The puzzling flattening of carbon emissions and the problem of global growth

Last week we learned that maybe, just maybe, global carbon emissions were flat in 2014 even though the global economy supposedly grew by 3 percent. As Brad Plumer of Vox (whose work I greatly respect) points out, carbon emissions have moved up almost in lockstep with economic growth for the entire industrial age except during recessions and one year of growth 40 years ago.

This is why I use "supposedly" when referring to the global economic growth number. It's because there is another obvious and plausible explanation for the flat carbon emissions, namely, that the global economy did not grow by the stated percentage, that it may have grown only a fraction of that amount or not at all.

Economic measures are constantly being revised, and I think it is very likely that the global economic growth number for 2014 will be revised downward. Probably not to zero, but downward nonetheless. It's also possible that estimates of carbon emissions are too low. Plumer cites "notoriously unreliable" Chinese emission numbers as one reason to be skeptical.

Recent radio interview on Israeli National Radio

I was recently interviewed by Doug Goldstein on his personal finance show, "Goldstein on Gelt," which plays on Israeli National Radio, the English-language radio network in Israel. Goldstein saw a piece of mine and asked me on the show to discuss the recent sharp decline in oil prices. A podcast of the interview is now available. Goldstein is a good interviewer with an eclectic mind and brought out the best in me with his conversational approach. The interview starts at about 2:30. Click here to go to the page containing the podcast.

Cheap oil, complexity and counterintuitive conclusions

It is a staple of oil industry apologists to say that the recent swift decline in the price of oil is indicative of long-term abundance. This kind of logic is leading American car buyers to turn once again to less fuel efficient automobiles--trading efficiency for size essentially--as short-term developments are extrapolated far into the future.

The success of such argumentation depends on a disability in the audience reading it. The audience must have amnesia about the dramatic developments in the oil markets in the last 15 years which saw prices reach all-times highs in 2008 and then after recovering from post-crash lows linger at the highest average daily price ever from 2011 through most of 2014. And, that audience must have myopia about the future. It is an audience whose attention has narrowed to the present which becomes the only reference point for decision-making. History is bunk, and what is, always will be.

The alternative narrative is much more subtle and complex. As I've written before, the chief intellectual challenge of our age is that we live in complex systems, but we do not understand complexity. How can cheap oil be a harbinger of future supply problems in the oil market? Here's where complexity, history and subtle thinking all have to combine at just the right intellectual temperature to reveal the answer.

Lipstick on a pig: America as the world's swing producer of oil

Most people have heard the old saying: "You can put lipstick on a pig. But it's still a pig." That's sort of what is happening in the American oil patch as producers try to put a positive gloss on the devastation that low oil prices are visiting on the industry.

Perhaps the most inventive redefinition is as follows: The part of the U.S. oil industry devoted to extracting tight oil from deep shale reservoirs in places such as North Dakota and Texas has made the United States the world's "swing producer." A swing producer is a country or territory that has large production in relation to the total market, substantial excess capacity and the ability to turn its capacity on and off quickly in response to market conditions.

The term makes the U.S. oil industry sound powerful and important. And, while the U.S. industry remains an important player in the world--third in production behind Russia and Saudi Arabia--it is most definitely not powerful in the sense that the moniker "swing producer" would imply.

Taking a short break--no post this week

I'm taking a short break this week and next and expect to post again on Sunday, March 15.