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Albert Pinto Profile picture
Albert Pinto
Alternately Defiant, Dispirited, and Despondent. Without illusions but not disillusioned. Focus on Climate, Inequality and Development.
Herve Moal Profile picture Dana Eyre Profile picture Kevin Docherty Profile picture Olímpico de Jesus Moreira Chaves Profile picture Ben Schmidt Profile picture 5 added to My Authors
Apr 6 • 21 tweets • 10 min read
Damn this is good. Poszar may be the most creative thinker of our generation. We are going to argue that Poszar is offering Beijing a to-do list to solve their "Financial Malacca Dilemma". plus2.credit-suisse.com/shorturlpdf.ht… Structure is uncovered from how shocks propagate thru a system:
Crash revealed NY-London centrality to Finance
Corona revealed Fossil-fueled 𝘴𝘺𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘮𝘴 that undergird world economy
Ukraine war? Commodities & Multipolarity

How will US & China respond?
adamtooze.substack.com/p/chartbook-10… Image
Apr 5 • 9 tweets • 6 min read
Thesis: IPCC report,‘now or never’ if world is to stave off climate disaster carbonbrief.org

Antithesis:Russian gas flows on pipelines to Europe remain steady reut.rs/3x4H4qY

Synthesis: Andreas Malm’s Anti-War, Anti-Carbon @MaxJerneck
lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/… Andreas Malm's 'How to Blow Up a Pipeline (2021)' is cursed with such an incendiary title that people think they get the argument without reading the book.

@kunktation review lays out the argument:
newrepublic.com/article/162247…
Apr 3 • 5 tweets • 4 min read
There was a solution to the green problem but it involved deepening European-Russian relations. Crazy how we have terrible war because so many people keep Climate & Geopolitics in separate silos & are unable to do 'joined-up thinking'. #GeopoliticsOfGHGs
we proposed this #GeopoliticsOfGHGs solution in 2019 researchgate.net/publication/33…
Mar 10 • 32 tweets • 20 min read
Global food emergency needs institutional response to procure & distribute.
"During World War I, the Allies faced a similar problem: Shortages for key goods were being exacerbated by uncontrolled international competition on private markets" nytimes.com/2020/04/15/opi… Russian and Ukrainian wheat as important to rest of world as Ru oil and gas are to Europe. Having no plan for alternatives is recipe for sociopolitical instability in both. Its why many countries in Asia & Africa abstained from UN vote to censure Russia.
Feb 28 • 18 tweets • 10 min read
If there is any point to Putin 's nuclear brinksmanship and West's sanctions escalation of weekend, it is to bring everyone to the negotiating table! Thread on the HARD next phase of sanctions relief and economic+security deal that West-Russia can live with. Not looking forward to nuclear winter. Hope sense prevails and West exchanges stoppage of war for pulling back sanctions. Punishment of russia's economy/people and talk of regime change in Moscow only fuels escalation towards MAD
Feb 28 • 6 tweets • 4 min read
1/ A hot war, a financial war, & nuclear M.A.D...

A question to zoom out: Did high energy prices embolden Putin? Are the commodities markets responsible for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine? @rupert_russell’s timely new book 'Price Wars' says: YES.
penguinrandomhouse.com/books/622647/p… Image 2/ Moscow’s military interventions have come at times of historically high oil prices. And right now, energy prices are approaching triple digits for the second time in a decade. Previous highs:
1979 - Afghanistan invasion
2008 - Georgia invasion
2014 - Ukraine "
2022 - Ukraine " Image
Feb 6 • 8 tweets • 4 min read
Kelton on MMT: Image MMT on managing inflation with multiple tools
"Whether it's businesses raising profit margins or passing on costs...there are a range of sources of inflation that aren’t caused by the general state of demand & aren’t best regulated by aggr demand policies"
ft.com/content/539618…
Jan 27 • 20 tweets • 12 min read
83/ War is brewing in Europe.

Napoleon, 18thC : The Russians have General Winter.

Brussels, 21st C : The Russians have General Gas. Churn out Heat Pumps! Speed up Home Insulations! ft.com/content/a0dab1… Image 84/ With forecasts of cold weather and a hot war, Energy markets are VOLATILE right now. A wild day in US Gas Markets with prices doubling and then crashing back down. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Jan 21 • 20 tweets • 9 min read
Economists who don't pay attention to details of production are not economists. Production of cars, oil and meat was disrupted because they are "just-in-time" and bottlenecks in production or transport (like shipping/ports/trucks) hurt.
Thread 2/ Started the thread here 2 years ago, as it became clear that coronavirus would shock the world economy. The shock of E Asia shutting down was immediate to markets & commodities and our "just-in-time" fossil-fueled systems #CoronavirusImposesCarbonTax
Dec 6, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Oilman T Boone Pickens on Bob Dole.

Pickens hated Dole & Agribusiness love of Corn ethanol. Told Dole, its a fuel that requires more energy (and oil+subsidies) to produce than it delivers at the pump.

Dole:math is 21 farm states =42 Senators

Result?
features.propublica.org/palm-oil/palm-… 2/Witnessing the disaster in Indonesia in 2015 was devastating. Most ppl outside Midwest don't know that 2007 RFS mandate replaced 10% of each gallon of gas sold in the US with corn ethanol. It was pushed by all major envtl group then. Horrifying impact.
Nov 9, 2021 • 8 tweets • 6 min read
#NoContextGreenTransition photos from around the world thread (1/n)
ht @climatevisuals climatevisuals.org/collections/ #NoContextGreenTransition photos from around the world (2/n)📸: @bvdbrug latimes.com/environment/ne…
Oct 21, 2021 • 13 tweets • 9 min read
Pentagon just unclassified its Climate report to the National Security Council.

