WHAT IS AHEAD FOR 2025?

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The AI and Robotics technological breakthroughs in 2024 set the stage for 2025 as outlined in my previous post: Review of Economic Events for 2024.

The chart below shows exponential growth but not the kind we like to see. In fact, it’s the kind that can result in the outright debasement of a national currency and a collapse in its bond markets. U.S. national debt-to-GDP now stands at 123%. The U.S. government is already running a cumulative fiscal deficit for fiscal year 2025 (starting October 1) of $622 billion. Current forecasts for fiscal year 2025 exceed $2 trillion.

U.S. National Debt Outstanding 1900–2024 | Source: U.S. Treasury

When the fiscal irresponsibility of any government reaches this level, there are usually only two choices to address the problem: Austerity, which is the least politically desirable. Reductions in spending and entitlements always have a degree of economic impact and certainly don’t make voters happy. Devalue the national currency. This is obviously what has been taking place. About 27% of U.S. national debt has been created in the last four years. Money “printing” always results in the devaluation of U.S. dollars and reduced purchasing power.

JEFF BROWN (BROWNSTONE RESEARCH) SUGGESTS THERE IS A BETTER WAY OUT OF THIS MESS

A large productivity boom would accelerate economic growth, lessen the impact of the current debt load, help reduce interest rates, and – if done right – could result in a fiscal surplus.

The USA is on the cusp of the greatest productivity boom in history. And it will be entirely technology-driven. Artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and automation technologies will be the underlying productivity drivers. With cheap energy, the USA will compete with China as robotics beats cheap labour. Robots operate 24 hours a day 7 days a week: no time off, sickies, or holidays, and do not make mistakes.

With Trump at the helm, the U.S. regulatory environment will shift quickly in support of technological innovation, investment, onshoring of manufacturing, blockchain technology as the next generation of payment and settlement rails, and energy production to support economic growth.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will materially reduce the fiscal year 2025 deficit by at least $250 billion, and by more than $1 trillion by fiscal year 2026 under the leadership of Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk.

The Centers for Disease Control, the Department of Health and Human Services, the National Institutes of Health, and the Food and Drug Administration will return to evidence-based medicine practices and streamline the clinical trials process with higher standards for drug approvals, driven by the leadership of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Jay Bhattacharya. This will be a net benefit for the biotech industry.

Interest rates will decline mostly in the second half of the year by another 50–75 basis points. It will take some for the fiscal and economic policy changes to tame inflation. The larger cuts will come in 2026, an even better year for the economy and the markets.

Not surprisingly, AI will continue to be the hottest growth trend in 2025. Hundreds of billions will continue to be spent on the hyperscale “AI factories” being built to train AI foundation models. Jeff believes that we’ll see at least one company develop an artificial general intelligence (AGI) by the end of 2026. We’ll see the equivalent of genius-level IQs from the foundational models of OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta (Llama), Alphabet (Gemini), and xAI (Grok). And the outlier – the big surprise in 2025 will be from Elon Musk and his team at xAI. The entire industry has discounted xAI because it was a bit late to the game of building a foundation model for AI. That’s a mistake, for two reasons. Within a few months, xAI will have the largest training cluster of GPUs, at least 200,000 GPUs developing Grok 3.0. xAI is also developing a “maximum truth-seeking AI.” When training an AI, the quality and accuracy of a model’s outputs depend heavily upon the quality and accuracy of the inputs. Other companies trying to program their foundational models with clear bias and/or political narrative actually slow down their own technological development. Doing so adds complexity. xAI is avoiding that trap by designing, building, and performance training. This is a large competitive advantage that will catch the rest of the industry off guard. xAI’s Grok will outperform the rest of the industry.

2025 will also be the year when we experience Level 5 autonomous transport without any geofencing, entirely driven by vision models. This is different than Waymo, Cruise, or others that are heavily dependent upon LIDAR and require very precise maps allowing them only to operate in geofenced areas. And there is only one company capable of this technology – Tesla.

This year will be the first year when we experience unsupervised full self-driving technology. Unsupervised means that no one will have to sit in the front seat and monitor the full self-driving software for safety. Tesla will succeed in “turning on” this technology in at least one U.S. state this year. This will also enable Tesla to launch a robotaxi network, enabling Tesla owners to opt their Teslas into the network, enabling their electric vehicles to earn income. This will change the entire dynamic of the automotive industry, as Teslas will become affordable to an even larger percentage of the market. And it will, of course, be bullish for Tesla as the only EV company capable of this technology.

Humanoid Robots Overtake Offices & Factories

We’ll also see impressive advancements in AI in the manifested form of humanoid robots. Again, Tesla will lead here with its forthcoming release of Optimus Gen 3, which will be capable of autonomous operations in both industrial and consumer settings. While I don’t expect Tesla to start external sales of Optimus until 2026, it will widely use its production of Optimus in both its own office and factory settings. Optimus will set the standard for humanoid robot productivity, and investment will increase dramatically in other major players in this field. 1X Technologies, Agility, and Boston Dynamics will work hard to catch up to Tesla’s technology.

