Archive for July, 2015

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GE close to getting EC approval for Alstom acquisition

July 18, 2015

After a closed door meeting on 2nd July with the EC to explore the EC’s concerns over its acquisition of Alstom’s power and grid business, GE was given till 16th July to make a written submission of any modifications to the deal. The EC decision is expected by the 3rd week of August.

GE has now made its written submissions and they should now be clearly focused on the EC’s concerns. My guess is that GE would have addressed two areas:

  1. So as not to block potential – and qualified – competitors from entering the HDGT market, GE may have offered to make “open source” that technology and IP from Alstom which they do not use themselves. This could, for example, be done by making specified patents and associated test and operational results “freely” available though, perhaps, subject to some nominal royalties. These concessions may satisfy the EC’s concern that the number of OEM’s for HDGT’s would decrease such that there would be an unhealthy concentration of market share.
  2. So as to ensure that pricing for the servicing and for spare parts for Alstom’s fleet of engines would not be unduly or unfairly increased, GE could have offered to limit some margins on this business. They could, for example, hold or index prices for spare parts to 3rd party service providers in – say – Europe for machines installed prior to – say – the year 2000. I suspect that GE would have found a creative way to ensure that their business plan revenue from the service business was maintained with concessions to the EC only on margins rather than on revenue. This should bridge much of the gap, since the EC is primarily looking to avoid monopoly or predatory pricing and unjustifiable margins.

I expect that EC approval for the deal is now very close. Perhaps one more iteration will do the trick. Of course I am only speculating and I personally would like to see the deal go through.

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Posted in Business, Europe, European Union | 3 Comments »

Hitler has long inspired the British Royals

July 18, 2015

The Saxe-Coburg and Gothas may have changed their names to Windsor, and the current British Royals are certainly not the Tudors, but they do have a hankering for the “good old days” when forelocks were properly tugged and dissenting heads could be “offed”.  That Edward and Wallis were fairly committed supporters of the Nazi cause has been well documented. But The Sun has now acquired some home movies where Edward is shown teaching his nieces and his mother the Nazi salute in 1933. Of course in 1933 most of the Royal Houses of Europe supported Hitler as the scourge of the communists and the potential saviour of Royalty. Mind you, as recently as 2005, the Nazi sympathies of the Windsors were on display with Harry Windsor.

The Editor of The Sun would be high on their list of people to be sent to The Tower.

(I find it a little amusing when present members of ruling Royal families extol the virtues of monarchic democracies).

1933 – (The Sun- 2015)

Royals Hitler 1933 The Sun

Royals Hitler 1933 The Sun

1937

23 October 1937 Edward and Wallace with Hitler

23 October 1937 Edward and Wallis with Hitler – Wikipedia

2005 – (The Sun – 2005)

Harry Swastika 2005 The Sun

Harry Swastika 2005 The Sun

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Posted in Behaviour, History | 2 Comments »

Mass murderer Breivik being pandered to by Oslo University

July 17, 2015

There is something wrong with the state of justice in Norway when “rules” are used as an excuse to overrule common sense and pander to the desires of Anders Behring Breivik.

Anders Behring Breivik strax efter rättegången i Oslo 2012.

Anders Behring Breivik soon after his trial in Oslo 2012 – image SvD

Svenska Dagbladet:

Anders Behring Breivik, sentenced for mass murder, has been admitted into the graduate program in political science at the University of Oslo.
The mass murderer will be studying at a distance from his cell, never staying on campus, nor having any contact with other students or staff. All contact between Breivik and the university will be through a contact in the prison. Breivik will not participate in the seminars.

“We as an institution must follow the rules. We can not allow a single person to change this”, says Rector Ole Petter Ottersen.

Rules cannot be an end in themselves. They are tools devised for some purpose. It has been my experience that “rules” are always used as an excuse when actions are known to be wrong but where the actor has not the imagination or skill or competence to find the route to correct behaviour.

That the Rector uses “rules” to justify his actions in pandering to the wishes of someone who killed 77 innocent people and injured 24 is unconscionable. It is the lazy way to justify doing wrong. It is the excuse used at the Nuremberg trials. An insufficient exercise of mind. Was it the purpose of the “rules” to provide aid and comfort to a mass murderer?

