@andrew_leach His numbers are based on what? Did he just pull them out of the air? Is there a proposal we can all scrutinize?
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel
8.2K posts
Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel
@ldeichel
Telecom professional, food policy writer. Opinions are my own. Writer/Creator of the Food Policy blog, The Universal Wolf.
Montreal, Canada Katılım Temmuz 2010
237 Takip Edilen488 Takipçiler
Interestingly, this throws a massive dart at Toronto's proposal. The Toronto CMA is about 1/5th of Canada's population, so it does make one wonder how much Toronto's program is going to cost and/or how little it will be able to deliver.
Scott Robertson@sarobertsonca
Avi Lewis: "We have a very clear plan to cut grocery prices by 30-40% for Canadians at a cost to the federal government ... We'd subsidize it. It costs $350m to launch and $300m a year, which is one-half of 1% of the current defence budget."
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@Pagmenzies Someone should do a study on the length of time for the CRTC's use of the terms 'soon', 'in the near future', and 'shortly'. I my experience, the timelines for each are very elastic.
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Next week, it will be 5 months since the CRTC promised its next Online Streaming Act decision “in the near future.” As usual, reporting that could embarrass the CRTC is hard to find. readtheline.ca/p/peter-menzie…
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
JUST IN: On March 24th, I published this: the Strait of Hormuz is no longer closed. It is no longer open. It is something the world has never seen before. A permissioned corridor run by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, priced at $2 million per vessel, payable in yuan.
I described the mechanism: IRGC intermediaries, IMO number submission, ownership chain vetting, cargo alignment checks prioritising oil over fertiliser, Hormozgan Provincial Command sanctions screening, clearance codes, VHF radio hails, AIS verification, patrol boat escorts, one ship at a time through a 5-nautical-mile channel between Larak and Qeshm islands inside Iranian territorial waters. I reported three ships in 24 hours versus a pre-war average of 60 per day. Four hundred vessels waiting outside the strait. $1 per barrel in yuan. I said the strait did not close. It changed ownership.
Dan Tapiero, founder of 10T Holdings, a $700 million digital asset fund, replied with one word: Nonsense. The post reached 1.6 million views.
Today the Financial Times confirmed every detail. One dollar per barrel. Payable in Chinese yuan or cryptocurrency. No US dollars accepted. IRGC intermediaries issuing clearance codes. Stablecoins routed through a Qeshm Island crypto exchange window. Secret codes for escorted passage through the Larak corridor. The mechanism I described on March 24 is now the mechanism the FT is reporting on April 8 as breaking news.
The reason I was two weeks early is that the analysis followed the molecules, not the headlines. The IRGC legislated the Hormuz Management Plan through parliament on March 31, but the operational system was already running by March 13 when Lloyd’s List first tracked vessels following the Larak corridor protocol. The parliamentary vote formalised what the IRGC had already built. The ceasefire on April 7 did not create the toll booth. It legitimised it.
The fertiliser detail from March 24 is now the molecule crisis that C&EN says will debilitate global petrochemicals for the rest of 2026. Gulf nations supply 49 percent of the world’s exported urea. The IRGC is prioritising oil because oil generates toll revenue. Fertiliser does not. Zero fertiliser vessels have received approval through the permissioned corridor. The molecules that feed four billion people are trapped behind a gate that only opens for molecules that fund the gatekeeper.
The yuan detail from March 24 is now the petrodollar fracture the FT is documenting. Every tanker that pays in yuan instead of dollars establishes a precedent. Every precedent weakens the architecture that has governed energy trade since the 1974 Saudi-US petrodollar agreement. The $2 million toll in yuan is not a fee. It is a proof of concept for a post-dollar energy settlement system, stress-tested under live fire in a three-front war with the world’s largest military.
The analysis was called nonsense two weeks ago. Today it is the front page of the Financial Times. The strait changed ownership on March 13. The market discovered it on April 8. The gap between those two dates is the gap between following molecules and following headlines.
