From Oil to Carbon
The Great Reset, also known as 'Build Back Better,' makes the general claim that all societies, cultures, and economies must change to align with the proposed Fourth Industrial Revolution. Reading between the lines, the messaging promoted by the World Economic Forum occurs as a half-hearted admission that most institutions and governments have become corrupted, compromised by 'Free Market Capitalism,' or more specifically, multi-national corporations and greed at the expense of the environment and human wellness. Yet it fails to acknowledge that some of the members of the World Economic Forum are the source of such corruption, and that Globalism has proven to be a race to the bottom that values low cost, at all costs, which translates into immeasurable harm to Nature and biology.
The key to any major economic transition is energy.
If we value clean air, water, and soil, it seems clear we must change our approach to energy. Charles Eisenstein recently wrote about the shift in perspective that must accompany a regenerative approach to energy production and consumption. Increasing our consciousness of energy use and reverence for our interdependence with Nature is critical to the imagination of new and previously concealed innovations.
Renewables are a sensible part of a diverse mix, as long as we are honest about the environmental consequences of all technologies, including wind and solar. And we can incentivize renewable infrastructure without American taxpayers incurring unrepayable debt. While many recognize the need to shift away from dirty fuels, a 'sanitized last mile' is an essential first step although ultimately, we must calculate the cost of extraction, disposal, land consumption, and local environmental conditions where mining occurs. The goal is not perfect efficiency or zero waste; the ultimate aim is designing energy production with environmentally friendly reuses of its waste and exhaust, and fair compensation and treatment of all participants in the supply chain.
Regardless of your opinion of oil, the domination of a high-barrier-to-extract energy source traded with a single currency has threatened the economic and physical security of many nations. Diversification into clean energy will ideally alleviate some of the suffering caused by a reliance on the hegemony of oil. That said, stopping the flow of oil production may prove to be an imprudent decision. We must transition, the question is how quickly?
Decoupling fuel from currency
In the oil economy, oil is both a primary source of energy and the basis of value for the world's most accepted currency. Beyond the incredible economic value generated through production, it served as a source of wealth creation through the capitalization of land via mineral rights and royalties. In the new Carbon economy, energy production becomes decoupled from the store of monetary value, which takes the form of carbon.
Carbon is the new oil.
The story of a mid-nineteenth-century oil is poised to become the future of carbon credits. In the carbon economy, oil and its assets are scapegoated for a new commodity and yet another state of emergency.
Few scientists question the need to take carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and return it to the earth. Many questions remain: how, how urgent, and what are the consequences of a new system that seems to further a perverse concentration of wealth?
If we are realistic with ourselves, carbon is a grossly limited measure of the health of our environment. The carbon story masks the overarching damage caused by pollution emitted by many corporations claiming environmental stewardship at World Economic Forum conferences.
To put it bluntly, a central theme of the Great Reset appears to include the largest investors in oil, promoting the emergency of Global Warming. I am a staunch defender of Nature and for many years was confused about this. Global oil companies may appear to care about oil, but they and their largest investors have made clear their primary motives are money and political control. Is it so far-fetched that banks and investors might be willing to cannibalize an existing system to control money, energy, and the global economy by transitioning their assets to a new commodity of currency like we did in 1973?
While carbon may become currency, unprecedented wealth will incur to the owners of undeveloped land.
Undeveloped land owners are the money printers of the future.
In the proposed new world of carbon, undeveloped land is valued proportionally for its ability to sequester carbon. This value will be extracted through the sale of carbon credits, which are highly profitable financial instruments to buy and sell. These manufactured transactions will offset, not eliminate, the hyperbolic threat to civilization.
While the stated goal may be to incentivize the reduction of carbon output, the path is prosperous.
Simply put, carbon credits are a tax. One person emits carbon and therefore must purchase a credit (or pay tax) to another who owns land, or carbon capture technologies, that sequester carbon. Some claim carbon tax would primarily penalize energy companies although the system opens the door to require all countries, businesses, and people to participate. Meanwhile, global banks reap healthy commissions on the trades.
Carbon can theoretically be calculated (using challengeable assumptions), therefore, carbon credits can be considered a store of value. This is where carbon credits are poised to replace oil. Carbon, and the undeveloped land that sequesters it, becomes the new basis of value for the entire global economy, and financiers in London and New York continue to control the world's financial markets, and through ownership in a web of multi-national corporate entities, most of the natural resources.
The interesting thing is…
It is not trivial that both carbon and undeveloped land are incredibly abundant resources versus the relative scarcity, or at least finite nature, of oil. Many economists claim money must derive value from a scarce commodity, which I will challenge in a future article. But what now that money, or at least its core store of value, will derive from an abundant commodity?
The answer is both simple and frustrating. The men who currently control the world's money supply, who are poised to indirectly collect commissions on all the carbon trades, appear also to want to own all the land. Because in this newly proposed economic system, he who owns undeveloped land will print the money.
