round trip with sound

They say it is indistinguishable from magic. Advanced technology. There I was, on my 430 mile round trip, and I'd asked the car to play some music. 

"Play Regina Spektor," I said and it had selected "What we saw from the cheap seats." 

I let it run and then noticed that in with the album were mixed a few other tracks, which eventually took over the play list. I could understand if they were 'curated commercial tunes' but this was "Neutral Milk Hotel' and 'The Magnetic Fields'. Even a track by Nico and several by bands I'd never heard of, but all (with a few exceptions) good to listen to. 

 I compare this new car with the sounds played on my prior one, which were mainly from a connected iPod which had 160Gb of tracks I'd downloaded from iTunes/Music. 

This car is permanently connected to the Internet and so has a few more tricks up its sleeve. But the music. It really is excellent.

gyre and gimbal

Oh well. A few weeks ago I was away in Greece and we changed Monarch.This time, away for a few days and we seem to have changed Prime Minister...again.

It seems that there is a limited talent pool, because I gather that the contenders included the has-been slug from the Premiership-minus-one and the runner-up from the recent selection, voted upon by the finest brains of the membership.

This time, a panic to prevent a further vote, after the frabjous and blatant lies from the slug who pretended to have enough Parliamentarian votes. Vorpal sword time. Snicker snack. Ironically, if his bluff had worked and he had got through to the next round, we'd have probably had him back in power.

Rishi Sunak has his work cut out. I still blame Johnson the most. He was partying hard at the pole wheel, in between his copious vacations, including during term-time. There are no words. 

Truss was the unconsciously incompetent replacement and now we have Sunak as the consciously competent one, although perhaps about to be dragged into the mire by some of his so-called associates. 

Hasta la próxima.

Movin' on down

Johnson didn't set the controls on the plane so that it would crash into a cliff face. He was much too busy squandering political capital to think about steering. 

Truss picks up the plane when its front view is all of that rapidly approaching cliff face. A new leader so new political capital? Not this time. Walking on stage to Heather Small singing the M People anthem - "Moving on up" - shame no one vetted the lyrics.

"You’ve done me wrong, your time is up

You took a sip from the devil’s cup

You broke my heart, there’s no way back

Move right out of here, baby, go on pack your bags"

Insta-squander. She lives in a bubble of unselfawareness. Her attempt to unite her party has become, instead, one to ignite her party. Crash, Crash, Crash.

She talks about growth yet is now 38 points behind Labour in national polls. A highlight of her speech was the interruption by Greenpeace, which gave her a chance to adlib over the perfectly valid point raised by Greenpeace that nobody voted for her ideas. 

t was telling that she chose to aim at an “anti-growth coalition” whose members include a nameless elite who “taxi from North London town houses to the BBC studio". She looked pleased with herself to pull this off although it's all London-speak, no doubt been prepped by a speech writer. It also sailed clumsily close to the 'elite from North London' - a phrase usually eschewed nowadays.

The subverters are lining up: 'worst (conference) since the 1970s', 'It feels like we've already lost', (accusations of) 'organising a coup', 'get a grip', no mandate to reverse the 2019 manifesto (Gove), 'if we don't want to deliver on the deal, we need a fresh mandate' (Dorries). And I have;t even got around to Mordant, Shapps or the dislikable Rees-Mogg.

Still, she can recover discipline wth hard line tactics, credit piracy and blame avoidance. 50 MPs of the 357 Conservative MPs backed her in the first round. She can tell the rest they must back her or they are sacked, or at least tarnished with reputation damaging innuendo. Some would call it cutting her way to glory. Some one should tell her it doesn't work. 

Let us consider:

• a cost of living crisis
• stretched public services
• interest rate rises
• a big jump in mortgage payments
• escalating cost of fuel
• the market's fiscal uncertainty
• decline of the GBP
• losses on the stock market

These are not the traditional signs of growth. Although maybe she wants to start from a low place?

a different kind of arm waving

I can't see this Growth, Growth, Growth thing that Truss is talking about. 

She copied the Blair 'Education, Education, Education' triplet of 1996, but having just seen that TV show about 'Would you like to be a Prime Minister', it all came across as, well, a bit like something from The Apprentice.

I checked a number. The FTSE. Share prices aggregation, from when Truss took over to now. Its about a 3.39% drop, drop, drop. We're scraping along just over 7,000. No wonder there's a new tranche of US Funds being launched.

