Yes, I know, it seems like the smug is absolutely dripping off me at the moment, especially considering that as of right now, America and Israel have decided to veritably put a gun to the head of the world by essentially starting a conflict, and possibly a boots-on-the-ground war with Iran. This has resulted in fuel prices absolutely skyrocketing the world over. Diesel has climbed past $3.00/L and Unleaded? That’s over $2.20.
The photo below, says it all, really. While most people come to the servo for petrol and diesel, I go for the snacks.
Now we can go into my thoughts and feelings on this conflict, my thoughts on the American, Israeli and Iranian governments (they’re all in the shitlist in my eyes in various different ways), but the truth of the matter is, this conflict has highlighted a key point that I have been drumming across for years now. Our dependence on imported oil as a nation is a bipartisan national security risk.
This is because Australia imports 90% of its oil from foreign sources.
This means that because of this war, the cost of everything that involves oil, such as the manufacture of plastics, fertilisers, lubricants, fuels, bitumens and indeed other petroleum products will go up. Most importantly, people are already feeling it at the pumps.
Now, does this mean that other things like Electricity will go up in price? If you’re Japan and solely depend on imports for your LNG supply? Yes. If you’re in Western Australia? Maybe not so much.
This is because, all the way back in 2006, Then premier at the time, Alan Carpenter, passed legislation that would see Western Australian gas producers allocate 15% of all available gas from new gas reserves as gas for consumption by the people of WA. This essentially does three things.
- It guarantees a buyer, with the government being mandated to chip in 15% of all new gas reserve costs, and thus allow projects that’d normally not go ahead to go ahead.
- It still provides ample room for gas companies to export gas to other parts of the world, as there’s a base amount of gas that is kept aside for the public. This keeps gas cheap for locals whilst keeping gas companies profitable. It’s a win/win for both parties.
- It allows the government to regulate prices by means of tapping in to the gas reserve when costs are high, and by building it up when costs are low, it effectively acts as a “state wide gas battery” allowing the state to deal with the rise and fall of commodity prices.
Now LNG is mostly used as a way to generate electricity here in Australia, with roughly a third of our domestic consumption going towards firing gas peaker plants, used to fill the gaps between baseload coal and daytime solar power generation. Whilst yes, gas still does generate emissions, charging your car on fossil-fuel powered electricity emits half the CO2 of a comparable ICEV, whilst also extracting four times more energy from plant to wheel than an ICEV does.
This is because even the dirtiest of coal fired power plants are designed to sit at one RPM and generate power at their most efficient load, all day every day. Power plants are optimised to extract the most amount of energy out of the fuel as possible. Coal-fired plants can extract as much as twice as much energy out of its as an ICEV can, and closed-cycle gas-fired plants can extract as 45-55% of the energy stored in the gas which feeds them. Meanwhile ICEVs can only get about 15-25% of the energy stored in the liquid fuel in their tanks thanks to drivetrain losses, conversion losses and waste heat, as this image below from Yale University Climate Connections states. (full article linked above)
And seeing as Western Australia is one of the world’s largest LNG producing regions on the planet, this effectively means that our cars, trains and trucks, if electric, can run entirely on energy that is sourced locally, as opposed to being sourced from overseas.
We are also one of the highest potential nations for solar generation (or Insolation as it’s known to us energy nerds). We are currently the highest per-capita nation for generating solar from our rooftops, with that figure sitting at 1.4kW per capita. If we couple this with residential and gridscale batteries, we have the potential to gradually phase out coal, and then gradually phase out our Gas plants to hit our target of net-zero by 2050 quite easily.
So what has this got to do with rising oil prices? Simple. The war in Iran demonstrates just how vulnerable Australia, and indeed any oil importer is to price shocks and global conflicts. If you hate the idea of Australia going to war, you’d do the best you can to push for Australia to move towards reducing our dependence on foreign oil. That means we should be doing what we can to push EVs, smart grids, walkable cities, whatever.
This means that, and I cannot stress this enough, you should be actively doing what you can to consider an electric vehicle as your next car. Put your politics aside for a second and think about your wallet, the climate, or your national security. Depending on foreign oil, on fossil fuels that’re affected by global conflicts, is a security risk that we Australians can no longer ignore. If you really hate states like the United States, the Gulf states, Israel or Iran, you should be doing everything you can to stop giving these pricks any money, and the way you do that is to stop giving these nations an excuse to continuously fight these gods-forsaken oil wars. Venezuela was fought over Chinese control of oil. Iran, Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan was, were, and is being fought over Russian and Chinese control of oil. Vietnam too, surprisingly, wasn’t just fought over communism, it too was an oil war.
