geopolitical problems, which I wrote about in The Edge.

Um, I think it's been conflated.

So if you went about confused, you know, I think the, what's driving the American, and I've gotta say UK GDP right now, is technology.

Technology's being blamed for these cost increases.

You don't run data centers on liquid fuels.

Mm

It's the right way to run an economy that needs lots of work, is don't start with a fuel.

Yeah.

I think that's right.

Um, you've, you've argued both sides of that.

You've said that you're starting with a fuel, which almost assumes that you have to in some way, shape, or form.

I think my, my, uh, argument is that, um, yes, there's a thermodynamic inevitability.

So what do you mean by that? You mean if you put whatever it is, coal, gas, uranium for that matter, into an energy-making machine, less than half of it turns into electricity, right? But, uh, as we all know, the, the energy doesn't disappear, right? So what happens to the other bit? Right, the other bit turns into some form of addit- a different type of energy, and you used the word thermodynamic.

[laughs]

Wow.

Uh, because, uh, airlines can't afford the pa- uh, the petrol.

So, you know, I think that's an issue.

I think food is something that we need to be looking at here in the United States.

There's typically about a three to six-month lag between the price of gas going up and the price of food.

Why? Because you make food with gas.

That's nitrogen, um, uh, fertilizer effectively.

Oh.

I-

Thank you so much.

But, but I think what...

To, to, to, to, to talk about something that other people aren't necessarily talking about, there's Lomonosov Ridge.

Uh, the, the laws of the sea, by w- by, by which, by the way, the United States [chuckles] hasn't signed up to, but that anybody within 200 miles can claim the resources under the Arctic, right? So what are the resources under the Arctic? Maybe 13% of the world's oil, maybe 20 or 30% of the world's undiscovered or unexploited natural gas.

Then you've got all the minerals, and then, of course, you've got the shipping lanes, you've got the geopolitical issues.

So this is where-

Then the submarines.

Jonathan Maxwell on the moment for commodities.

We've spent the last modern history, since the post, post-Second World War, uh, a lot of it has been about competition for resources, right? And particularly fossil fuels.

What we're seeing now is a different arena emerging from where that competition is flaring up.

And, you know, I've described it.

I wrote a book about this called The Age.

I think we're at a real age moment in history.

Right.

-coming together and, and, and, and flashing.

Is there a way to look back and say what was the main mistake or mistakes that Europe and its leaders made? Because Europe and the UK is in really bad shape.

Well, look, for sure.

I mean, we have had relatively little investment in baseload generation in the UK and Europe.

There has been relatively little investment in storage in the UK and Europe.

There are enormous investments happening, which I'm delighted about running a sustainability company in renewables.

But at the same time, you know, the energy system needs to sort itself out.

The biggest piece of it, though, the biggest piece that I would refer to is as follows.

But they also have to get the fuel in the first place.