Imagine if you own land rich in oil reserves that generate millions, or billions, or trillions of dollars. What if you could own huge plots of undeveloped land, have no exploration or drilling costs, carry little risk, and ordinary people, small businesses, and even countries pay you to own the land? This would be a compelling reason to create intentional inflation to bankrupt private property owners and spread rumors that the largest landowners, cattle ranchers, are causing a global catastrophe, and to start wildfires all over the world.
Global corporations will be incentivized to buy huge tracts of land.
The most carbon-producing businesses are international corporations. These companies would be highly incentivized to buy as much raw land as possible. In essence, they would pay the 'carbon tax' to themselves and generate volumes of money from selling carbon credits to everyone else in the world who inevitably releases carbon. Does this sound at all like feudalism?
What do we do?
It is easy to criticize a brilliant and sophisticated proposal to transition the world's energy and monetary system. My intention is not to disregard the pros for the cons; a system of energy and money that seeks alignment with Nature is not a trivial task. If an informed public resigns to accept that carbon is the best commodity to base economic value, I may concede.
The very idea of tying our currency and store of value to the abundant resource of land is a monumental idea. But the hurdle to fair, naturally aligned energy solutions involves the assurance that many will be able to participate in the equity created. We need to make sure as many people as possible can own land.
If the system is predicated on carbon, we need to vehemently defend property rights, end government spending and money printing causing inflation, and exercise great caution that those introducing the new system are not creating a wave of foreclosure with the intent to tax the world. Contrary to the propaganda of recent acts of Congress, perpetual inflation will occur by increasing taxes and spending by $100 Billion and laying the groundwork for globalist policies which appear to save the environment and may inadvertently create an even greater concentration of global wealth.
The Great Reset may be less about environmentalism and more like a media production to distract us with a burning ship while the big guys steal a bigger one. It is a campaign that deserves our attention and serious non-partisan debate about the details and potential consequences. If the goal is to create an inclusive system that serves the people, I propose the people have a seat at the negotiation table.
Carbon may be the new oil.
But Love will always conquer fear.
References:
1) Great Reset - https://www.weforum.org/great-reset/
2) Build Back Better - https://www.weforum.org/great-reset/
3) Fourth Industrial Revolution -
4) Charles Eisenstein – Inverting the Energy Paradigm - https://charleseisenstein.substack.com/p/the-solution-to-the-energy-crisis
5) Tesla’s Secrets - https://electrical-engineering-portal.com/did-tesla-discover-the-secrets-of-antigravity
6) Why Renewables Can’t Save the Planet – TedTalk -
7) Renewable Energy without Unrepayable Debt - https://www.gregorychristianporter.com/all-posts/28xnc7kdc25sa46ckk6ew7pp937wp8
8) Local Mining Conditions - https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/06/18/green-energy-dirty-side-effects-renewable-transition-climate-change-cobalt-mining-human-rights-inequality/
9) US/Saudi – Petrodollar - https://etd.ohiolink.edu/apexprod/rws_etd/send_file/send?accession=oberlin1495977646733298&disposition=inline
10) Stopping Oil Production - https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/27/biden-suspends-oil-and-gas-drilling-in-series-of.html
11) 1973 Kissinger Petrodollar article 2 - https://www.sandstoneam.com/insight/rise-of-the-petrodollar
12) National Capital Impact Group – Cambridge - https://www.cisl.cam.ac.uk/system/files/documents/measuring-business-impacts-on-nature.pdf
13) Carbon Credits - https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/carbon_credit.asp#:~:text=our%20editorial%20policies-,What%20Is%20a%20Carbon%20Credit%3F,-and-trade"%20program.
14) Microsoft Carbon Off-sets - https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2021/01/28/one-year-later-the-path-to-carbon-negative-a-progress-report-on-our-climate-moonshot/
15) Contraptions to sequester carbon - https://energypost.eu/10-carbon-capture-methods-compared-costs-scalability-permanence-cleanness/
16) Theoretical Atmospheric Carbon Measurement - https://eos.org/editors-vox/atmospheric-model-hierarchies-connecting-theory-and-models
17) The World As A Monopoly - https://www.gregorychristianporter.com/all-posts/lpxclcabchb6rgjjkn5wcw7t45fxmn
18) Intentional Inflation- The End of Inflation - https://www.gregorychristianporter.com/all-posts/e2clmxgntbapnkaaabepla3ngfkxmc
19) Bill Gates – Cattle Causing Global Warming - https://www.livekindly.com/bill-gates-cattle-greenhouse-gas-emissions/
20) Wildfires / Arson - https://nypost.com/2021/08/12/arson-spree-near-californias-dixie-fire-blamed-on-former-professor/
21) Property Rights / Eminent Domain - https://www.newamerica.org/future-land-housing/briefs/is-compulsory-managed-retreat-our-future/
22) The End of Inflation - https://www.gregorychristianporter.com/all-posts/e2clmxgntbapnkaaabepla3ngfkxmc