So what if you can’t afford an EV. What can you do?
First of all, i do not blame people for being frustrated with this war. It will hurt all of us. Yes, even us EV owners. It’s gonna kick our arses when it comes to the cost of transporting goods, our groceries, our commodities, all will go up in price thanks to this war. The only thing we save on is our fuel costs, and even then, that is entirely dependent on who your energy provider is and how they provide energy. At least in Western Australia, we should be less stressed by things because Synergy and Horizon (as far as i know, anyway) do not use diesel fuel for any of their plants. We can always tap into that aforementioned gas reserve to level prices out for those who rely on gas generation.
The RBA predicts it can add an entire percentage point or more to inflation, and whilst one percentage point doesn’t sound like much, consider they’re targeting a 2-3% inflation rate. If interest rates go up from 3% to 4%, a $1000 purchase just got more expensive by $10. Your dollar is weaker the higher the inflation rate, and it directly contributes to the cost of living, because it means someone earning say, $100,000 a year now effectively has $1000 a year less purchasing power.
This is why I and many union advocates say that any wage increase below the effective rate of inflation is a veritable paycut. This is because your spending power effectively decreases. This is of course, unless you have other things that actually improve under inflative economies, such as the cost of mortgages. If you took out a $200,000 mortgage say, 10 years ago, for example, your higher wages effectively mean that your mortgage may have in fact, gotten cheaper over time…
Economics is literal wizardry, I tells you!
And I’m going to look like a right smug, stick-up-the-arse prick if I laugh, point the finger and say i told you so. I mean, I do sometimes do this, but only to people who buy big dirty Landcruisers and American Pickups as status symbols, never take them offroad, and then complain about how much their diesel costs each week and how Unaustralian my car choice is, whilst their massive tank of a car is powered by the very thing that keeps the regimes they don’t like in power in the damn first place. The hypocrisy of political conservatives and so-called nationalists never ceases to baffle me…
And don’t even get me started on the “90,000 litres of diesel” myth.
So, in light of all of this, here’s a few things I can suggest you do that do not involve buying an EV.
- If you’re just sitting in an office all day, you don’t really need a car to get around, so why are you driving? Get your partner, a colleague or a friend who lives near you to swing past and drop you in on the way to work (if they can of course). I use this option pretty often if my partner’s heading to work at the same time and in the same direction as me. If it’s a mate bringing you in, be sure to sling them a fiver every time they do this for you. You don’t wanna be a stingy prick, after all.
- Speaking of ridesharing, now I know a lot of you have a hate-boner for Uber drivers, but if it means you can get a cheap ride out of it, there’s no shame in ridesharing. Didi is what I tend to use when I need to use a rideshare service here in Australia. Just do the math before you do this as surge pricing can and sometimes does kick you in the butt here.
- If you do use your car for work, keep a note of all your expenses. Fuel receipts, servicing, etc. It might hurt now, but if you solely use your car for work, make sure you solely use it for work. You can, if you play your cards right, write off your fuel costs as a work expense in certain cases. This is a good one for the tradies, salespeople and support workers out there who need their cars to work, btw.
- If you do have to drive, drive less aggressively. Anticipating slowdowns and speedups, reducing use of the brakes by using engine braking (for you Manual car and Jake Brake enjoying truckies out there) or by just generally driving smoother will help you save fuel. This is also good practice for EV drivers as using regen braking also helps you improve your car’s efficiency. Also it makes you look like less of a twat. Unless you own a Ford Ranger. I mean you can’t spell ranger without anger, after all.
- If you can, take a break from driving. No, really, If you’re a fellow West Aussie, we have one of the most useful public transport networks for car drivers, especially along the north-south corridor. You may have seen B-Series trains stickered up with the linked slogan on the side of them, and since our trains are powered by electricity and only cost $2.80 per trip to use the network for 2 hours, it’ll drastically cut your costs down. Yes, it’ll take you longer to get places. Yes, you do have to deal with people on public transit. Nothing a good book and some AirPods can’t fix. It’s certainly cheaper than an EV, and in some ways, better for the planet too. I use the train more than I do my Tesla on some weeks.
- If you do have the option to do so, speak to your bosses about working from home. The best commute for the planet, for your wallet, and for you, is a commute that is not taken at all. WFH can cut your emissions in half and save you literally thousands of dollars each year. Also, WFH means you can get some other stuff done in your downtime. Don’t have the time to do the washing of a week? Just take five minutes out of your day to pop a load on while you’re at work. I work a Hybrid schedule myself (which means i come in a few days a week and stay home for the rest.)