LLM’s (Large Language Models): The Year of Agentic AI

Let’s define agentic AI. Unlike traditional AI, which linearly executes commands, agentic AI systems interact with tools and databases autonomously and in logical order to achieve more reliable and robust results. If you were to query an agentic AI system with a multi-step problem, it would parse your request in the most logical order instead of moving from the top down.

These Agentic AI agents will be capable of reasoning and solving tasks that require multiple steps to complete. Agentic AI will be capable of transacting on behalf of anyone. The technology will be able to interface with the internet and fill out fields to complete assigned tasks. This technology will extend even further to the blockchain industry, where AI agents will be capable of managing smart contracts and engaging in self-directed economic activity. Blockchain technology is particularly conducive to agentic AI technology because of the ease of transacting with digital assets and the construction of smart contracts using blockchain technology. Which brings us to the digital assets industry.

The Year of Digital Asset Revitalization

The Trump win means pro-crypto, pro-innovation, and a plan to put clear regulations in place for digital assets. Fortunately for the digital assets industry, we’re already seeing a complete revitalization of the blockchain industry concerning investment in the U.S. 2025 will be a big year for crypto.

New regulations will be put in place, providing clarity and clear guidance on industry rules. And the enforcement of baseless and antagonistic actions against the leaders in the industry will come to an end. This will be bullish for high-quality cryptocurrencies. We should expect to see a lot of speculation in the industry, as well.

Jeff has relaunched his Neural Net Profits research service. It is powered by a sophisticated neural network that Jeff’s team developed at a cost of more than $1 million, called The Perceptron. It picks up on short-term trading signals in cryptocurrencies. Additionally, we’ll see U.S. dollar stablecoin projects thrive this year, as more and more financial transactions happen and settle on blockchain technology.

Lift Off for the Space Economy

Jeff expects that Boom Supersonic will succeed in flying its one-third-scale aircraft supersonic in the first half of this year. Boom is the most advanced aerospace company in building a supersonic commercial aircraft capable of traveling at Mach 1.7 with 64-80 passengers. It is an answer to what comes next after the Concorde.

The Trump/Musk partnership will also put NASA back on track for its return to the moon program – Artemis – by 2026. SpaceX will launch at least 15 Starships this year, as it refines the technology of the largest rocket and spacecraft in history.

Radical Shifts in Defense Spending

The U.S. will stop the absurd spending and funding of overseas wars and focus instead on rebuilding a technologically advanced defensive capability for the U.S. military… a peacekeeping military. Representative companies will be Anduril and perhaps General Atomics. The key will be uncrewed, autonomous drones and aircraft. Given the advancements in artificial intelligence and autonomous technology, the nature of warfare has dramatically changed. The use of autonomous drones and uncrewed aircraft will be an explosive trend in 2025, as will the development of intelligent cybersecurity agents to protect against nation-state attacks – most notably those of China on U.S. infrastructure that has commanded an alarming number of headlines in 2024.

Investment will accelerate in advanced technologies in the defense sector, as opposed to the more traditional technological approaches. Western adversaries are using unconventional weapons to infiltrate and fight, and the industry must adjust. We’ll also see an increase in spending on defense as it applies to the U.S. Space Force. The progress with hypersonic technology in 2024 will make space-based defense systems and communications that much more critical as a deterrent to war.

Nuclear’s Next-Generation Renaissance

Energy policy will also become a cornerstone development in 2025 for the new administration. The “pause” that we witnessed in natural gas production in the last four years will be lifted and the industry will start to invest heavily again in natural gas. Energy produced from coal will drop, just as it did during the first Trump administration. There will also be a major policy push to bring both oil prices, and thus gasoline prices, down. The last four years seriously depleted the U.S.’s strategic petroleum reserves – to levels that we haven’t seen since the early ‘80s. Lower prices will be critical to refill those strategic reserves and to ensure energy security for the U.S. economy.

In parallel, there will be strong regulatory support for the recommissioning of nuclear reactors in the U.S., as well as for the commissioning of new fourth-generation small modular reactors (SMRs) to address the shortages in energy production. Nuclear energy will experience a rebirth in 2025. That will be true for both nuclear fission as well as nuclear fusion technology.

Front runners in the nuclear fusion race are General Fusion, Helion, Zap Energy, Commonwealth Fusion, and China-based private company ENN. There may even be a national laboratory in South Korea, China, Japan, Germany, or the U.K. that may make the claim. Jeff predicts record levels of investment in nuclear fusion companies in 2025… precisely because the path is so clear toward net energy production. Institutional capital can now see a path toward commercialization – and ultimately returns – on their invested capital.

The solar power industry will continue to thrive. Investment will continue in solar in markets where it makes sense. And as interest rates come down, solar will benefit from improved project financing.

Energy production from wind, however, will suffer, as it should. Wind power is not economical and environmentally destructive. The carbon footprint of wind turbines is terrible when considering all the minerals that need to be mined, and petroleum needed to keep the wind turbines turning. Not to mention the short lifespans and the fact that turbine blades cannot be recycled. They simply end up in a dump.

AI WILL DRIVE A BIOTECH RESURGENCE

Novel therapies will be developed in a fraction of the time and for a fraction of the cost of the traditional drug discovery process. The use of AI will also reduce toxicity and improve the safety of drugs. When we couple the positive impact of AI on the drug discovery process with the cleanup and streamlining of the relevant health agencies in the U.S., we will naturally see an increase in investment in the biotech sector.

