The Forgotten Migration

In all the clatter about immigration and migration and all the rest the potential for a substantial inflow of either recently removed British and Irish or their more distant cousins from places that have become poor, unsafe or unwelcoming has not been factored into the estimates. Places that still welcome skilled British and Irish may change their policies quite suddenly.

Around a dozen of my cousins moved abroad and there are now a number of their children and grandchildren, call it a total of around forty. That is just me, in other cases of individuals the figures could be more or less. I have not counted the potential of great grandchildren.

Going back a bit, say four generations to the point where I have 32 forebears none of them were born in the town that I and my parents were born, although two were from the same county. Beyond that people appear from many places.

So I am the child of many migrations in the Atlantic Isles, from Sutherland to Shanklin and from Sligo to Great Yarmouth with a wide scatter of places in between. Beyond these generations are others from further afield and wide and wider as the centuries go back.

Amongst the many others from these 32 families who have moved abroad the figures of descendants, more distant cousins, must be substantial, certainly into three figures, possibly more. Again, that is just my extended family.

In recent years I understand there has been a large outflow of British and Irish to other places. A good many retirees have gone to Spain, some to France and others in Florida and various sunny locations. Many who are younger have taken their skills to other places at their own volition or the behest of their employers.

Call it instinct or what, but I sense that an increasing number of these are beginning to return, climate or no climate. They are encouraged by the fact that as their finances collapse and the once thriving economies that welcomed them also collapse or suddenly close their doors there is the default option.

This is going to where medical treatment, badly needed by some, is free and other benefits may be had. The UK here we come.

When the weather turns very wet a trickle can become a stream, that can become a river and a river can become a flood. Historically, it has happened many times before in terms of the movement of peoples and tribes. It is nothing new.

Call it the forgotten immigration if you like but if what can happen does happen what are the implications? What provision is there for half a million sick, broke and homeless pensioners fleeing from a Spain in turmoil and poverty? Or any other large group from somewhere or other? Where will they stand in the priority ratings?

What do I do if someone wearing a slouch hat festooned with corks, with shorts a deep tan and carrying a crocodile suitcase surrounded by their family, who are also mine, asks for shelter and sustenance? Remind them of the reasons why their ancestors were transported or offer them my meagre hospitality?

It could happen to you.

Pumping, Prices And People

The disasters of the last few years have caused many to look for historical parallels. Most have been about the collapse of empires, societies and financial systems. Sometimes I think that some of the great maritime ones would be better. Storms which come out of nowhere, failures of navigation and others.

The lesson we should learn perhaps comes from Sir Cloudesley Shovell who struck on the Scillies in bad weather in 1707. The debate still goes on about how it happened.

In all the petty wrangling and posturing that is going on what we lose sight of is some of the possibilities that exist for real trouble. One is the issue of Peak Oil, fiercely debated and a highly complex matter where many able experts do not agree on the facts, the future or the economic implications.

What is certain is that there are major problems looming, notably for Europe and if the item below is anywhere near right the implications are very nasty. Amongst them is the question of whether Germany, at present the lynch pin of the European economy, might be the most vulnerable if it all goes badly wrong.

This article below on the issue of Peak Oil, which says it is already here, is long but worth reading if you do want to look beyond the immediate media excitements.

Quote:

The oil 'peak' has been reached

Posted by Luis de Sousa on September 29, 2010 - 9:28am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Economics/Finance

Tags: net oil exports, oil prices, original, peak oil, piigs [list all tags]

Jorge Nascimento Rodrigues is perhaps the only journalist in Portugal aware of the issue of oil scarcity. During the past few years, I have had the opportunity to collaborate with him several times, bringing the Peak Oil message to a larger audience on an almost regular basis.

Last weekend, the largest weekly newspaper in Portugal (and among the diaspora), Expresso, had another article in its Economy section, penned by Jorge with a few thoughts on present events and trends. Samuel Foucher kindly provided an updated version of one of his graphs to illustrate the article.