- Get an electric scooter or power-assisted bicycle. No, it doesn’t have to be an expensive model, e-Bikes can be had for as cheap as a few thousand dollars and an afternoon on the tools for the cost of a used brand-name bike, and a decent quality torque-sensing eBike conversion kit. We have some of the best bike pathway networks in the country here in WA (thanks to the Principal Shared Path network), and using an e-Bike will help you lose weight, save money and most of all, it’s literally more energy efficient than walking. And your boss isn’t likely to get mad at you if you’re charging your scooter or bike battery at work because charging one costs less than 10c of electricity from empty to full… So long as you are using an RCM compliant charger and your battery has an appropriate BMS.
So, yeah, it’s going to suck for a while, but there are some things you can absolutely do outside of owning an EV. But like all things to do with war, it’s time to get Political for a second here.
And now, for the aformentioned ranty-poo.
If, and I do mean If, you are considering a purchase of a new or used car, you should first consider an electric vehicle above all else. Put your politics aside. Politics does not care about your wallet, nor does it care about the planet, or the people whose lives are lost on the battlefield due to stupid wars fought over oil. My assault on this front is hilariously bipartisan, and will tackle people to my political left, and to my right. That’s because my Ideology ignores all the culture-war online BS, and focuses on “gettin’ shit done” when it comes to pretty much all issues, really.
So, i’m going to start off by Steelmanning Conservative arguments against EV ownership and Renewables by looking at it from an ideological and national security lens.
Now, because I’m Australian, and Australia is an oil importing state, so let’s assume I’m going to talk AusPol for a bit. Seppos can sit out for this one because well… Yeah.
Now, I’m going to play Devil’s Advocate here and steel-man One Nation for a second. I know, I know, this is horrible for me to do, I find their rhetoric pretty horrible, and their desires to basically turn border force into a proto-ICE to be pretty fucked up (and let’s be honest, Labor is doing pretty good on Immigration, but let’s not show these people, including some of my own family members, what facts look like), but let’s for one second, play that Devil. I’m going to spend the next few dozen paragraphs pretty much proving Brandolini’s Law pretty much correct by putting in monumental effort into refuting some bullshit you lot spin.
Let’s say you really, really don’t like Fundamentalist Islam. Firstly I don’t blame you, I hate that shit too, it subjugates women, denies their rights and causes harm to so many people, but secondly, funding the war machine of OPEC means you’re directly giving money to the societies and regimes you tend to dislike. You know, the ones who you call “Ragheads” in passing conversations to “own the libs” despite the fact that Liberal means something entirely different in Australia and your brain’s now deep-fried on USPol thanks to you having way too much time on your hands in Retirement.
Regardless, since Australia is a 90% oil importer, and now since their party is now directly funded by a billionaire who makes her living out of coal mining, this means that One Nation voters have, hilariously, no excuse other than to buy EVs, solar panels and batteries for their homes.
Why? Well, since Gina Reinhardt, who both owns coal mines used for electricity generation, and now directly funds the One Nation party openly, this means that if you really, really like One Nation (once again, it baffles me, but regardless… We’re steelmanning here), you should be doing all you can to consume energy that is generated here out of a sense of both patriotic duty and fealty to your new Coal Queen. After all, Gina makes her money from coal and uses some of that funding to fund the party you like, why don’t you make your energy from doing so too?
Australia is the largest supplier of Lithium and Iron Ore on the planet. Chinese EVs are made using lithium and Iron Ore from our mines, which they refine and turn into batteries. If she decides to get on that iron ore and Lithium gravy train too, Gina’s sure to make a bit of cash off of that if there’s room in the budget for it, otherwise many of her other mates in mining are clearly going to take advantage of that.
Now, let’s round this off and say why I think voting for One Nation in 2028 is pretty much pointless at this point. Labor is actively pushing for what it calls the Australian Sunshot, where they’re pumping billions into investing in improving access to solar and wind infrastructure, building a smart grid that better distributes power to reduce blackouts, subsidising solar installs and batteries on homes, and so on. All of these things are going to benefit local mining companies, including Old mate Gina’s, because the cost of energy production will get cheaper overall, and will require less government subsidization in the future due to the economies of scale that come along with it.
So despite her bellyaching, she seeks to actively benefit from a Labor government too. It’s a literal win/win situation for her, and it’d cost her way less in lobbying money if she just Logged Off for a second and thought about it. It’s incredible how stupid people can be, including Billionaires, when they’re over exposed to social media.
So in short, not supporting the transition to renewables is basically like shooting yourself in the foot, really. Every time you burn Diesel, you’re giving the Arab states the money they need to maybe, fund terrorist proxy groups and movements you dislike.