Department of Defense wants you to know climate change is a "threat multiplier". What are all our poor bases in shithole countries going to do?
#GeopoliticsOfGHGs
media.defense.gov/2021/Oct/21/20… US defense technocrats will now include Climate in prioritizing threats; in strategies for countering threats; in planning missions of the armed forces; in what weapons to develop and five-year plan for investments that support strategy #GeopoliticsOfGHGs
media.defense.gov/2021/Oct/21/20…
Oct 21, 2021 • 6 tweets • 5 min read
US- Russia a thread

Worlds largest oil and gas producers? ✅✅
Military budgets many times larger than green investment? ✅✅
Grains in drought?✅✅
Massive forests going up in smoke? ✅✅
Massive chutzpah to create carbon offsets with said forests? ✅✅
bloomberg.com/news/articles/… ImageImage 2/“You wouldn’t always know it, but it went up every year I was president. That whole, suddenly America’s like the biggest oil producer & the biggest gas — that was me, people"-@BarackObama

Energy Independence/Dominance is a hell of a drug in both US (green line) & Russia (blue) Image
Oct 19, 2021 • 5 tweets • 3 min read
US Power Sector emissions alone "exceeds GHG emissions of all but seven countries". US is the largest oil & gas producer on the planet.

Fight in US Congress is a big deal. If Biden can't do it with legislation, he will face opposition on regulations from GOP dominated courts The N American oil complex has raised ~$1000 Billion from banks & pension funds to frack oil & gas over next 5 yrs.

At UN's #COP26, developing countries haggle over a symbolic $100 Billion from rich countries for climate wri.org/blog/2018/11/n…
Sep 21, 2021 • 7 tweets • 4 min read
71/BIG news from Xi : "China will not build new coal-fired power projects abroad"

Will Coal stop? In eyeopening research @kellysgallagher et al found (1)domestic interests in countries push Coal (2)that 87% of coal finance is non-🇨🇳estatements.unmeetings.org/estatements/10… Image 72/ EU's Hydrogen strategy was to build 6GW of renewable hydrogen electrolyses by 2024.

China's response? Go big or Go Home! 100 GW! Its manufacturing economies of scale that gave rest of the world cheap solar and cheap batteries, now applied to Hydrogen rechargenews.com/energy-transit…
Sep 11, 2021 • 4 tweets • 4 min read
Democrats 'build back better' bill will give unto $12,000 in tax credit for new Electric Vehicle purchases! waysandmeans.house.gov/sites/democrat… Image "Even if the president persuades Congress to fund his climate aid proposal, it’ll still be less per year than what the U.S. spends on a single aircraft carrier." ht @AlexCKaufman
Its the 0.4 in $11.4 billion for developing countries that is *chefs kiss*
huffpost.com/entry/biden-un…
Sep 8, 2021 • 8 tweets • 5 min read
36/ "Since Trump's trade war, there has been a total increase of about $200 billion in tariffs from China. For e-commerce companies, this means direct China-US trade has become too expensive. The solution? Mexico."
ht Spencer Potiker @CharmaineSChua
37/ Beijing is popping China’s $52 Trillion property bubble that caused:
underinvestment in industry (crowding out effect)
decline in R&D (talent going to RE)
low consumer spending (tightening belts to save for pricier houses)
low growth (fewer babies)
Aug 16, 2021 • 9 tweets • 6 min read
34/ China's anti-Robber Baron moment? New five-year regulatory effort on Edu & Technology-related sectors on issues like overseas listings, antitrust, privacy.

“looking after middle-class people both in their role as consumers & in their role as workers” ft.com/content/bdcbbd… 35/ Forget 'varieties of capitalism'. We need a 'varieities of corruption' literature. Her fabulous essay on the Robber Barons of Beijing should make you run out to get @yuenyuenang's seminal book
foreignaffairs.com/articles/asia/…

book: sites.lsa.umich.edu/yy-ang/wp-cont…
Aug 8, 2021 • 9 tweets • 6 min read
Everyone please read Project Drawdown drawdown.org/solutions/tabl…
We need to weave many different climate solutions in this decade & all hands required on deck! ht @GlobalEcoGuy globalecoguy.org/we-need-4-wave…
1 Quick Wins
2 New Infrastructure
3 Growing Natural Sinks
4 Deploying New Tech 2/ " “Quick Win” solutions focus on halting highly destructive practices, such as widespread deforestation, flaring and fugitive emissions of methane, and “black carbon” emissions from dirty cookstoves, biomass burning, and other sources" drawdown.org/solutions/tabl…
Aug 7, 2021 • 8 tweets • 5 min read
21/ "While policymakers in advanced economies...argue about whether...aggressive fiscal stimulus...will generate inflation...inflation has already reached the developing world in the form of rapidly rising global commodity prices incl food"
ht @Jayati1609 foreignpolicy.com/2021/08/05/eme… 22/ "Once it is recognised that the US external accounts are driven less by relative goods and service demand—that is by real goods and services—and more by global demand for US financial assets..."

@GeneralTheorist on the world dollars make & unmake moneyinsideout.exantedata.com/p/the-end-of-b…
Aug 2, 2021 • 10 tweets • 6 min read
31/ "crackdown on the education companies. Beijing has come to realize that a credentialed arms race has all sorts of bad side effects like delayed marriage, fertility collapse and social alienation and radicalization of people with worthless diplomas" 32/ Investors lose ~$1000 billion in a wild week of market shocks. What is going on w China's regulatory authorities going after education companies,BigTech?

Is it Progressive Authoritarianism for the middle class? Superb piece by @hancocktom @TomOrlik bloomberg.com/news/articles/… Image