The alarm has sounded: the scarcity of oil will affect everyone, say analysts
'Peak' oil is no longer debatable. The projections for the year, the five-year period, or the decade when global oil production would start declining "are now a part of history", says Luís de Sousa, member of ASPO-Portugal and contributor to the blog "The Oil Drum", talking to the Expresso. "The period of peak is already being lived. Predicting it is no longer relevant", he adds.

According to this specialist, the vast majority of the important mathematical and accounting models of oil production used by entities independent from the oil industry all point to a similar time period when oil production reaches a maximum and begins to decline. This is a period of about a decade centred between 2008 and 2010, and the maximum oil produced is between 78 and 85 million barrels daily.

Luís de Sousa emphasizes that since 2005 world liquids production has been bound between 80 and 82 million barrels per day, clearly in agreement with those models. This plateau "has been sustained by the increase of natural gas liquids, with pure crude [petroleum] in decline since 2005".

Recently, the 'peak' has returned to the spotlight because of a secret report by the Future Studies group of the German Centre for the Armed Forces Transformation, a military think tank working for the Berlin Ministry of Defence. The study was published by "Der Spiegel", causing considerable concern by those less used to the issue and its geopolitical implications.

The Diplomacy of Oil

The report has an alarming tone: "scarcity shall affect everyone" and "oil price increases pose a systemic risk, not only for transport systems, but also for all other systems". And left a message: "It is vital to secure access to oil", for in a fairly short time-frame, between now and 2040, we may see "a change in the international security panorama with new risks - like that of fuel transport - and new actors in a possible conflict around the distribution of an increasingly scarce resource".

The German report concludes that "oil exports available through the market of supply and demand will shrink" and that need for oil diplomacy will sky-rocket because of oil's geo-politization.

The increasing scarcity referred by the Germans is associated with "an almost unchanging level of oil production, fixed within a band that began during 2004," emphasizes Luís de Sousa. This variation "band" is called by many specialists, with some humour, an "undulating plateau".

Meaning, in this plateau, production variations oscillate, like a wave, from year to year, independent of price variations. The present crisis, whose end continues to be debated, "will likely prolong this undulating period, flattening what otherwise would have been a prominent peak".

More important than the peak itself or the production plateau is the volume of oil available on the international market, or in other words, what is available for export beyond what is consumed by those producing the oil. "Maximum exports were reached in 2005, at an amount equal to 44 million barrels a day (mbd).

Since then, production has entered into a slow, but irreversible, decline," says the ASPO specialist. Presently exports amount to 42 mbd, and in 2020 exports are likely to be under 35 mbd. Luís de Sousa also adds that in the contest for the oil available in the international markets, a change is taking place.

"There is a transfer of consumption from the countries that form the OECD (developed countries) to those emerging.- If in 1990, half of the oil produced was consumed by the OECD, today that fraction is down to 1/3". The world market has been turned upside down.

This long term structural change, deriving from the scarcity of this commodity and growing geopolitical risks (including those of navigation through strategic straits), has been further changed, in recent years, by what was dubbed the "financialization" of the crude futures market.

This happened when financial speculators nicknamed "Wall Street refiners" entered the marketplace, buying and selling "paper barrels", causing an additional disturbance in the market, with sometimes "wild" oscillations.
PIIGS are the most affected

One of the groups in the OECD that will suffer most with the contraction of available oil is the one formed by those countries most dependent on oil in their energy mix, according to Luís de Sousa. "A detail must be noted - those countries in greatest difficulties will be precisely those called the PIIGS.

These countries each have an oil dependence in their total energy mix of over 45%, including Greece with 58%, Portugal and Ireland with 55%, Spain with 48% and Italy with 46%. This is in contrast to the European Union average of 37%.

If we add the four countries with oil dependency above the European average, but below 45%, we get a complete map of the zone where the 'undulating plateau' will have the greatest impact. Besides the PIIGS, this includes Austria (44%), Holland (42%), Belgium (41%) and Denmark (39%)."