Jeff is confident that 2025 is the year when the government will step back from destructive policies, restore trust, and push ahead on pro-energy, pro-growth, and pro-innovation policies.

How does all of the above fit into Biblical end-times prophecies? It doesn’t, Biblical end-times prophecies is Middle-East centric with Satan’s focus still on destroying Israel. The next major battle is given in Daniel 8, the goat (Yvan) Sunni Turkey putting down (Persia) Shia Iran in an attempt to re-establish a Neo-Ottoman Empire. Watch for it and use it to prove the Bible is God’s word. We know how this ends.

Next on God’s agenda for planet Earth is Jesus’ Millennial Kingdom – http://www.millennialkingdom.net

WIND AND SOLAR IS NOT THE ANSWER: USA GOING TO NUCLEAR

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USA is planning to convert closed coal-fired power stations to nuclear. Just as Peter Dutton suggests Australia should do with small modular nuclear reactors as well as new conventional nuclear reactors.

Nuscale Small Modular Nuclear reactor

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today released a report showing that hundreds of U.S. coal power plant sites could convert to nuclear power plant sites, adding new jobs, increasing economic benefit, and significantly improving environmental conditions. This coal-to-nuclear transition could add a substantial amount of clean electricity to the grid, helping the U.S. reach its net-zero emissions goals by 2050. 

The study investigated the benefits and challenges of converting retiring coal plant sites into nuclear plant sites. After screening recently retired and active coal plant sites, the study team identified 157 retired coal plant sites and 237 operating coal plant sites as potential candidates for a coal-to-nuclear transition. Of these sites, the team found that 80% are good candidates to host advanced reactors smaller than the gigawatt scale.  

A coal-to-nuclear transition could significantly improve air quality in communities around the country. The case study found that greenhouse gas emissions in a region could fall by 86% when nuclear power plants replace large coal plants, which is equivalent to taking more than 500,000 gasoline-powered passenger vehicles off the roads.  

It could also increase employment and economic activity within those communities. When a large coal plant is replaced by a nuclear power plant of equivalent size, the study found that jobs in the region could increase by more than 650 permanent positions. Based on the case study in the report, long-term job impacts could lead to additional annual economic activity of $275 million, implying an increase of 92% in tax revenue for the local county when compared to the operating coal power. 

“This is an important opportunity to help communities around the country preserve jobs, increase tax revenue, and improve air quality,” said Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Dr. Kathryn Huff. “As we move to a clean energy future, we need to deliver place-based solutions and ensure an equitable energy transition that does not leave communities behind.” 

The reuse of coal infrastructure for advanced nuclear reactors could also reduce costs for developing new nuclear technology, saving from 15% to 35% in construction costs. Coal-to-nuclear transitions could save millions of dollars by reusing the coal plant’s electrical equipment (e.g., transmission lines, switchyards), cooling ponds or towers, and civil infrastructure such as roads and office buildings.  

Argonne National Laboratory, Idaho National Laboratory, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory conducted the study, sponsored by the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy. 

Read the full report here.

GOOGLE TURNS TO NUCLEAR ENERGY

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Alphabet’s Google is plugging into nuclear power for its artificial intelligence (AI) operations. The tech giant inked a deal with Kairos Power to purchase electricity from small modular reactors (SMRs).

  • The plan: Bring the first SMR online by 2030, with more to follow through 2035.
  • The bigger picture: This move highlights the surging energy demands of AI, with U.S. data center power consumption projected to triple between 2023 and 2030.

In a deal that marks the first corporate agreement to deploy multiple small modular reactors (SMRs) in the U.S., Kairos Power, and Google have signed a Master Plant Development Agreement to facilitate the development of a 500-MW fleet of molten salt nuclear reactors by 2035 to power Google’s data centers.

Momentum for a nuclear revival driven by data center power demand is already beginning to crop up. As POWER reported earlier this month, Microsoft and Constellation Energy committed $1.6 billion to restart the Unit 1 reactor of the shuttered Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania by 2028. The facility, known as the Crane Clean Energy Center, could supply Microsoft’s AI-driven data centers for at least 20 years. Amazon Web Services, similarly, last year bought a 960-MW data center campus powered by the 2,500-MW Susquehanna nuclear plant.

Also, the Strategic Capabilities Office of the US Department of Defense (DOD) has selected BWXT Advanced Technologies and X-energy LLC to develop a final design for a prototype mobile microreactor under the Project Pele initiative. The two teams have been selected through a preliminary design competition which began in April 2019. Three companies – BWX Technologies, Westinghouse Government Services, and X-energy – were selected last year to begin preliminary design work for a prototype reactor. One of the remaining two companies may be selected to build and demonstrate a prototype after a final design review early next year, and the completion of an environmental analysis under the US National Environmental Protection Act, DOD said.

Australia has realized the need for nuclear submarines, so we are committed to nuclear energy and need to develop expertise with small nuclear reactors. We have also had a nuclear reactor in Sydney since the 1950s without incident. Hence, it makes good business sense to bring nuclear energy into our energy mix as well.

