Monday, June 12, 2017

Irony in Rio Tinto and Would You Like Chop Suey with That #Science


A multi-billion dollar bidding war for most of Rio Tinto's Australian coal mines has broken out between China-backed Yancoal and Glencore after the Swiss commodities giant made an unexpected offer


A multi-billion dollar bidding war for most of Rio Tinto's Australian coal mines has broken out between China-backed Yancoal and Glencore after the Swiss commodities giant made an unexpected offer.

Rio, the world's second-largest miner, is exiting coal mining in Australia at a time of falling prices and market volatility.

The Anglo-Australian firm in January said it was selling Coal & Allied, to Yancoal Australia—which is majority controlled by China's Yanzhou Coal, one of China's largest mining groups by market capitalisation—for US$2.45 billion.

But Glencore, which already owns mines near the Coal & Allied assets in New South Wales state, has jumped into the fray, offering US$100 million more, Rio Tinto said in a statement.

"The Rio Tinto board and management will give the proposal appropriate consideration and respond in due course," the miner said Saturday.

Phys.org:  Foreign bidding war for Rio's Australia coal mines


Perhaps, mates, you're smirking already but do believe it gets better ... in the next article I read.



Just as Donald Trump was pulling the United States out of the Paris Accord on climate change, China was opening the world's biggest floating solar farm

Phys.org scored its one point with Trump but lost the match when it apparently did not review the other article in this context.


The 40-megawatt power plant has 160,000 panels resting on a lake that emerged after the collapse of a coal mine in central Anhui province.

It is part of Beijing's effort to wean itself off a fossil fuel dependency that has made it the world's top carbon emitter, with two-thirds of its electricity still fuelled by coal.

The solar facility went online around the time of President Donald Trump's much-criticised June 2 decision to withdraw from the international accord aimed at saving the planet from climate change catastrophe.

At that stage, I was wanked by their use of this to spank Trump and sure you can but so what.

Phys.org:  Floating solar farm reflects China's clean energy ambitions


Mates, there are ironies within ironies in this one.

China must have so dug out their own coal mine that it collapsed and became a lake.  That sounds maybe like poetic ecological justice ... but they built this solar farm ... and bought another fuckin' mine in Australia.

China will likely keep burning coal the same way the Pentagon burns money so there's the Rockhouse political cheapshot of the moment even though it's dead accurate.  That prediction for the Chinese is likely accurate that they will burn it unless they have decided coal is an aphrodisiacal substitute for rhino horns.

or ...

Switzerland, the angelic virgin home of alpenhorns and chocolate, will buy this stinking coal mine and wtf will Switzerland do with a mountain of coal.  There's something rotten in Switzerland and do be careful with that chocolate ... there's no tellin' what's in it.

Ed:  mining it doesn't stink that much; burning it stinks!

Fair enough ... but it all stinks anyway.


The Rockhouse does not believe China is being disingenuous about meeting the agreements in the Paris Accord although it's one circuitous path to get there.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I maybe wrong but I thought Switzerland went coal free while I was still in high school.
So they will buy it and sell the output to China because they would not want to soil the air above Switzerland

Unknown said...

It must be something of the nature you suggest when they're not going to burn it themselves. This whole mess stinks like a whole platoon of angry skunks.

Anonymous said...

China needs that coal. They are decades away from replacing it. Paris Accord signed or not

Unknown said...

Seems kind of thin to think they can meet the deal but they made the commitment. We shall see. Considering Beijing, they've got a lot of reason.