The weakest sector for the five most vulnerable countries of the euro-zone (Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece and Spain) is the transport sector, particularly when road-based. "This dependency can derive from geographic location, inappropriate urban and national planning or both" says Luís de Sousa.

He recommends increasing maritime and railway modes of transportation; it is not sufficient to modernize the electrical infrastructure or to encourage other sources of energy.

Unquote

And you think our troubles will soon be over. What was it that Norman Tebbit said about bikes?

Burnham To Dunce Inane

The annual performance of The Scottish Play has now taken place at Manchester Central Station that was. Things did not run according to the timetable. Also, this year we had a dearth of Scottish performers for the lead parts. Ed made an unconvincing Macbeth making sure all the blood was on other hands.

David could not make up his mind whether he was Duncan or Banquo’s Ghost. Either way he may choose to disappear in a cloud of eco friendly carbon dioxide.

Harriet might have been expected to be more convincing as Lady Macbeth but seemed to be auditioning for Titania, Queen of the Fairies in another play. As for the three witches, at one time Labour had a marvellous choice of candidates.

This year I felt that Darling , Johnson and Straw would have to do the parts as transgender social outcasts. Interesting, but not good to watch.

The BBC, frantic for a pretty Labour face to give the spiel without upsetting too many people let Andy Burnham have a large chunk of their news bulletin. As an Everton supporter whose team are bottom of The Premiership and looking bad he may not have been the best choice.

Anyhow, he did try to make us weep for all the dire hardships he and his fellow candidates for the Labour leadership have suffered for the last few weeks. My little heart bled for them.

Burnham predictably went banging on about the NHS and what disasters awaiting the old. This caused my twitch to start up. He represents Leigh in Lancashire. A relation of mine had his father land in Leigh Hospital a decade ago. The man was diagnosed with dementia.

The family had no discussion with any doctor and indeed were denied access to one but were simply instructed by a junior local government official that he was going to put into a care home and his property sold.

The family went to the Court of Protection, see Anna Raccoon’s blogs, to try to sort out the alternatives. Unluckily the relation landed in hospital in an emergency and while he was there the official forced the father, near blind and stone deaf as well as suffering dementia to sign documents authorising the sale of his property.

The Court of Protection did nothing, but we now know that they would not challenge politicians.

As well as selling the property at well under value over the family’s heads the relevant local authority took a large chunk of money as administration fees. This was Wigan, who once had Hazel Blears as one of the legal officers. Of course she will have had absolutely nothing to do with devising these procedures.

Curiously, some of those involved in the buying and selling were attached to local Labour Parties. Gosh golly, and you would have thought they would have been much too busy coining it in from Pathfinder and other Labour redevelopment wheezes.

Meanwhile, Andy told the BBC that the Coalition had produced a “White Paper from nowhere.” about the NHS. This is unlikely unless the Three Witches had been at work for the Tories as well as Labour. Perhaps Andy is clueless about where they come from normally.

Perhaps Andy is clueless because when he was in charge of Health the civil servants might actually have been thinking beyond the next sound bite or appointment at the hairdressers for the colouring and styling.

Perhaps Andy is clueless because he sees the NHS as just a big jobs and property racket for the various members and funders of his party.

Perhaps Andy is clueless because nobody told him that there was something called The Treasury that might be looking for different ways of funding services and that was always going to include Health.

On the other hand, perhaps he really is just totally clueless.

Threading Needles And Jumping Beans

In 1961 the year the Berlin Wall went up and “West Side Story” and “La Dolce Vita” hit the screens, Viv Nicholson of Castleford in Yorkshire won the pools for the huge amount of £152,000 (say 40 detached houses in Tunbridge Wells) and declared she would “Spend, spend, spend”.

For this she was excoriated by the press and from pulpits. Sound and moral men told her to save, exercise due economy and to invest wisely to gain a reliable income and by doing so set a good example to her class and community.