Then I tried the GBP to USD. Without the forceful intervention of the Bank of England the GBP would be tanking now. Tank, Tank, Tank. The problem that it creates is that interest rates have moved up and thus the price or mortgages, which has caused almost 1,000 products to be pulled.  Fall, Fall, Fall. The one thing that is growing is the cost of mortgages. Fail, Fail, Fail.

Then there's the trashing of the environmental pledges. The levelling down of the cabinet. The threats to her own party if they don't stay loyal.

Truss can still remember the chants and how to read the autocue. Shame she can't read the numbers.

competence is a long road

I remember that management thing about 'consciously incompetent' and 'unconsciously incompetent' etc. I think I worked out the prior Prime Minister on the scale, and I think I've a clue about the current one. 

The thing is, I thought that the previous mendacious buffoon would only last a short time, but I was wrong. Three years to steer the plane towards the solid rock face and then to abandon the controls. Whoever haplessly picks up the stick after this was probably on a hiding to nothing. I want a large proportion of the blame to stay with the last person though. 

But a new pilot who imagines she is great and wakes up every morning thinking, 'what would a Prime Minister do today?' could be significantly dangerous. Ten year gilts up 4.3%. Emergency bond buy-back totalling £65 billion. Sinking pound until bale outs. Mortgaging tomorrow. Sorry kids, you'll have to pay for it. 

I suppose the 81,326 shamelessly unaccountable party members who made the unconsciously incompetent decision that we get the current leadership can dig in and say its for the best. 

We have an unmandated leader who hasn't even noticed the manifesto. Her answers to questions are like Thatcher's. A broken record of 'select track and play'. I know they are trying to backpedal now, but the situation illustrates how they have no depth at all in the hollowed-out remains of the Conservative Party. 

If that oh-so-loyal Rees-Mogg and his cronies have their way then there is much elite hay to be made at the expense of everyone else. The encouragement to champagne-fuelled hedge-fund managers to bet against the GBP shows how we are being manipulated by the people who are building the UK Freeport and Casino.

And what's the point of giving anyone else a say in any of it? Not colleagues, not the cabinet, not even the press. Just bankers shorting the pound. Let's add in threats to dissenters with their removal from the Party. Loyalty or bust.

Levelling up? I don't think so when seven times as much of the revised funding goes to London as to the north. Rees-Moggs' levelling up is to flatten large swathes of the north and make it into fracking sites.

I can already hear the slithering into position of others who believe themselves to be heir or heiress apparent. Trouble is, they are as unconsciously incompetent as the ones in power.

frack

I used to advise some energy sector clients and this inevitably means hanging around in corporate entrance lobbies waiting to see individuals. One that particularly struck me was a lobby showcasing fracking and the extraction of oil from sand. I seem to remember it was a Canadian story and the walls of the room had a few pictures. 

Recently, I've seen Jacob Rees-Mogg break cover to smooth over the fracking story with oleaginous contempt for any challenges.  I remember being dismayed by those original lobby pictures I saw, so I wondered what 'levelling up' stories would now be applied to the UK. I see one right wing newspaper is saying how great it is that the north of England has so many fracking opportunities. The potential appeals to  'Red Wall' country?

The Cuadrilla maps don't quite tell the whole story though. By looking at a geo-survey of aquifers and shale it is possible to see that the target zones could drop right into the rich Tory heartlands of the south-east. One of those red squares appears to land on Guildford. Hold that thought.

I remembered the lobby depicted activity around Alberta, so I thought I'd take a look at how things are going. Here's a picture of the effect around an oil sands bitumen recovery site.

An example mine would produce 260,000 barrels per day of bitumen at its peak, cover 24,000 thousand hectares and — during its 41-year lifespan — tap into reserves in the neighbourhood of 3.2 billion barrels. 

The bitumen requires processing to turn into oil, although some places directly burn the bitumen to generate power. It is all a messy business. 

I haven't mentioned the shale gas yet, which is a euphemism for methane/methanol and is the other main target of the frackers. Hydraulic fracturing – commonly known as fracking – is the process used to extract shale gas. 

Deep holes are drilled down into the shale rock, followed by horizontal drilling to access more of the gas, as shale reserves are typically distributed horizontally rather than vertically. Fracking fluids containing sand, water and chemicals are then pumped at high pressure into the drilled holes to open up fractures in the rock, enabling the trapped gas to flow into collection wells. The drillers explain that it entirely safe, aside from the occasional accidental fire.