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Now Lefties, Liberals, don’t think for a goddamn second that y’all have left my crosshairs. I’ve got a bone to pick with you too, especially regarding your stance on Tesla.
Despite all the horrible things that their CEO has done, I swallowed my pride and bought a brand new Tesla despite my thoughts on Elon Musk.
Yes, I know. he’s a literal pedophile neo-fascist tech-bro nepo-baby. Yes he was named in the Epstein Files and was caught in literal 4K begging to old mate Jeffy about wanting to go to his wildest parties, but Tesla has had other CEOs in the past, and will have other CEOs in the future. It is, after all, a company that is traded on the public stock exchange. He only has a 13% control of the company, and as such despite all his desires to want to take it off the market, he would literally send himself broke doing so. Tesla’s current (and frankly, overvalued) valuation would require him to sell SpaceX and xAI, and turn them in to public companies in order for him to take Tesla private.
And, despite me owning one and being able to buy a Tesla, you do not have to do the same thing as me. You could buy a Leapmotor, BYD, Polestar, Chery, Volvo, BMW, Mercedes, Ford, Kia, Hyundai, Geely, whatever. I have specific circumstances that I have beaten on, en masse, and verbatim on this blog. There are cheaper and less… Musky EVs out there. Go buy them. Competition is good and it will only force Tesla to improve. In fact, it already has.
The truth is, since the US is so addicted to oil, it picks fights with the Arab and Persian states all the damn time because America just wants control of all the world’s oil. This is how superpowers exist, they control a core resource and act as the monopoly over that resource. If you want to push back, buy into alternatives. Go European and take public transit and send Alstom’s stock ever skyward, or embrace Chinese-made EVs, yes, including Teslas (I argue the Chinese Teslas are the best ones, since they have to compete head-to-head with BYD and Xiaomi’s EVs).
Tesla also does more than just sell cars. They sell the very batteries and software needed to underpin a smart grid. CATL and Tesla are the two biggest gridscale battery suppliers on the planet, and CATL, ironically enough, also supplies Tesla’s standard range vehicles with LFP battery packs. Gridscale batteries benefit Public Transit projects and urbanist design, as it means that more solar can be collected throughout the day, and then used at night. This is a fact that people on the political online Left forget, Tesla does more than just sell refrigerators on wheels that keep breaking (they don’t btw. My Tesla has been the single most reliable vehicle i’ve ever owned), they sell batteries, software, and soon, possibly, Autonomous Robots.
Now, which party has been pumping more into pushing for large scale solar battery infrastructure in Australia than any other? Yep, that’s right, it’s Labor, not the Greens, not One Nation, Labor.
The Greens have actively pushed back against Lithium Mines and renewable energy projects due to environmental reasons; And whilst it’s all good and fair to make sure that well, these evil bastards don’t fuck up the bush too much, we need to get our energy from somewhere, and the longer we keep waiting to build mines, solar farms, refineries and battery factories, the more oil we end up consuming. As you lot always say, time is of the essence, right?
EV ownership and the push to renewables is entirely bipartisan, because the climate does not give a singular fuck who you vote for, and neither do the innocent lives of people who’re being killed in all these bloody, horrible wars being fought over oil. The longer we burn oil, the more people will die in natural disasters, wars, heatwaves and famines. We have the capability and the power to make this switch, yet there are political parties in this fucking country that continue to debate whether or not climate change is even real.
For fuck’s sake.
Politics isn’t about Owning the Libs, or Punching Nazis, it’s about figuring out how we’re going to solve problems. Extremist parties like One Nation and The Greens serve no purpose other than to placate the rhetorical, populist culture of whingers, pissers and moaners that this nation has allowed to flourish in spades due to the nearly three decades of economic prosperity born from the Hawke-Keating administration’s economic reforms in the 80s. For a nation of people who think they’re tough and hard, we sure like to complain an awful lot about seppo-coded culture war bullshit and issues well outside our own borders, huh?
In conclusion, this war sucks. I really, really wish to fuck that we can get off oil, gas, and other fossil fuels, as well as subsequently building walkable cities and transit infrastructure sooner rather than later. Less fossil fuels will mean less wars, less bushfires, less rising oceans, and so on. Walkable cities will mean less need for cars in general, cheaper housing, better access to jobs, less emissions and less issues with social cohesion and migration. I say this to both sides of politics:
If you want to stop this war and indeed future wars, it’s time to stop our addiction to oil, and start building our energy, transportation and cities in a way that we Australians can truly call our own.
Have a good weekend. Stay offline if you can, get on your bike and enjoy the sunshine. I know I sure as hell will.
And as always, when it comes to Nation building, Lee Kwan Yew was right.
Beano out.