THE AI-SPARKED NUCLEAR REVIVAL

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The data centers that power AI technologies require such prodigious – and reliable – volumes of electricity, that tech giants like Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) and Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) “rediscovered” nuclear power as an ideal energy source.

Microsoft and Constellation Energy, the utility that owns Three Mile Island, announced a new deal on September 20th that will lead to the restart of Unit 1 at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station. This will be the first time a nuclear reactor in the United States has been brought back online after being shut down. 

The deal is for 20 years and is a power purchase agreement in which Microsoft will buy the power generated by Unit 1 for an estimated $110-$115 per megawatt hour in order to reliably power its Artificial Intelligence (AI) data center demand while meeting the companies clean energy goals. Unit one will reopen as the “Crane Clean Energy Center” by 2028 so long as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission approves the plan.

Amazon Web Services is paying as much as $650 million for a data center campus adjacent to a nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania. The cloud provider reportedly plans to build several data centers there, according to The Information. 

The recent Amazon and Microsoft nuclear deals are not outliers. Earlier this month, Oracle Corp. (ORCL) Chairman and Co-founder Larry Ellison announced that his company had obtained “building permits for three nuclear reactors. These are small modular nuclear reactors to power the data center.

Along with this surprising announcement, Ellison also mentioned that some of the newest data centers under construction will require ten times more power than the typical facilities in operation today. Oracle, he said, is building an 800-megawatt data center that will have “acres of Nvidia GPU clusters” that will be used to train one of the world’s largest AI models.

For perspective, 800 MW is nearly identical to the entire power supply that Microsoft expects the Three Mile Island plant to produce once it reopens. In other words, one modern data center will need the entire output of one nuclear reactor.

In many important respects, nuclear energy has no equal, especially when it comes to powering data centers. Electricity that is intermittent, or susceptible to interruption, is electricity that could cause a big, expensive mess for data centers. Nukes prevent that problem. They can run continuously for long periods of time without needing maintenance or refueling.

Importantly, nukes also require a relatively small footprint, compared to renewable energy sources. Theoretically, a square plot of land, 22 miles long on each side, could accommodate enough nuclear reactors to power the entire United States.

Looks like Dutton may be onto a winner by bringing Nuclear Energy into our Power Mix. Because of the need for lots of land, batteries, digitalisation, and new infrastructure (grid upgrade and expansion) with wind, and solar the renewables option is more expensive and less reliable than Nuclear.

https://www.cnbc.com/video/2024/09/20/constellation-energy-reopens-three-mile-island-nuclear-power-plant-in-agreement-with-microsoft.html

ADOPTION OF SMALL MODULAR REACTORS

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Britain’s new Labour government has said small nuclear plants will play an important role in helping the country meet its net-zero targets.

Britain’s Office of Nuclear Regulation (ONR) said the Rolls-Royce SMR 470 megawatt (MW) Small Modular Reactor (SMR) design had completed stage two of its three-step generic design assessment (GDA) – the formal process for approving a new reactor.

“The team will move directly into Step 3 of this rigorous independent assessment of our technology – ideally positioning us to deliver low-carbon nuclear power and support the UK transition to net zero,” said Helena Perry, Rolls-Royce SMR’s Safety and Regulatory Affairs Director.

The overall duration for the Rolls-Royce SMR GDA is expected to be 53 months, reaching completion in August 2026.

A unique approach

According to Paul Stein, Chairman of Rolls-Royce SMR, “The UK SMR heralds a new approach to the cost of nuclear power by broadly rethinking the manufacturing and construction methods and by the extensive use of digital twinning, keeping the physics package exactly the same. The SMR uses a pressurised water reactor, a type we know and love.”

The production will utilize commercially available, off-the-shelf components from within the UK supply chain, injecting revenue into the British economy and avoiding high-risk, complex construction principles.

Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)

The second volume of The NEA Small Modular Reactor Dashboard is another milestone in the ongoing efforts of the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) to comprehensively assess the progress toward commercializing and deploying SMR technologies. It is important to note that the present publication is not an update to the complement of reactors assessed in Volume I. Instead, the work extends the same methodology to a further 21 SMR designs worldwide to evaluate their progress toward commercialization and deployment as of 21 April 2023.

Australia is a member of the OECD and has access to the publications of its Nuclear Energy Agency on SMR’s and would be aware that the widespread use of SMRs is underway.

Notable public announcements, even in the intervening months since NEA published Volume I in March 2023, now reflect technology choices and plans by chemical manufacturers, oil companies, and copper mine owners. Market signals suggest that this trend will only continue to accelerate as awareness grows about the potential for SMRs to provide alternatives to fossil fuels for both power and non-power industrial applications.

Nuclear Energy allows us to use the existing transmission lines and infrastructure, which is extremely important in Australia with a widely distributed, small population in a large country. The proposal submitted by the Liberal Party for replacing cold fire power stations with SMRs and larger-scale nuclear reactors utilizes the existing transmission lines so is a cost-efficient option.

Wind and Solar in remote locations means a whole new transmission infrastructure to get the power to where it is needed. Moreover, they only work when the wind blows and the sun shines, so the power output is unreliable.