From there it is piped away for commercial use. Methane is 25 times more toxic to the environment that carbon dioxide, so we don't want any of it to escape.  

This is another messy business and incorporates a few extra pipes and gadgets.

If all goes well, then there's money in that there Red Wall. 

If it goes wrong, we could see a few earth tremors or even some light flooding of the landscape - just like in Alberta.

A steady flow of oil leaking from the ground across four well sites includes the latest covering up to 40 hectares, according to the Alberta Energy Regulator. No one knows how to stop the leaks, which are ongoing.

Above ground the search for sites continues...

But Rees-Mogg insists it is all okay.  Is this what was meant by levelling?

Insider knowledge?

A long time ago, when I was learning about economics, the pound to dollar was around 1: 2.40. Some may recognise that a cent was equivalent of an old LSD penny.

Recently, when I was changing money to go to Greece, I noticed that the pound had almost reached parity with the USdollar and that it was bouncing along at the same conversion rate as the €uro.

We've seen a record setting descent after the new Conservative Party budget. There, I've said it. Budget - although by not calling it a budget the Chancellor manages to avoid fiscal scrutiny. That's a Borisovian trick, if ever there was one.

What if a few hedge funds shorted the pound? (In other words, forward sold large quantities of currency they didn't have hoping to pick it up cheaply before their debt was called).

Unhinged Liz decided to host a dinner for hedge fund managers a few days before the KamiKwasi budget.  

With the massive hints provided, hedge funds with remarkably close links to the UK government made shed-loads of money. 

Everyone else was gobsmacked, to use an economist term. £45 billion in new borrowing for new tax breaks in a curious bid to revitalise an economy facing recession.

Someone likened the trickle down philosophy to hanging from a cliff waiting to be rescued yet the money being provided to the rope-making companies.

More a case of fall-down rather than trickle-down. No wonder one of her victory tweets said she was ‘ready to hit the ground on Day One’. Ouch.

I suggest the puppet-masters will use her to make the UK into a casino for the elite. The recent all-in currency play is merely a taste of the structural changes being discussed to turn UK into an international deregulated tax haven. 

Truss may have run for cover over the last few days (guilt or gilt?). There is certainly room for her in the icey hidey-holes that the previous PM used. It is probably easier than having to explain how the new debt will be absorbed. 

Let the Bank of England bond-buying commence.

green policy disposal

The sun may never be enough to charge an electric car (eg optimistically 10 hours sun  at 3 kWh, compared with a car's capacity of over 60kWh), but I'm more suspicious of a government that creates green policies and incentives and then quietly disposes of them.

1 - Removal of the Feed in Tariff (FiT) incentive for solar panels. I did just scrape in to this one, which pays me for solar generation as well as export. The paperwork to get started as a micro systems generator was spectacular. The replacement scheme (Smart Export Guarantee) has low incentives for export, which were hardly generous in the prior scheme. Oh and the SEG scheme requires a smart meter as well.

2 - Smart Meter. I have a smart meter. I checked its spec and it is SMETS1 upgradeabkle to SMETS2. Most electric companies won't admit it though, and some used it as an excuse to not switch me to their cheaper tariffs. They say I need to have it replaced. It is a scandal that the UK spent 13.8 billion on smart meters, yet they mainly don't work. I am now with Octopus, who proved in a couple of days that my meter was fully smart.

3- Excuses used by other electricity providers: 'we can't switch you to a low tariff because of government policy' and other such bunkum which has stopped me for more than a year from getting a dual tariff system (eg Economy7 style). Thank you Octopus for fixing this.

4 - Taxing me at 20% VAT for use of electric vehicle charging when away from home, yet I can get 5% when on my own supply.

5- Removing the incentive to get a wall charger for an Electric Vehicle.

6 - Removing the 'discounts' to get an Electric Vehicle.

7 - Creating complicated 'type verification' to qualify for a Congestion Charge 100% discount in London. Three documents required including one from the car manufacturer. It is bonkers.

8 - Creating two separate applications for ULEZ charge reduction and Congestion Charge reduction in London. If I didn't apply for each, the default is that I pay both daily charges.

I think fracking will deserve a separate post.

charging the Tesla electric car

I've been keeping track of my mileage and running costs for fuel since I've had the electric car. 

Fascinating - I've had to become an anorak on pricing unit charges of electricity and their wild variations. 

I've travelled some 2,355 miles now and it's enough to gain an initial impression of the car and its range capabilities.