This is what independent research looks like. Full analysis on Substack.
open.substack.com/pub/shanakaans…
Shanaka Anslem Perera ⚡@shanaka86
BREAKING: The Strait of Hormuz is no longer closed. It is no longer open. It is something the world has never seen before: a permissioned corridor run by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, priced at $2 million per vessel, payable in yuan. Three ships transited in the last 24 hours. Three. Out of a pre-war average of 60 per day. Total throughput: 310,000 deadweight tonnes. Three percent of normal. Four hundred vessels are waiting outside the strait right now. One hundred and fifty tankers. One hundred and twenty bulk carriers. One hundred and thirty others. Waiting for permission from the IRGC Navy to enter a 5-nautical-mile channel between Larak and Qeshm islands inside Iranian territorial waters. This is how the gate works. A vessel operator contacts approved intermediaries with IRGC connections, submitting full documentation: IMO number, ownership chain, cargo manifest, destination, crew list. The intermediaries forward the package to the IRGC Navy’s Hormozgan Provincial Command for sanctions screening, cargo alignment checks that prioritise oil over all other commodities, and geopolitical vetting. The toll is approximately $2 million per tanker. For a VLCC carrying 2 million barrels, that is $1 per barrel. Preferred currency: yuan. If the vessel passes, the IRGC issues a clearance code and route instructions. Upon approach, VHF radio hail, AIS verification, patrol boat escort. One ship at a time. Through the narrowest channel of the most important waterway on Earth. Iranian crude is still flowing. Approximately 1.1 to 1.5 million barrels per day, mostly to China, at near pre-war levels. Iran’s own oil transits the strait it controls. The blockade applies to everyone else. Iran is simultaneously the gatekeeper and the primary beneficiary. The toll funds the IRGC. The IRGC maintains the gate. The gate generates the toll. The circle is self-sustaining. Now look at what is NOT transiting. Fertiliser. Gulf nations supply 49 percent of the world’s exported urea. Ammonia requires the natural gas that Qatar declared Force Majeure on and that Iranian strikes disrupted at South Pars. Effectively zero fertiliser vessels have received approval through the permissioned corridor. The IRGC is prioritising oil because oil generates revenue. Fertiliser does not. The molecules that feed four billion people are trapped behind a gate that only opens for molecules that fund the gatekeeper. The yuan preference is the structural shift that outlasts the war. Every tanker that pays in yuan instead of dollars establishes a precedent. Every precedent weakens the petrodollar architecture that has governed energy trade since 1974. The IRGC is not just blocking a strait. It is building an alternative payment rail under live fire. The $2 million toll in yuan is not a fee. It is a proof of concept for a post-dollar energy settlement system, stress-tested in the most extreme conditions imaginable: a three-front war with the world’s largest military. The world’s central banks are trapped by the same strait: the Fed cannot cut, the ECB is hiking, the BOJ is tightening. Six countries are rationing fuel. Japan’s 10-year yield hit a 27-year high. Slovenia has QR codes at the pump. South Korea is barring government vehicles one day per week. And behind all of it, 400 ships wait outside a 5-nautical-mile channel for a clearance code from the IRGC Navy, payable in a currency that is not the dollar. Twenty percent of the world’s oil supply. Controlled by a VHF radio call and a yuan transfer. The strait did not close. It changed ownership. open.substack.com/pub/shanakaans…
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
900 battery-powered ships and counting: It isn't a test case anymore, it’s a declaration of independence from being fossil fuel hostages: With battery costs down 99% since 1991, the "too expensive" excuse is officially dead for shipping
Sovereignty is renewables
ft.com/content/06563c…
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Ozempic users are eating less junk food and spending less on groceries.
That's a satiety effect.
GLP-1 drugs suppress appetite. But so does eating 30g of protein at breakfast. So does fiber. So does choosing whole foods over processed ones.
The difference? One costs $1,000/month. The other costs $3 in eggs.
We've medicalized what used to be common sense: eat food that fills you up.