 

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Tokyo scraps “bicycle helmet” Olympic stadium – thank goodness

July 17, 2015

I have not been all that impressed by the much vaunted Zaha Hadid‘s architectural designs. I think her Jockey Club Innovation Tower for Hong Kong’s Polytechnic University is a particularly self-indulgent, 15-storey monstrosity. I find most of her buildings are terribly pompous and bordering on the presumptuous.

I haven’t found any of her designs that I truly like. Some are less grandiose or less offensive than others. But I don’t have to pay for her presumptions.

Hadid Jockey Club

Hadid Jockey Club

She had designed the Olympic Stadium for Tokyo 2020 which looked remarkably like a bicycle helmet and quite ugly. Fortunately it has proven to be too expensive (over 300 billion Yen – c. $2 billion), or perhaps it is an estimate of cost which is being used as the cover story for cancelling a structure which should never have been selected. Whatever the real reason, it has been scrapped.

Thank Goodness.

hadid Tokyo Olympic stadium - image Kyodo

hadid Tokyo Olympic stadium – image Kyodo

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More snow in Queensland and NSW than for a decade – harbinger of the coming ice age?

July 17, 2015

Carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere is the highest in modern times and has been increasing for well over a decade. But global temperatures – however that is defined – has shown no sign of warming and a slight decrease in that period. The Sun’s activity is down and reducing to levels similar to that of the Maunder Minimum in this Landscheidt Minimum. A new Little Ice Age is likely by 2030.

The small little signs of weather that are harbingers of the coming Little Ice Age are accumulating – even in the southern hemisphere. Australia is experiencing a “cold” wave (though +12ºC does not seem particularly cold). The cold wave is also giving “unprecedented” (for a decade) levels of snow.

It is inevitable that since the global warming priesthood have been preparing for the icecaps melting that we will now enter a new ice age.

Maybe this time the glaciers are going to spread in the southern hemisphere across Australia and South America?

SMH: Snow creates winter wonderland … in Queensland, as well as NSW

Embedded image permalink

https://twitter.com/KatRose1997/status/621840520591966208/photo/1

Embedded image permalink

https://twitter.com/7NewsQueensland/status/621817081122521088/photo/1

 

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Posted in Alarmism, Australia, Climate, Weather | Comments Off on More snow in Queensland and NSW than for a decade – harbinger of the coming ice age?

Solar Impulse voyage abandoned after irreversible battery damage

July 16, 2015

The Solar Impulse 2 “adventure” is over. The lithium-ion batteries have overheated and have been irreversibly damaged. It may fly again in April 2016. Even if it does, that cannot – by any stretch of creative hype – be considered a part of this journey which has effectively been abandoned. By April 2016 a new plane could be built. The planned duration of the whole flight was to have been 5 months. But 4 months after starting in Abu Dhabi the plane has been grounded in Hawaii after completing 17,800 km of its planned 35,000 km journey.

The much hyped journey of Solar Impulse 2 as a solo flight circumnavigating the world was never really about technology or science. It was all about perceptions and PR. The project has been made into a symbol for solar energy  with claims that

Solar Impulse is the only airplane of perpetual endurance, able to fly day and night on solar power, without a drop of fuel. 

This revolutionary single-seater aircraft made of carbon fiber has a 72 meter wingspan (larger than that of the Boeing 747-8I) for a weight of just 2,300 Kg, equivalent to that of a car. The 17,000 solar cells built into the wing supply four electric motors (17.5 CV each) with renewable energy.

During the day, the solar cells recharge lithium batteries weighing 633 Kg (2077 lbs.) which allow the aircraft to fly at night and therefore to have virtually unlimited autonomy.

This flight has done little to demonstrate “perpetual endurance” or “unlimited autonomy”. Every flight starts with fully charged batteries (presumably charged from the grid and that would be fossil energy) and the solar cells need to top up the charge lost during night flying during the day. What has actually been demonstrated with the maximum flight length of five days is that – at best – the stored charge declined by 20% each day. Moreover the batteries suffered irreversible damage after a 5 day flight. That suggests fatal-flaws in the design of the plane, both in the sizing of the solar panels and in the design of the batteries. Firstly, either the power absorbed during flight has been under-estimated or the recharging capacity has. Secondly the immaturity of the battery technology and the inherent risk of over-heating during recharging has popped up again (as with Tesla, Volt and the Dreamliner).