Blocking nuclear is a major setback for Australia’s industrial sector. In the past with our own coal and natural gas Australia provided industry with comparatively cheap energy that will change dramatically without nuclear. Also, Australia has the world’s largest economic demonstrated resources of uranium. In 2021, it was the world’s 4th largest uranium producer. However, Australia has only one commercial nuclear power plant therefore, it has limited domestic uranium requirements. It has and will continue to provide excellent export income.

NUCLEAR POWER IS ALREADY POWERING ONTARIO CANADA & THEY ARE LEADING THE WAY WITH SMR’S

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Why aren’t our politicians following what is happening in Canada specifically in Ontario. Watch the video below and hear from Ontario politicians on what they believe about nuclear power.

(CAMBRIDGE, Ontario – April 19, 2024) – BWX Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: BWXT) announced today an investment to expand its Cambridge manufacturing plant. Already one of the largest nuclear commercial manufacturing facilities in North America, the site’s increased footprint will enable greater capacity to support ongoing and anticipated customers’ investments in Small Modular Reactors, traditional large-scale nuclear, and advanced reactors, in Canada and around the world.

The expansion, estimated to cost C$50 million, will increase the facility’s footprint 25 percent to 280,000 square feet. Additionally, over the next few years, BWXT will invest approximately C$30 million in advanced manufacturing equipment for the facility that has designed and manufactured hundreds of large nuclear components. This total estimated C$80 million investment will increase capacity significantly, improve productivity and create more than 200 long-term jobs for skilled workers, engineers and support staff in the area. 

John MacQuarrie, president of Commercial Operations, BWXT, stated, “Our expansion comes at a time when we’re supporting our customers in the successful execution of some of the largest clean nuclear energy projects in the world. At the same time, the global nuclear industry is increasingly being called upon to mitigate the impacts of climate change and increase energy security and independence. By investing significantly in our Cambridge manufacturing facility, BWXT is further positioning our business to serve our customers to produce more safe, clean, and reliable electricity in Canada and abroad.” 

Mike Rencheck, president and CEO of Bruce Power said, “The nuclear industry is powering Ontario’s economy, by supplying clean, reliable electricity, life-saving medical isotopes, and creating thousands of good jobs. We are supporting advanced manufacturing while providing a deeply decarbonized grid to attract new businesses to our province. The expansion at the BWXT facility in Cambridge is another great example of the positive impact our industry can have in communities all across the province. Clean air, cancer-fighting medical treatments, and economic expansion leading Ontario to a better future.”

Ken Hartwick, president and CEO of Ontario Power Generation (OPG), said, “As we refurbish our existing nuclear facilities and build new, OPG is also generating jobs and economic activity in Ontario’s robust nuclear supply chain. BWXT’s planned expansion is a great example of how building out a system to meet Ontario’s increasing clean energy needs is also paying dividends for our province’s economy.” 

Recent announcements by provincial governments to increase emissions-free power generation have reinvigorated the nuclear industry in Canada. Within the last year, the Government of Ontario has announced support for building a total of four small modular reactors (SMRs) for Ontario Power Generation’s (OPG) Darlington New Nuclear Project; refurbishing OPG Pickering Nuclear Generating Station; and initiating pre-development work for siting up to 4,800 MWs of new nuclear power generation at Bruce Power.  

Premier of Ontario Doug Ford said, “We’re thrilled to see BWXT expand its footprint and create hundreds of new jobs in Cambridge. As our province continues to lead the future of nuclear energy, the company’s investment will help provide Ontario families and businesses with access to clean, reliable, and affordable power.

IS THE NUCLEAR VERSUS RENEWABLES A “MAY THE BEST MAN WIN” RACE?

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This article is taken from the article “Peter Dutton’s nuclear policy gives renewables investors a shock” in The Australian Monday 24th June 2024.

If renewable energy was the cheapest electricity source and nuclear the most expensive, the green energy barons would have nothing to fear from a nuclear competitor. Yet the market reaction to Dutton’s intervention proved investors don’t buy the government’s spin. They know that in a competitive market, nuclear generation will eat renewables’ lunch, just as coal once did before wind and solar were showered with subsidies and the market rules were altered in renewables’ favour.

(AUSTRALIA OUT) An aerial of the Lucas Heights nuclear reactor site on 14 November 2005. SMH NEWS Picture by ROBERT PEARCE. (Photo by Fairfax Media via Getty Images/Fairfax Media via Getty Images via Getty Images)

However, the Clean Energy Investor Group is hardly a disinterested observer. It is the peak body for major renewable investors, including Macquarie, Blackrock, Neoen, and Tilt Energy. Together, they own 76 clean energy assets worth $38bn. The present value of those assets is now hostage to the electoral fortunes of Anthony Albanese (current Prime Minister), which is why cashed-up renewable energy investors are accumulating a war chest of hundreds of millions of dollars to keep Labor in power.