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Decades of data says the price of storage drops by 19% every time global production doubles. This isn't some marginal gain. It's an unstoppable force of nature
You can’t out-compete math this aggressive. This "learning rate" is a one-way street to total electrification - because it's cheaper. As battery costs crater, EVs become cheaper than petrol cars, and grid storage makes solar/wind reliable 24/7
This feedback loop can't be stopped, however many fossil fuel wars Big Oil continues to initiate
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
ARTEMIS II AS SEEN BY THE OFFICIAL NASA CESSNA
THIS IS THE BEST LAUNCH VIDEO AND IT ISN'T CLOSE
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@ryankatzrosene Very cool. And that it came off pretty flawlessly was an amazing engineering, logistics and human marvel.
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Some personal news to share.
My regular column with La Presse has been suspended indefinitely this week, after 25 years and more than 1,000 columns. This was not my decision.
The decision is linked to recent public comments I made on social media regarding the evolving media landscape in Canada, including reflections on government support for media and its potential implications. I understand that these are sensitive and complex issues, and my remarks may not have aligned with the publication’s perspective.
While I am disappointed, I fully respect their decision and remain grateful for the opportunity I’ve had to contribute over the years.
I would also like to note that my contributions were always made on a voluntary basis. I was never compensated for my columns, and have personally supported La Presse through a paid subscription throughout that time. It has truly been a privilege to write for such an important institution.
I continue to believe that open, thoughtful discussions about the future of media in Canada are both necessary and healthy.
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@Mark_Goldberg @TechnionLive Very cool.
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
A familiar policy tension seeks to promote competition without undermining incentives to invest. #CRTC has to decide whether incenting investment is a talking point, or a fundamental policy objective.
Has the CRTC boxed itself in? • Telecom Trends mhgoldberg.com/blog/?p=19693
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
I would gladly learn *three* foreign languages enough to tape a condolence message in each for a $12.08 million a year salary.
Why, I already *pay* to learn to sing in Latin, Italian, and Spanish.
This is cretinous poppycock.
J.J. McCullough@JJ_McCullough
The obvious conclusion to draw from snarky pieces like this is that it’s extremely difficult to learn a second language you don’t need for day-to-day communication as a grown adult. This is an extremely mainstream conclusion in linguistics, but a forbidden fact in Canada.
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Nobody in the Trump administration planned for Iran to shut the Strait of Hormuz. Nobody planned for sustained missile strikes on American bases across the Gulf. Nobody planned for an energy crisis. Nobody planned for Europe to look at Washington, shrug, and walk the other way.
Nobody, it turns out, planned for very much at all.
Read the accounts of how this war was decided and you are left with one deeply uncomfortable realisation: the people who launched it appear to have been genuinely surprised by almost everything that followed. The Iranians shot back. The allies didn’t show up. The oil price went vertical. All of it, apparently, news to them.
Which leaves two questions so obvious they’re almost embarrassing to ask.
What exactly did they think was going to happen?
And did anyone, in any room, at any point, think further ahead than the applause?
Gandalv / @Microinteracti1
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Copper theft continues to be a problem in Canada. I wrote about it 3 years ago in Stealing Copper Cable • Telecom Trends
mhgoldberg.com/blog/?p=17262
Tony MacIntyre 🎙🎧☕️ 🇨🇦🇺🇦@Tony_MacIntyre
Copper theft shut down internet for some Bell users in Southwest N.B. Affected customers were in Durham Bridge, South Portage and Fredericton ___________________ · CBC News · cbc.ca/news/canada/ne…
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@Mark_Goldberg @environmentca It's all relative to where you are. Last night in MTL - freezing rain and snow mix. The winter tires stay on for another couple of weeks.
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OK. I have decided that this winter is finally over. Consider it to be part of my Passover prep - the snow tires got taken off this morning and the birds were noisy in my back yard. If @environmentca tries to screw around with my mind, I'll just stay home that day.
Happy Spring!