Certainly it has demonstrated the endurance of the pilot flying solo and all credit to him for that. But it has not provided much in the way of new science or demonstration of engineering or technology. That solar cells work and solar energy can be converted into electricity is not new. That battery technology is still struggling to provide efficient, reliable and sustainable charging and recharging has been demonstrated but it did not need a plane to do that. That the cost and weight of extra cells needed to compensate for the lack of solar energy at night is still a major challenge, remains the state of the art.

Following the longest and most difficult leg of the round-the-world journey which lasted 5 days and 5 nights (117 hours and 52 minutes), Solar Impulse will undergo maintenance repairs on the batteriesdue to damages brought about by overheating.

During the first ascent on day one of the flight from Nagoya to Hawaii, the battery temperature increased due to a high climb rate and an over insulation of the gondolas. And while the Mission Team was monitoring this very closely during the flight, there was no way to decrease the temperature for the remaining duration as each daily cycle requires an ascent to 28’000 feet and descent for optimal energy management.

solar impulse route . based on BBC graphic

solar impulse route . based on BBC graphic

Log (BBC):

LEG 1: 9 March. Abu Dhabi (UAE) to Muscat (Oman) – 772km; in 13 hours and 1 minute

LEG 2: 10 March. Muscat (Oman) to Ahmedabad (India) – 1,593km; in 15 hours and 20 minutes

LEG 3: 18 March. Ahmedabad (India) to Varanasi (India) – 1,170km; in 13 hours and 15 minutes

LEG 4: 18 March. Varanasi (India) to Mandalay (Myanmar) – 1,536km; in 13 hours and 29 minutes

LEG 5: 29 March. Mandalay (Myanmar) to Chongqing (China) – 1,450km; in 20 hours and 29 minutes

LEG 6: 21 April. Chongqing (China) to Nanjing (China) – 1,241km; in 17 hours and 22 minutes

LEG 7: 30 May. Nanjing (China) to Nagoya (Japan) – 2,852km; in 44 hours and 9 minutes

Leg 8: 28 June. Nagoya (Japan) to Kalaeloa, Hawaii (USA) – 7,212km; 117 hours and 52 minutes.

The story is now being spun madly to get some PR benefit, but if the objective was to demonstrate unlimited autonomy then it has been a fiasco. Five days and nights is a long way from being unlimited.

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Germany pips France in the rush to Tehran

July 15, 2015

The French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius announced yesterday that he had been invited by his counterpart to Tehran and would soon be visiting there. But he did not announce any date for his visit. In the meantime while Fabius was talking the Germans were making their travel arrangements. The German Economy Minister has moved fast and has already arranged to take a large trade delegation to Tehran in 4 days time on 19th July (Tehran and Isfahan).

Both France and Germany were major trading partners for Iran before the sanctions and are looking to take a serious chunk of the frozen moneys now being released (about €800 million every month) and which Iran will most likely use to get equipment and components it has long been starved of. There is likely to be a rush of trade delegations and Germany and France are sure to be in the front. However the three countries which have had most trade with Iran during the sanction years have been Russia, China and India and they will also be expecting to be preferred suppliers for whatever they can offer. In any event the world economy will see an increase of trade by about €10 billion per year and increasing as Iran’s oil revenues pick up.

France24:

Fabius noted that French firms were “very well thought of” in Iran but denied the nuclear deal was struck with an eye on business. “Trade is very important. It fosters growth. It’s important for the Iranians, it’s important for us,” he said.

“But when the president of the Republic (Francois Hollande) and I took the strategic decision (to agree to a deal) … we did not take it for commercial reasons, but for strategic reasons because we wanted to avoid nuclear proliferation,” stressed the minister.

France used to have a strong presence in Iran before the sanctions went into effect, with Peugeot and Renault being major players in the Iranian auto industry and energy giant Total heavily involved in the oil sector. But two-way trade has fallen from four billion euros ($4.4 billion) in 2004 to just 500 million euros in 2013, according to French statistics.

PressTV:

Germany sees a big rise in trade with Iran, preparing the first high-profile foreign delegation for visit to Tehran this week since the conclusion of nuclear talks on Tuesday. 

Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel will arrive at the head of a large political and trade delegation on Sunday for a two-day visit which will also take him to the central Iranian city of Isfahan.

The 60-strong delegation will include representatives of big German industrial companies such as Linde and Siemens, Amir-Hossein Zamaninia, Iran’s deputy oil minister for commerce and international affairs, said.

Gabriel, who is also Germany’s vice chancellor, will meet with President Hassan Rouhani, Minister of Petroleum Bijan Zangeneh as well as Iranian ministers of trade and energy and the central bank governor.

“We expect to see a big increase in trade, especially in German sales of capital goods,” the Deutsche Welle website quoted Michael Tockuss, chief executive at the German-Iranian Chamber of Commerce, as saying.

According to the German Foreign Ministry, bilateral trade grew by 27% to 2.7 billion euros ($3 billion) in 2014 because of the sanctions relief. With the conclusion of nuclear talks on Tuesday, conservative estimates foresee bilateral trade expanding to 6 or 7 billion euros in 2016 assuming sanctions are dropped quickly, DW said.

 

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Bibi Netanyahu loses his security blanket

July 14, 2015

I particularly like this from B Michael in a Haaretz opinion column, even if his sarcasm is a little over the top. But with Bibi nothing registers if it does not go over the top.

My heart goes out to Benjamin Netanyahu. With one cold, cruel stroke of the pen, the rulers of the world have taken away his most beloved toy – the apple of his eye and the joy of his heart, the rock of his existence and the source of his strength, and above all, the rock of his refuge and safe haven. Or in short, the Iranian bomb. ……… From now on, Netanyahu is like a baby that has lost its security blanket, or like one whose favorite teddy bear was thrown into the garbage – the one that warmed his heart during the long nights and infused him with calm and serenity during times of trouble and election campaigns.

But Bibi has an easy solution says Michael. He could just take one of Israel’s greater than 200 nuclear warheads and smuggle it into Iran and he can then rest easy that he can get back to crying “Wolf” whenever he has nothing else to say.

But our hope has not yet been lost. If salvation doesn’t come from without, we will bring it from within, from ourselves. ….. As everyone already knows, the State of Israel – of course only according to strange foreign sources – has a respectable arsenal of atomic bombs that long since crossed the 200 mark. More than enough to destroy half the world. 

And here, in these surplus bombs, lies the solution to Netanyahu’s distress. All he has to do is take one of those 200 bombs of ours (according to foreign sources), wrap it up nicely in gift wrapping and give it secretly, as an anonymous donation, to the Islamic Republic of Iran. …… To anyone who fears the move might be discovered and embarrass us, don’t worry; nobody will notice the loss of one bomb out of 200. And even if a curious journalist does discover that one is missing, it’s not so terrible. As is the norm in such cases, Israel will grab the lowly guard on duty and cast him into purgatory the way one usually does with scapegoats, and that will settle the matter.

And thus, everyone will once again be happy.

But to be serious for a moment, bringing Iran back into the fold and creating a more balanced situation could be the best thing to happen in the Middle East for a long time. It is actually the 3-pronged balance between Israel, Saudi Arabia and Iran which gives hope. A military, political, financial and even a religious balance. Ultimately the Middle East has to find its own solutions for what constitutes “democracy” and of living together, without solutions being imported and imposed from Washington.

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Iran deal is done, Bibi unhappy, Greek deal done, Greeks unhappy.

July 14, 2015

Reuters and other anonymous sources are reporting that an Iran deal has been done.

Greece yesterday, Iran today, what’s for tomorrow?

Bibi is neither pleased nor amused. A “pre-emptive” strike by Israel on Iran now becomes that much more difficult. Saudi Arabia will not be too pleased either. If sanctions are  lifted and also on weapons sales by Iran then we can see the pro-Iranian factions across the Middle East getting a boost. Which will probably constrain the advance of ISIS somewhat (and whatever the Saudis might say it is private Saudi money funding the barbarians). The pro-Iranian factions in Syria and Iraq will not only get a boost, they may also be more successful on the ground than the US-led coalition.