Evidently she was a lady ahead of her time. Today she would be regarded as a potential member of the board of the Bank of England and Charles Bean, the Deputy Governor would be praising her economic wisdom and sense of moral purpose. Vince The Mince and Ed The Red would be hanging on her every word.

Avoiding all the very obvious jokes about Mr. Bean I understand he has told us all to loosen up on spending, take on extra credit, forget saving or run down those you have and for that matter draw down on capital perhaps by extending mortgages or going in for some fancy equity release caper. All that is missing is a big poster with the little children looking up at a pensive father and asking “What did you do in the Great Recession, Daddy?”

Perhaps I should take Mr. Bean to a quiet room, play calming music (not Mozart or Beethoven, they both died broke) and explain things to him gently in a soft voice and gentle manner. Then I might clobber him with the shillelagh I keep to welcome door to door salesmen and debt collectors just to make sure he gets the message.

Firstly, my income has suffered steady deterioration in the last few years almost entirely due to the relevant indexes being fiddled to understate real price rises for the bulk of the population.

Also, the way in which major financial entities now govern how companies operate to achieve very high and ever increasing rates of return on their highly leveraged investments has impacted in all sorts of ways on many of our basic expenses. Mr. Bean and his little friends gave up the idea of regulation without realising how they would impair basic consumer spending and saving.

Secondly, despite not taking foreign or indeed any holidays recently my savings have also depreciated in real terms because interest rates governed by the Bank have not reflected the realities of the markets. The interest on any credit etc. that do relate to market conditions are still way too high for any rational man to take them on.

Indeed, I have been on my own personal tax avoidance scheme and refusal to obey the advice of my masters. We have simply stopped spending on almost all goods that carry VAT or not absolutely essential to basic functioning. Also, we have cut our activities and therefore car and out and about expenses quite radically.

We can manage quite well without all the heavily advertised consumer stuff that people are urged to fill up their supermarket trolleys with. Yes we spend more time doing things that most people no longer do, like eating leftovers and preparing foods by hand rather than buying packaged versions.

Economies and activity that were routine for earlier generations but forgotten now have been reinstated. Threading needles and not throwing away is now something we are doing a lot more often.

Sorry, Mr. Bean, no can do. We are already closer to the margins than we want to be. If things go badly for us there will be no help from a shattered state machinery. If I were fool enough to do as he suggests then I would in the same sort of trouble that so many have endured.

It was precisely the spending and credit ideas that he is recommending that have broken so many families, ruined so many others, caused so many repossessions, have put people into debt slavery for the rest of their lifetimes and reduced so many pensioners to penury.

If he really wants to know what could happen he should ask Viv or at least take a look at her web site. Is this his vision for Britain’s future?

Middle England Or Middle Earth?

Ed The Red it seems wishes to retrieve the support of Middle England for Labour. So forget Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the old Labour heartlands where the working class has all but gone. The people who matter are in the marginal seats in England. They are those on the edge of prosperity who are extra sensitive to changes in the structure of their income and holdings.

Is this just an appeal to New Labour and his present paymasters or is it for real? They have lost their grip on all those high paid high pension entitlements in the machinery of state and its associates and they want them back, fast. Others want their hands on power again because as time moves on others will soon replace them.

So what is he saying? It is the old myopic meanderings of one of sons of the London Mediocracy now elevated by his own kind to lead the party of that class? He has had almost nothing to do with ordinary people or ordinary workers in the whole of his life and neither did his parents. They were recent academic migrants so there is a total absence of family history in the Atlantic Isles in his background.

Corpus Christi at Oxford would not have provided much, nor would LSE in the period he was there, nor would his career before election in 2005. Were he to be a man of huge and encompassing intellect or someone of outstanding contribution to one thing or another, business, academia or the military it might be an explanation. But he is none of things.

It seems that he has political skills superior to those of his contemporaries in the Labour Party. This, given their recent record, is hardly a major achievement. We had a Prime Minister like that after 1997 and look what happened there. That one knew little about anything and understood less except where the money was for him. I fear it looks like more of the same.