GIF
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Few people appear to realize it, but the Manitoba government’s decision to de-tax prepared foods in grocery stores raises serious issues of fairness in taxation, which have not been addressed in its decision. If you zero-rate prepared foods in grocery stores you also have to 1/
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Renewables are the only exit strategy: Day 27 update of the structural heart attack currently taking down the fossil fuel system
➡️India: PANIC. Long queues at petrol pumps nationwide, total dry-out risk up. 9 days of reserves left. Restaurants shut in 10 states. Planting season at risk due to Gulf fertilizer shortage
➡️USA: PRICE SHOCK. Diesel prices up 33%. Gas taxes suspended and Strategic Reserves being drained. Russia and Iran sanctions quietly paused
➡️Indonesia: QUEUES FORMING. Long lines at stations in Surabaya and Jakarta. Crude reserves of 20 days. Government weighing mandatory 1-day WFH policy to cut fuel use 20%
➡️Pakistan: PARALYSIS. Massive queues at stations following overnight price surge. Schools closed. 4-day workweek. LNG terminals at 20% capacity
➡️Brazil: SHORTAGE SIGNS. Lines forming in major cities, distributors warn of gasoline shortages. Fuel prices up 13%
➡️Bangladesh: CHAOS. Long queues and literal looting at petrol stations. Owners threatening to shut down entirely due to security concerns and inadequate supply. Textile production going dark
➡️Japan: TICKING CLOCK. Usable state reserves of 95 days. Emergency release of 80m barrels started
➡️Philippines: MANDATORY 4-DAY WEEK. Long queues at petrol stations. State offices shut on Fridays. National Energy Emergency declared
➡️Vietnam: DRYING UP. Stations running out of fuel. Government mandated WFH. Country effectively in energy lockdown
➡️Türkiye: EXPLOSION. Vehicles queuing for miles as fuel prices jump for 4th time in a month. Inflation at 31%, currency under severe pressure
➡️Germany: SOCIAL UNREST. Gas over €2.32/liter. Petrol stations limited to one price change/day to prevent panic price-gouging
➡️Thailand: 3KM QUEUES. Late-night lines stretching for kilometers in rural districts. Farmers waiting overnight for rationed 1,000-baht fuel caps. AC set to 26°C
➡️UK: WARNING. Concerns over queues growing. Government reviewing National Fuel Emergency Plans
➡️France: PRECAUTIONARY PANIC. Long queues visible across Paris and suburbs. Fuel prices up 30% ➡️South Africa: STATIONS EMPTY. Motorists driving to 3 or 4 stations to find any diesel stock. Farmers rationed to 80L per day
➡️Italy: PUMP RAGE. Tax reduction of €0.25/litre. 89% of power is gas-influenced; generation costs up 58%
➡️Kenya: WHOLESALE LOCK. Dry pumps in Nairobi. Suppliers curbing wholesale sales due to price caps. Motorists queuing overnight
➡️South Korea: LONG LINES. Growing anxiety as queues form at petrol stations. 50-day countdown has started. Release of 22m barrels from strategic stockpiles
➡️Nepal: CHOKE POINT. Families queuing for days for cooking gas (LPG). Total reliance on the trans-India supply chain has become a catastrophic liability
➡️Australia: RUNNING DRY. Panic buying has caused hundreds of stations to go dryu. Tanker arrivals slowed to a crawl. Penalties for price gouging doubled
➡️Sri Lanka: RATIONING. Restricted fuel supply. 4-day workweek. Schools closed. Petrol passes and long queues are back
➡️Slovenia: LIMITS. Private drivers capped at 50L per day. Queues at borders for fuel tourism from neighbouring countries
The fossil fuel era is an abusive, dirty and expensive system of renting energy through endless, risky imports to benefit the few at the expense of the many
Clean energy is about owning it
For every country, this is yet another trigger to convert fossil fragility into electric independence
Assaad Razzouk@AssaadRazzouk
