Sciencematters

It’s one of the world’s largest oil deposits; companies have been working on it for decades, both in and outside of 🇻🇪. I’m wary of outside interests that claim it’s a shortcoming of 🇻🇪 science or infrastructure to justify outside intervention-even though outside interests haven’t solved it yet either

Or possibly just an a-hole in a K-hole.

Kessler syndrome - Wikipedia

And in a demonstration of his sheer brilliance, the man who told us he would get us to Mars has almost single-handedly created the Kessler syndrome that will keep us from leaving the planet. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler...

Yep. I don’t know electric vehicles or satellites or social media platforms, but I do know brains and neurorehab. When I first heard him wax poetic about Neuralink, I was horrified by the garbled buzzword sales pitch. And the more I’ve learned, the more horrified I’ve become. No thank you very much.

USAID shutdown has led to hundreds of thousands of deaths | Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health The Trump administration’s decision to shut down the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths from infectious diseases and malnutrition, accord...

Apparently, hundreds of thousands of people have died so far. I do hope he and the DOGE crew are all held accountable at some point. hsph.harvard.edu/news/usaid-s...

One thing I learned when working in public vs private sector is there are extremely privileged people who have always been surrounded by boardroom sycophants and just assume that they can say anything and will it into reality, facts be damned. Turns out that is a non transferable “skill.”

Oh, they know. I was living down there in 1998 before Venezuela nationalized its oil wells and international interests, including the US, were definitely aware of the barriers. You essentially have to pump the ground full of kerosene to extract it, and then you have to refine the sulfur out of it.

I don’t know. I was living down there in 1998 just before Chavez’s election, and while there was a lot of international oil work going on, there were serious barriers-and that was before the nationalization of their oil industry. Not an expert, but know enough to know it isn’t just efficiency.

It’s not really even usable without additives and specialty refining though. Otherwise Venezuelans would be very wealthy.

I’m reading other people who are suggesting it could be rare earth minerals instead of oil. Since I can’t find anywhere building a slew of new specialty oil refineries, this makes more sense to me, but that’s just a hunch.

That is definitely a theory I seen floating around, but not one I know enough about.

Was just talking to a relative on the East Coast who had no idea there was flooding going on in the PNW. Said she wasn’t paying attention to the news because it always exaggerate weather events. Um, no. 100,000 people are under evacuation and 30 highways are closed. Mudslides, etc. No exaggeration.

Some areas of western Washington had more than 12 inches in 72 hours.

An "atmospheric river" of moisture has left parts of Oregon and Washington under feet of water. The heavy rain have closed roads, caused power outages, and stranded vehicles.

I believe so, and that would make more sense to me than the oil. Venezuelan oil is almost solid at room temperature and so soured by sulfur that it requires a ton of processing. There is a reason Venezuela isn’t one of the wealthiest countries in the world.

The number of people who don’t understand how different Venezuelan oil is from “sweet” oils is astonishing. Venezuela wouldn’t be where it is today financially if its oil was fantastic quality.

The US has been periodically targeting Venezuela far before Chavez. Venezuelan oil is notoriously poor quality, which is why they are not a wealthy country. It’s difficult to extract from the ground because it’s so thick and it’s also full of sulfur so it has to go through specialty refineries.

In all honesty, it can’t be just the oil because Venezuelan oil is notoriously poor quality, which is why they are not a wealthy country. Extracting it requires pumping chemicals into the ground and even then you have to have specialty refineries because it’s got so much sulfur in it.

I highly doubt the Saudis want Venezuelan oil. It’s not exactly high-quality which is why Venezuela is not super wealthy.

Possibly more. Venezuelan oil is very low quality, and extremely difficult to extract and refine. There is a reason Venezuela is not wealthy despite it’s massive oil deposits.

I’ve been wondering about that. The oil doesn’t exactly make sense since it is such low quality “sour” oil and it requires specialty equipment to refine. I can’t find anyone building new refineries for it so that doesn’t seem to be the plan.

Except Iraqi oil is not comparable to Venezuelan oil. There is a reason it’s one of the world’s largest deposits and it hasn’t been heavily tapped. It’s hard to extract from the ground because it is near solid at room temperature and it has so much sulfur that it has to be specially refined.

It doesn’t quite make sense though. Venezuela would already be incredibly wealthy if its oil was easy to extract. But it’s near solid at room temperature and riddled with so much sulfur that it requires specialty equipment to refine. It’s considered “sour” compared to Saudi “sweet” oil.

That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out. If their oil was truly that lucrative, either Venezuela would be very wealthy or nefarious external actors would have already been extracting it. Something in the puzzle doesn’t quite fit but I’m not sure why.

Amazon is riding an AI bubble that has potential to take the company down because they over-invested in a way that they will never get a return on. Divest from them, if you have not already.

But are you screwing over more employees with even more cuts?

I know someone who has worked for the buy all company for longer than almost every person at the company. And it looks like the latest cuts will make work untenable. Do they not realize how damaging a desired tell all book about them could be? PSA. don’t screw your employees.

Venezuelan oil is extremely hard to extract and purify. It is “sour” and riddled with sulfur, unlike “sweet” Saudi oil. there is a reason Venezuela is not one of the wealthiest countries on earth, despite sitting on a large oil reserve, and it isn’t mismanagement.

Venezuela oil is not Middle Eastern oil. It is almost solid at room temperature and riddled with sulfur. It requires specialty equipment and chemicals to extract from the ground and is expensive to purify for use. There is a reason Venezuela is not living the high life of the Saudis.

Eh… Venezuela oil isn’t Middle Eastern oil by any measure. It is almost solid at room temperature and riddled with sulfur (“sour”), which requires specialty equipment and money to extract and purify.