The influence of this powerful, crony-capitalist enterprise is one reason Dutton has only an outside chance of turning nuclear into an election-winning issue. However, polling on public support for nuclear has been trending Dutton’s way, and the evidence from around the world is stacked in his favour. Bearing in mind, Australia already has a Nuclear Reactor. The High Flux Reactor was Australia’s first nuclear reactor. It was built at the Australian Atomic Energy Commission Research Establishment at Lucas Heights, Sydney. The reactor was in operation between 1958 and 2007 without incident, when it was superseded by the Open-pool Australian lightwater reactor, also at Lucas Heights and it is still in operation today.

However, the history of bad ideas shows them to be most potent when entrepreneurs discover ways of making a buck out of them. The influence of the cashed-up renewable energy sector in global politics and cultural institutions has made the net-zero narrative all but impossible to dislodge.

Protecting the present value of trillions of dollars of global capital rests on maintaining the fiction that wind and solar power, backed up by numberless batteries yet to be built and pumped hydro yet to be installed, is the key to rescuing the planet. Trillions of dollars of capital have been misallocated to this purpose thanks to perverse incentives provided by politicians whose most pressing concern is not to save the planet but to survive the next election.

Australia is not the only country caught up in the exuberance of the 2019 Paris climate conference and promised more than it could possibly achieve. It is hard to find a single Western economy remotely on track to meet 2030 commitments, let alone the big one in 2050. I will shortly put up a post entitled “Germany Failed to Achieve Clean Energy Transition Without Nuclear”

In a report published last month by the Fraser Institute, Czech-Canadian scientist Vaclav Smil outlined the task ahead. More than 4 terawatts of electricity-generating capacity must be replaced, and almost 1.5 billion gasoline and diesel vehicle engines must be converted to electricity. Almost all the world’s agricultural and crop-processing machinery must be replaced, including 50 million tractors and more than 100 million irrigation pumps. New heat sources must be developed to smelt iron, manufacture cement and glass, process chemicals and preserve food. More than half a billion domestic, industrial, and institutional gas furnaces must be abandoned. Novel forms of motive power must be found for 120,000 merchant vessels, and we’ll need to develop a carbon-free way of keeping 25,000 jetliners in the air. Not to mention, the AI revolution is gobbling up power. AI, the Cloud, and decentralized currencies like Bitcoin require enormous energy at a time when the world is trying to transition to solar and wind which are totally unpredictable power sources.

For Vaclav Smil, the most disturbing thing about the net-zero fallacy is what it tells us about the economic, numerical, and scientific illiteracy of a generation that is, on paper, the most educated in history. As Smil told American author Robert Bryce in an email exchange, we live in a fully post-factual world.

The net-zero fallacy has taken root “because the soil is receptive: utterly brainless mass of mobile-bound individuals devoid of any historical perspective and any kindergarten commonsense understanding”.

The cartoonish reaction to Dutton’s nuclear announcement last week was evidence of Vaclav Smil’s point. If there is a solid argument against legalising nuclear power in Australia, Chris Bowen failed to produce it. Bearing in mind we have had a nuclear power plant operating safely in Sydney for decades. Until he does, Dutton can safely regard the debate as won.

Yet politicians are not rewarded for winning fact-based arguments. They are rewarded by winning elections. As Thomas Sowell points out, one of the differences between economics and politics is that politicians are not forced to pay attention to long-term consequences.

“An elected official whose policies keep the public happy up through election day stands a good chance of being voted another term in office, even if those policies will have ruinous consequences in later years,” Sowell wrote in Basic Economics.

Yet the test of Dutton’s policy is whether it will increase competition in the market, offering a credible alternative to the untrodden renewable-only path on which we are embarked.

The squeals from the renewable energy establishment last week suggest he is on the right track.

Nick Cater is a senior fellow at the Menzies Research Centre, a visiting fellow at the Danube Institute, and a columnist with The Australian. He is a former editor of The Weekend Australian and a former deputy editor of The Sunday Telegraph. He is the author of The Lucky Culture published by Harper Collins.

We are living in the Biblical prophesied end-times world: God and His laws have been jettisoned, many churches have compromised with the world on homosexuality, gay marriage, and even transgenderism. Government debt is not sustainable so people’s confidence in politicians is at an all-time low, anarchy is next as energy supplies fail. Other, prophesied end times signs such as earthquakes, pestilences, and famine are already evident. The fact that the major Biblical end-times prophecy was already fulfilled over 70 years ago: the re-establishment of Israel as a nation, should give every Christian confidence that Jesus’ prophesied return to Earth is near.

AI IS DEAD IN THE WATER UNLESS RELIABLE SOURCES OF ENERGY ARE AVAILABLE

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AI Could Soon Need as Much Electricity as An Entire Country

This graph reveals that for decades the power demands for A.I. closely followed Moore’s Law, doubling roughly every 20 months. However, Moore’s Law was shattered in 2010. And the processing power required to train AI went from doubling every 20 months to doubling every six months. To put this in perspective for you: that’s a 16 trillion percent increase over the last 13 years alone… This growth shows no sign of slowing down. In fact, Epoch AI, a research institute warns: The amount of [computing power] developers use to train their systems will continue increasing at its current accelerated rate. That means in one year, the amount of computing power required to train AI systems will increase by 300%… In 3 years, by 6,300%… In 5 years, by a staggering 102,300%.