Renewables are the only exit strategy: Day 12 (updated) impact of the Israel and US attack, tracking Force Majeure, surcharges, and the explosive inflation behind the headlines FORCE MAJEURE IMPLICATIONS >Shell: FM on all LNG cargoes from Qatar >QatarEnergy: Pretty much totally down, declared FM on all LNG >Kuwait Petroleum Corp: declared FM on all crude and naphtha exports >Oman's OQ: Declared FM on LNG deliveries >Bahrain's Bapco: Declared FM on all refined products >Singapore's Aster Chemicals & PCS: Declared FM on ethylene and propylene >China's Wanhua Chemical: Declared FM due to no raw materials >South Korea's Yeocheon NCC, the country's largest ethylene producer, declared FM - facing a critical shortage of naphtha >Japan's Daito Medical Gas, primary supplier of high-purity gases for the semiconductor industry reported its Neon and Krypton reserves effectively dried up (see below) >South Korea's SK Innovation issued a "Level 3 Crisis Alert" for its refining division SELECTED COUNTRY IMPACTS 1 INDIA >Tariffs in western manufacturing hubs up 20% >Fuel Surcharge by Air India of 18% 2 UK >Fuel: Petrol up 4.2%, Diesel up 6.5% >Fuel Surcharge by BA of 12% to 15% ticket price rise 3 UKRAINE >Energy: 30% power deficit >Electricity import costs from EU up 20% >Fuel Surcharge: Ground logistics premiums up 25% 4 PAKISTAN >Fuel: Jet fuel prices up 81% >Pump prices up 12% >Fuel Surcharge by PIA and others of 15% to 30% ticket price rise 5 BANGLADESH >5 out of 6 major fertilizer plants shut (83% capacity loss) >Industrial power cuts up 40% >Fuel Surcharge by Biman of 15% 6 USA >National gasoline average up 20% >Fuel Surcharges of 10% ticket price rise 7 SOUTH KOREA >Fuel cap in place for the 1st time in 3 decades 8 JAPAN >Began tapping into strategic reserves 9 HONG KONG >Fuel surcharges up by 35.2% today 10 SINGAPORE >Electricity prices projected to rise 15% to 20% next quarter 11 THAILAND >Government spending 1b baht/day to cap diesel >Fuel Surcharge by Thai Airways of 10% to 15% 12 VIETNAM >Retail petrol UP 50% >Fuel surcharge by Vietnam Airlines of 20% 13 CAMBODIA >Petrol prices up 19% in last 72 hours 14 LAOS >Petrol prices up 33% CRITICAL COMMODITY WATCHLIST >Helium: Qatar provides 40% of world supply. MRI machines and semiconductor manufacturing face a "dry-up" by April. USA particularly exposed >Urea (Fertilizer): 45% of global urea transits Hormuz. Prices are up 35% this week; Brazil and India most exposed >Sulfur: Half of the global seaborne trade currently trapped >The "Noble Gases" Neon and Krypton: Supply chains for high-end chips showing serious alerts. Taiwan is critically exposed, South Korea and the USA are very exposed And so on. That's almost 5 Billion people affected, so far. And we're only on Day 12. In short, if your energy depends on fossil fuels you aren’t a sovereign country; you’re a hostage Renewables are the only exit strategy. There isn't another one. Get on with it!
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@FoodProfessor I agree. This is a fantasy. There are better alternatives: open.substack.com/pub/ldeichel/p…
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Toronto’s City Council will vote today on a motion to launch a publicly run grocery chain. By all means, proceed—but it may quickly prove to be one of the best-worst ideas of the year in the name of food security.
One city councillor even suggested that a family could save up to $10,000 a year on groceries. That implies roughly a 60% reduction in annual food costs—an assumption that is, frankly, detached from economic reality.
Public retailing of food is costly, operationally complex, and rarely competitive. The result? Likely millions in added costs for Torontonians, with little evidence it will improve affordability in any meaningful or sustainable way.
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
What does it cost to launch something into orbit?
This starts with @NASA Apollo Saturn V and projects forward to @SpaceX Starship. The exact figures are debatable, but it clearly shows huge progress, especially recently with commercial reusable rockets.
Orbital data centres become viable at around $250/kg: we're getting there.
Also fun that I've flown 2 of the rockets on the chart :)
Amazing progress in such a short time!
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Leonard ‘Real Food is the only Food’ Eichel retweetledi
Hormuz fertiliser block will upend world’s food supply ft.trib.al/pvXGzSC | opinion
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