What Middle England are we talking about? It is claimed now that only one per cent has more wealth than ninety per cent of our population. The figures are very complicated but it seems to be near the truth. This leaves nine per cent, who are assumed to be prosperous but not so rich as the plundercrats at the top. It is from this group that so many of the London Mediocracy come from. They are certainly a lot better off than the great majority of most of the poorer lot below.

Amongst this lower ninety per cent, there will be a proportion of people who are “comfortable” with a decent disposable income and limited debt. So Middle England therefore means that group of people, substantially in the south east or in areas outside urban centres, where many of the marginal constituencies are. It also means control of London.

These are the areas where the Middle England of fable lies. Is it beginning to be more of a fiction than a political fact? Increasingly these are now a minority as more and more feel the pinch and lower their expectations of being ever free from debt or having any margin of savings. They are also older and as this is the case disappearing ever more rapidly with the arrival of the grim reaper, the costly carers, or the depletion of savings and reduction in real incomes.

What few seem to understand is that the extraction of so much wealth and income from the UK has reached a level where it has now impacted not only on those at the bottom but those in the middling reaches as well. This has occurred in the USA and is happening in the West generally. It is simple to understand, look at all the bills you are paying and follow the money.

We have a wreck of an economy, a wreck of a constitution and almost everywhere you look it is complicated, chaotic and hugely vulnerable to even minor disruptions. I regret that an early 1990’s Masters degree in mathematical economics from the LSE, a touch of political philosophy from Corpus Christi and a few back room political skills honed in student politics and through media contacts are not enough.

Worse still, as you look amongst the ranks of all the political parties, all you see is the same with a few exceptions.

Middle England? More like Middle Earth nowadays, but then Tolkien who was at Merton along the street from Corpus Christi, did see service in some real life.

Milibands, Militants and Miners

London School of Economics late 1950’s.

Ralph Miliband is on the academic staff and is well known for his fervid left wing socialism and its mission in the Labour Party.

In “The Three Tuns” student bar the rugby club have arrived back, most of them Welsh, already well on the way and going at full throttle.

Quote:

My old man’s a Miliband,
A Miliband!!!
A Miliband,
A very fine Miliband is he –e - e,

All day he stuffs Tories,
Stuffs Tories!!!
Stuffs Tories,
And then he comes home,
And stuffs me.

Singing, hey jig a jig,
{redacted},

Unquote

Not many people know that.

Pakistan, Flooding, Energy And The Future

This long post was taken today from The Oil Drum and is by “Heading Out” and deals with matters of energy in Pakistan. Because coal reserves are there it does not mean they will be made use of. The Roman Empire never got round to large scale coal mining. Amongst other issues, but not in the article, is the many millions who are displaced now and without land. Where will they be going?

Quote:

Yesterday and this morning I spent my time helping clear up the damage from a storm that hit our town over the summer. We were away, and several trees were left with limbs torn, damaged and in some cases dangling. So, I used the chance to get some of the other trees pruned of dead wood, and to generally clean up around the yard.

Now I am left with a reasonable amount of kindling and firewood, to help heat the house over the winter. We have a tile stove, and so the effort is a little more to cut the wood to the shorter lengths, but the work is justified.

The trees remain, and will continue to grow. But other parts of the world are not as fortunate. Judith Curry has written of the facility with which commentators have cited the recent flooding in Pakistan as being due to global warming, when there is a significant case that it could, more correctly, be blamed on inept water and agricultural practice, with a little regional politics thrown in.

Unfortunately the problems that she describes illustrate the problems of a country where the pressures of a growing population have sought short-term answers to long-term problems.

For example:

Illegal logging supported by the Taliban in the northwest province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa has felled as much as 70% of the forest in some districts. The lack of trees, combined with overgrazing by livestock, reduces the soil’s ability to hold water and leads to soil erosion. Flash flooding in the northern, mountainous areas then sends silt downstream, reducing the amount of water the river channel can hold.