Operating and developing new artificial intelligence systems requires unparalleled energy demands… energy demands we cannot currently meet. Consider this: ChatGPT already receives an average of 10 million queries per day. That’s roughly 300 million queries per month. Research from the University of Washington shows it costs around one gigawatt-hour of energy to answer these queries. One gigawatt-hour is roughly the same energy consumed by 33,000 households! And that’s for only one AI program.

The problems are FAR worse at scale. The University of Massachusetts Amherst found that “training a single AI model can emit as much carbon as five cars in their lifetimes.” That’s not operating, just development. And that’s for just ONE of the thousands upon thousands of AI models that are being trained every single day. That’s why, The New York Times reported, by 2027 AI servers are predicted to consume as much as 134 terawatt hours annually. In less than three years, AI will have the same annual energy consumption as countries like Argentina, the Netherlands, and Sweden.

“If you really want to make the biggest, most capable super intelligent system you can, you need high amounts of energy.” SAM ALTMANCEO, OPEN AI

“The world is actually headed for a really bad energy crisis because of AI unless we fix a few things.” ARIJIT SENGUPTA, FOUNDER, AIBLE

Elon Musk predicts that by 2045 the power demand in the U.S will have tripled from current levels – largely driven by AI’s needs.

Those in the know, understand that unless the insatiable energy demands of artificial intelligence are met, the industry will never go mainstream.

Fossil fuels are the primary energy source used to train and operate AI systems and could continue to meet the growing energy demands…

But that would require the woke Silicon Valley tech companies and progressive politicians to turn their backs on the religion of Climate Change. And with the activists already up in arms about the environmental impact of artificial intelligence, this is untenable to the ruling class. So they’ll argue that renewables like wind and solar should be used to meet the energy demands of AI…

But the reality is that there is ZERO chance of these renewables producing enough low-cost energy to meet AI’s needs. As The Manhattan Institute reported: “Thinking that wind and solar can ever replace fossil fuels is nothing but an “exercise in magical thinking.” Of course, those who have decided that fossil fuels are quite literally the end of humanity don’t care for these facts.

The Ivy League elites continue to lecture us that wind and solar are the ONLY way forward. But let’s look at the data: Recent research has shown that after two decades of intense support for increased clean energy… The proportion of energy provided by these “clean sources” went from a paltry 13-14% to… get this… 15.7%. That’s after global investment and spending on these clean energy solutions hit an estimated $1.4 trillion in 2022. Tell me, after more than twenty years of failure, do you think these green “solutions” will suddenly be able to meet the exponential energy needs of AI. Of course not. Just consider the projected energy consumption of artificial intelligence we discussed earlier, 134 terawatt hours annually. To generate this amount of energy from wind power alone would require almost 17,000 wind turbines. That would take up roughly 2,284 square kilometers, about 1.5-times the size of London – a city of 8.9 million people.

And that’s assuming all this energy went to AI. This is why it’s obvious to me that renewables like wind, solar, and hydro will NEVER meet the energy demands of AI. And this has created a unique situation… The economic, social, and geopolitical incentives behind AI are far too powerful to be stopped.

Even the Biden administration is not incompetent enough to halt the progress on AI development and cede power to our rivals like China and Russia. However, for artificial intelligence development to continue and reach its full potential vast amounts of energy will be required. And there’s only one solution…

The U.S. Secretary of Energy, Jennifer Granholm, a radical who makes inane music videos about ending fossil fuels… …has come to admit that… the future of nuclear energy is here and should be protected. JENNIFER GRANHOLM, U.S. SECRETARY OF ENERGY

Hence the U.S. government is adopting nuclear power and recently passed the ADVANCE Act (the Accelerating Deployment of Versatile, Advanced Nuclear for Clean Energy)

Its stated mission is to: “Boost development and deployment of new nuclear technologies, incentivize expansion in America, […] and help position the U.S. as the world’s leader in nuclear energy.”

Miraculously, this is one of the only bills this year that made it through the Senate with bipartisan support… which highlights the importance of nuclear energy, not just for the future of AI, but for the country. In fact, the US Department of Energy recently went so far as to say: “Nuclear power is intrinsically tied to national security.”

While it’s refreshing to finally see D.C. pass legislation that is grounded in reality and that will benefit the country, there’s a problem. After decades of negative attention and pressure from the mainstream media, the U.S. has been closing nuclear power plants.

In 1998, the number of operating reactors declined to 104 and remained there through 2013… When the number then declined even further to 92 in 2022. On top of that, nuclear power has only provided 20% of total annual U.S. electricity generation from 1990 through 2021- that’s 31 years of stagnation. In fact, Plant Vogtle in Waynesboro, Georgia, will be America’s first new nuclear plant since the 1990’s.

The only catch? It took 15 years to build… and it cost more than $30 billion. This is a massive milestone for Waynesboro and the country. The plant is projected to power 500,000 homes and businesses for the next 60 to 80 years… but Plant Vogtle’s story exposes a brutal truth: Building nuclear power plants is expensive, time-consuming, and complicated.

This means that traditional nuclear power plants will be unable to meet the exponentially growing energy demands of the AI sector. It could take decades for the U.S. to build out the necessary infrastructure.