However Saudi Arabia will not be too unhappy about the additional downward pressure on oil prices. It will be sometime before Iran can ramp up production and during this time, low-cost Saudi oil will win further market share. Though Saudi Arabia failed to wipe out shale oil from the US, it is still increasing production and contributing further to the current oil glut. Saudi seems to be pursuing a revised strategy of keeping oil prices relatively low for 2 years or more in a war of attrition against the higher-cost oil producers. Market share is perceived as their prime weapon to try and get rid of the higher-cost producers. But I think they have miscalculated even here. A discontinued shale oil well can be restarted with very little investment and at very short notice. Production costs of shale oil have decreased sharply. Shale oil developers will just ramp their production up and down depending upon the prevailing oil price. And the larger shale oil wells can make money even with oil prices down at $40/ barrel.

It isn’t quite time for vacation yet in Europe (apart from Sweden which is closed for July). Some kind of framework resolution for the whole package of the 3rd bailout needs to be passed by the Greek parliament by tomorrow. Some resistance is showing today but the resolution will surely pass. Of course that says nothing about the Greek government’s implementation of all they have signed up for. Their track record of implementing what has been solemnly promised is not good. And if the reports today that the ECB will not be pumping liquidity willy-nilly into the Greek banks are correct, then the banking system will have to start issuing IOU’s to keep functioning while the negotiations are concluded. That will effectively be an alternative currency and it won’t be long before the IOU’s start trading at a different value to par. A currency by another name than “Euro” is still a Grexit for as long as that currency is used.

But an Iran back in the international fold is undoubtedly a good thing.

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Posted in Behaviour, Business, European Union, Greece, Iran, Nuclear Power, Oil, Politics | Comments Off on Iran deal is done, Bibi unhappy, Greek deal done, Greeks unhappy.

Varoufakis (backed by Krugman) chose the wrong game

July 13, 2015

Yanis Varoufakis is a Marxist economist and an “expert” on game theory. Paul Krugman is about as close to a Marxist economist as one can get in the US. The only thing that “star” economists get right are back casts where they force their theories to apply to things that have already happened. Krugman is a Nobel prize winner – but in economics that is not something to be very proud of. Krugman has been a vociferous supporter of the anti-austerity camp. He has even criticised those who have argued against debt write-offs. Thomas Piketty is another “star”, French, “socialist” economist who has also been supportive of the anti-austerity brigade.

(In my own view this is not a battle of ideologies since austerity and anti-austerity are not ideologies. If anything it is a battle between profligate public expenditure on the one hand and prudence and good housekeeping on the other.)

In any event, tonight Greece is contemplating the stringent austerity measures they must sign up to by Wednesday along with the loss of fiscal independence required to be able to just enter negotiations on a 3rd bailout of some €85 billion. Debt restructuring is not included in the package though some rescheduling of debt service will be discussed. It is a package is much more stringent than the Greeks rejected in their much-vaunted and self-indulgent referendum. (What referendum if posing the question “Do you want more taxes?”, would not answer “No”. I was surprised that as many as 39% answered “Yes”.) If the negotiations had been completed 3 months ago, Greece would have been able to conclude a much less painful package.

image – http://www.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk

But it all makes sense if seen as a high stakes “game” that Varoufakis convinced Tsipras and his Syriza colleagues to play. With his game theory credentials and the support of empty “heavyweights” such as Krugman and Piketty, Varoufakis probably thought that he could outmaneuver Schauble especially as he was initiating the game. Perhaps he even felt he was defining the game. A threat to leave the Euro was the nuclear weapon in his arsenal. Seen as such a game, the calling of the referendum was probably planned as the decisive, pre-ultimate move. Even his resignation immediately after the referendum was probably a premeditated move for the negotiation they expected to have. But these moves backfired. First, against Greek expectations, the banks were asphyxiated. Varoufakis had probably miscalculated in thinking that the ECB under friendly French influence would not shut off the liquidity tap. Schauble’s decisive counter-move came yesterday when, for the first time, a Grexit, in the form of a 5 year time-out, was openly named as the alternative. Once Schauble had hijacked that as the nuclear weapon, the game was over. Tsipras had no weapons left and no alternative to capitulating completely.

The Greek population are not only paying for the profligacy of the past. They are also now paying for a game started by Varoufakis which went horribly wrong.

This game is over but the match is still going on. Tsipras would do well to ignore Varoufakis (and Krugman and Piketty) for the rest of the match. Marxists and economy just don’t mix. Marxism may be able to hide its face in the blend but the economy is poisoned.

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