There are a substantial number of barrages (dams) on the Indus River that support irrigation and hydropower. The flood occurred when the rising river bed (owing to the huge silt deposition in the upstream areas) was trapped by the Taunsa barrage, obstructing the water flow.

These heavy silt loads were then transported through western tributaries of the Indus River. Construction of protective levees and dykes has also contributed to raising the riverbed and the sedimentation of upstream areas; moreover, the rising riverbed levels have rendered protective levees ineffective.

In 1951 Pakistan held a population of 34 million people. This had increased to 144 million in 2001, and is currently estimated at over 170 million. It is thus now the sixth most populous of nations. The average consumption of 500KWh is a fifth of the global average of 2,500 KWh. Of that thermally generated energy currently produces around 63% of the power, while hydro has produced around 32% (6,500 MW).

However, as noted above, the lakes behind the high dams are sedimenting rapidly, as deforestation increases the bearing load of the streams. It is estimated that 20% of the live storage capacity is already gone. Yet, because of its geography, there is a potential for more than doubling the amount of power available to Pakistan from hydro-electricity generation.

It has the advantage of being indigenous, in a country that already faces considerable expense in importing energy. There is one project, the Neelum-Jelham scheme, in Kashmir, currently in progress, though it is controversial.

Neelam Jhelum Hydroelectric Project is located near Muzaffarabad, capital of Pakistani Administered Kashmir. It aims to dig a tunnel and divert water of Neelam River from Nauseri, about 41 KM East of Muzzafrabad.

A Powerhouse will be constructed at Chatter Kalas, 22 Km South of Muzaffarabad; and after passing through the turbines the water will be released in Jhelum River, about 4 Km South of Chatter Kalas. Once completed, the Neelam Jhelum Hydroelectric Project will produce 969 MW of electricity annually at the cost of US $2.16 billion.

To meet the needs of the population Pakistan has steadily increased oil imports (to about 400,000 bd). It does have natural gas resources, and has seen these rise to almost 4 billion cu ft/day, in the same period. However it has, increasingly, also had to import coal to meet its growing needs. And yet the country has a large coal resource.

Pakistan coal reserves are estimated at 175 billion tons which according to the Vice-Chancellor (VC) of Punjab University, Professor Dr Mujahid Kamran equal 618 billion barrels of crude oil. According to the most reliable analytical reports Saudi Arabian crude oil reserves are estimated at around 260 billion barrels. At 60 Dollars per barrel this equates to 3708 Billion Dollars or approx. 4 Trillion Dollars (at current prices).

At future prices these reserves will be worth 8 or 24 Trillion Dollars. This is enough money to build the most modern infrastructure, the best roads, the best hospitals, the best education, the best universities, the best hi-speed rail system and the best public transportation system on the planet.

On the other side of India, there is a planned collaboration between India and Bangladesh to jointly build a 1320 MW coal-fired power plant in Khulna, the land being proposed as Bangladesh’s equity investment.

It is planned that the Khulna plant would use high-quality coal imported through the sea from countries like Indonesia or Australia. The government is not considering import of Indian coal as it is generally low in quality and comparatively more environmentally harmful.

Bangladesh opened its first coal mine in April 2003 and has yet to develop it extensively, though there have already been strong protests over the planned opening of the Phulbari surface mine.

I bring these matters up, because I anticipate that, with the tightening of oil supplies, and the resulting increases in the price of imported energy, that countries will have to rely more on the resources that they find within their own borders.

Pakistan, India and Bangladesh will likely be among those nations that will, likely because they have no other viable economic choice, move to an increased reliance on coal-fired power.

The reserves are there nationally, even if, for now, the world price for coal is low enough, because of the large size of other national deposits, that they may not be mined. But, in time, they will be. Because, as with places like Haiti, and Lebanon, once the trees are gone they will likely not come back for a very long time.

Unquote.

Just to remind you, we have severe energy problems imminent in the UK and no serious policy remotely able to deal with them.