However, thanks to a single decision on February 21 last year… a new type of nuclear energy will be able to provide practically endless clean energy all across the country. A new technology was recently approved by the U.S. government… and it’s THIS technology that will act as the Keystone for the AI industry. It enables AI companies to use nuclear energy – easily, quickly, and without spending years and billions of dollars to develop power plants. It’s a revolutionary new technology that allows us to build hundreds, if not THOUSANDS of nuclear facilities all across the country. At 1/50th the cost and in 1/5th the amount of time. To say this is a historical development would be an understatement. It is a generational achievement that, according to former Presidential advisor David Durham is A game-changing technology. DAVID DURHAMFMR. PRESIDENTIAL ADVISOR

It’s something that former White House Deputy, Matt Bennett, believes will… Save the world. MATT BENNETT FMR. WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY

So what is this technology that I believe will be the Keystone of the artificial intelligence industry for decades to come. It’s a nuclear power plant named after a Nobel-prize winning scientist named Enrico Fermi. Fermi was one of the greatest geniuses of the last 100 years and is considered the father of nuclear energy. it was the world’s first small modular nuclear reactor (SMR). As the name implies, an SMR is a nuclear reactor that produces nuclear energy but is MUCH smaller than a typical reactor. It has all the advantages of a nuclear reactor, with almost none of the disadvantages.

  • It can produce electricity without overheating.
  • It can self-regulate.
  • It can be paired with renewable resources.
  • It can be built in two years (as opposed to ten).
  • It can be deployed on top of shuttered coal plants, of which we have 300 in America right now… This is what Bill Gates’ nuclear company – TerraPower – has done. They’ve staked their claim at the site of a retired coal plant.
  • An SMR can produce energy for 10 years without being refueled, whereas a typical reactor has to be refueled every 18 to 24 months

This is why, as our energy needs continue to surge, SMRs are gaining the attention of governments all around the world. They know green energy can’t meet the demands so hundreds of billions of dollars are pouring into the development of SMRs. Right now, 80 different SMR designs are being developed in 19 different countries. Three have already begun operating. Others will soon follow. And when they do, the world will never be the same again.

For the first time ever, we will be able to provide nuclear energy to ANYONE, ANYWHERE, AT ANYTIME. And we’ll be able to do it WITHOUT having to spend billions of dollars on reactors that take a decade to build. And this is why Small Nuclear Reactors (SMRs) are the Keystone technology to the AI industry. It’s the ONLY way tech companies can meet the energy demands of artificial intelligence without fossil fuels.

In five… ten… even fifteen years from now… When we’re looking back on the craze of the AI boom, the top investments won’t be the company with the best artificial intelligence. The real winners will be those who master the SMR. Consider Sam Altman’s SMR startup, Oklo. He plans to take it public this year for upwards of $500 million dollars. Why? In his own words: “If the use of artificial intelligence scales up, it will demand a lot of energy… I don’t see a way for us to get there without nuclear.” SAM ALTMAN CEO, OPEN AI

He not only serves as the chairman of Oklo, the startup working to commercialize nuclear fission with microreactors… But he’s also invested $375 million in Helion – that’s right; another nuclear company – marking the “biggest investment [he’s] ever made” Helion is a nuclear energy startup working on systems that are “smaller, a lot faster to iterate, and then gets […] to commercially useful electricity […] as soon as possible.” Sam Altman – is ALL-IN on nuclear microreactors.

In addition to Oklo, a number of other companies are working on “new breeds” of advanced microreactors… Including GE Hitachi, Holtec, Kairos Power, NuScale Power, TerraPower, and X-energy. However, despite the potential of these companies, I don’t recommend you go near them. You see, there is one major roadblock each of them faces. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). In November 2022, the NRC denied “without prejudice” Oklo’s application to build and operate the company’s Aurora microreactor in Idaho. The reason? “Failure to provide information on several key topics.” Vague, confusing, and totally unhelpful – classic bureaucrats!

The company that is building small nuclear reactors is BWXT and it’s got the backing of the US government. BWXT will build the first advanced full-scale transportable nuclear microreactor in the USA under a contract awarded by the US Dept. of Defence (DoD) Strategic Capabilities Office. To be completed and delivered in 2024 for testing at the Idaho National Laboratory.

Poland’s first two nuclear stations will be BWRX-300 small modular reactors. By the end of the year, 20 locations will be presented to local communities, with the first SMR reactor set to be built between 2028 and 2029.

BWX Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: BWXT) today announced a two-phase, two-year contract with the Wyoming Energy Authority to assess the viability of deploying small-scale nuclear reactors in the state as a source of resilient and reliable energy to augment existing power generation resources. 03/21/2023

Man taking God’s place in controlling His universe will soon end. In Australia, the present government has ruled out the use of nuclear energy and is charging ahead with wind and solar. What madness. We need Holy Spirit-led people in power who can make Godly decisions. Fortunately, Biblical prophecy tells us that Satan and man’s control of Earth is coming to an end.

What energy sources will Jesus use during His Millennial reign to power the world? Will nuclear fusion be perfected for energy use? God uses nuclear fusion for the sun to provide the heat needed to sustain life on Earth so I think it is a natural alternative energy source..