 

1) No range anxiety. It always adds an en-route stop if it thinks it will run dry and also predicts the remaining battery capacity to the end of the journey.

2) Several free charges - notably Westgate near Oxford and Tescos. And all Tesla Destination Chargers! https://www.tesla.com/en_gb/destination-charging

3) I always carry the spare Type 2 connector cable because often the free chargers are 'untethered' (ie don't have a connector) I also notice that many Tesla owners don't know how to charge from an 'ordinary' charge point and I've seen at least a dozen cars not charging because they've not been properly connected.

4) My practical full range is around 330 miles. Enough to get from Exeter to London, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Penrith or York. To Newcastle it is a one stop refill at Hilton Park Services near Birmingham.

5) Since I switched from British Gas to Octopus Intelligent, I have drastically reduced the cost of a recharge at home. A 0%-90% charge is £5.40 and a more typical 20%-90% charge is £3.78! That is much less than a tank of petrol or diesel. British Gas proved massively unhelpful (and expensive) whereas dealing with friendly and faultless Octopus exceeded my wildest expectations.

6) Octopus Intelligent works seamlessly with the Tesla App to manage the charging and to schedule it to the equivalent of 'Economy 7' times - although it will also spot other cheap periods in the day. I can also override the 'no charge' periods and get a charge at any time, if needed. from the Octopus App.

7) The convenience of the Tesla Supercharger helps justify the relatively expensive cost of a refill from one (albeit still cheaper than petrol). They charge at around 500 miles per hour. So a full charge is around half an hour. 

The Tesla car calculates how much it needs to get to the next destination, with a reserve safety factor. That is the most economical way to use the Supercharger, and some of the refill times are as little as 5 minutes. 

And there is that opportunity to experience the Tesla auto-park in reverse into the charging space.

If I go for a coffee, then a full refill might cost £20. But it is still much less than a gasoline top-up. And some of the refill stops (eg Holiday Inn) give discounts to Tesla drivers!

As we have a petrol car and had a diesel, I've shown comparative costs below. Both internal combustion engine cars can take £100 of fuel, but I've shown the scaled back costs to a range of 330 miles, which is the typical maximum I get from the Tesla.

 

The kWh capacity of my Tesla is actually higher than I've stated (82kWh), but I have set it to the more commonplace 72kWh.

 

By way of a comparison, the charge rates are roughly as follows:

• UK Household mains plug:  9-10 mph (never used - really for if stuck somewhere)
• Tesla Wall Charger: 32 mph (ie at home - and every day gives a full charge)
• Public Locations  32 mph
• Fast public chargers 50 mph (ie the 22kW chargers)
• Tesla Destination Charger 32 mph (free)
• Supermarkets 32 mph (sometimes free)
• Tesla Supercharger (150kW-250kW)  300-500+ mph   (great for long distance)

The only connectors I've used are the ones on Tesla chargers and the blue Type 2 cable I carry in the car.

 

And how realistic are the range estimates? For Tesla - driving in 'Chill Mode', I'd say -'very'. I assume if I was driving in 'Sport' I'd get (10%-20%?) less.

 

Tactically, when I've been visiting someone, I've stopped on the way to recharge to '80% full', so that I'm at their place with an almost 'full tank'.

 

I know, it is probably too much information. And your mileage may vary, as they say.

 

Unexpected jab

A current post today. I'm mainly backfilling the last few weeks at the moment, but something quite interesting happened today. 

My iPhone reminded me that I was supposed to visit the surgery to get a flu jab. I'd forgotten about it because we're only just back from our Greek Idylls. 

Panic stations as I race out to the car, to go to the surgery. I start driving and realise that the iPhone has already downloaded the route into the car's satnav. The car knew where to take me without me doing anything. Now that's a new experience.

Then I get to the queue. I'd booked what I thought was an early appointment - to avoid backup, but so had everyone else around here, so there was a four deep queue running back along the pavement from the surgery. 

Then the magic of British queuing kicked in. We were all talking to one another, just like on t'telly at the moment. It may not have been THAT queue, but we had similar sentiments.

The thirty or so minutes I had to wait passed in a flash and I was soon inside, jabbed and ready to go.

Lindos

Somewhat hilly with a single route into the town, with its alley-like paths and myriad shops. Finally, to a bayside beach, complete with cool, clear waters. Further inland it was jarring to see at least two dried river beds, both 100 metres wide.

Poolside

One of those annoying poolside pictures. Pass the cocktail.