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Category: economics – Page 92

Robotics CEO Says Goal Is to “Remove” Human Labor From Economy

In response to the so-called “labor shortage,” companies are looking to finally replace replace workers with machines — and robotics companies couldn’t be happier to oblige.

David Zapico, the CEO of robotics company Ametek Inc., told Bloomberg News that his company is “firing on all cylinders” because, as he put it, “people want to remove labor.”

He’s not alone in his musings. Executives at Hormel Foods Corp and Domino’s Pizza also confirmed to Bloomberg that they’re investing in automation in an effort to reduce labor costs and respond to a “tight labor supply,” as one Hormel vice president put it.

Can methane pyrolysis based hydrogen production lead to the decarbonisation of iron and steel industry?

Circa 2021

Decarbonisation of the iron and steel industry would require the use of innovative low-carbon production technologies. Use of 100% hydrogen in a shaft furnace (SF) to reduce iron ore has the potential to reduce emissions from iron and steel production significantly. In this work, results from the techno-economic assessment of a H2-SF connected to an electric arc furnace(EAF) for steel production are presented under two scenarios. In the first scenario H2 is produced from molten metal methane pyrolysis in an electrically heated liquid metal bubble column reactor. Grid connected low-temperature alkaline electrolyser was considered for H2 production in the second scenario. In both cases, 59.25 kgH2 was required for the production of one ton of liquid steel (tls). The specific energy consumption (SEC) for the methane pyrolysis based system was found to be 5.16 MWh/tls. The system used 1.51 MWh/tls of electricity, and required 263 kg/tls of methane, corresponding to an energy consumption of 3.65 MWh/tls. The water electrolysis based system consumed 3.96 MWh/tls of electricity, at an electrolyser efficiency of 50 KWh/kgH 2. Both systems have direct emissions of 129.4 kgCO2/tls. The indirect emissions are dependent on the source of natural gas, pellet making process and the grid-emission factor. Indirect emissions for the electrolysis based system could be negligible, if the electricity is generated from renewable energy sources. The levellized cost of production(LCOP) was found to be $631, and $669 respectively at a discount rate of 8%, for a plant-life of 20 years. The LCOP of a natural gas reforming based direct reduction steelmaking plant of operating under similar conditions was found to be $414. Uncertainty analysis was conducted for the NPV and IRR values.

How Elon Musk’s Battery Farm is transforming lives of Australians?

Aside from upturning the economics of the automobile industry, Tesla has also begun innovation efforts in how we receive our day-to-day electrical power services.

Indeed, the day you begin to pay Tesla your electricity bills may soon come if they continue their success. Welcome dear, today we will talk about Tesla’s battery farm installations in Australia and how they changed the lives of many Australian citizens.

Tesla’s ‘battery farm’ in South Australia is officially known as the Hornsdale Power Reserve. Its construction history begins with the local southern Australian government searching for plausible plans for the improvement of their electrical power grid with a battery design in the region.

US China Insane Rivalry Is Extending From Earth Into Space

Few years ago, at the mention of space mission rivalry, the US and USSR comes to mind. However, things changed in 2003 when China launched the first human crewed mission space flight. We’ve always known the US and China to be rivals on so many economic and political grounds, but now, they’ve taken it one up to space.

What’s the whole point of the space mission rivalry? And most importantly, if the rivalry continues, how exactly will it affect both countries and the world at large? Well, we will find out in just a second.

While the United States’ status in the current world order requires no explanation, the People’s Republic of China’s rise to similar power warrants some examination. Following the death of Mao Zedong in 1976 whose ideologically restricted Stalinist rule caused much devastation and economic malaise in Chinese society, a new ruling class sought to change things.

4 more Chinese real estate companies topple, even Singapore feels the jolt

The domino effect of the falling of Chinese companies is in full swing, as one after another, four Chinese real estate companies have toppled. As reported by Asia Nikkei, Modern Land China has become the latest developer from Asia’s largest economy to miss a dollar bond payment, underscoring the stress spreading across the sector, as the property balloon burst at the time when Beijing was at its most vulnerable. According to a filing on Tuesday with the Singapore stock exchange where the bond is traded, the corporation failed to pay interest and principal on a $250 million bond. This month, Fantasia Holdings, Sinic Holdings, and China Properties have all defaulted on offshore notes, while China Evergrande Group narrowly avoided defaulting last week by making a coupon payment on time.

As liquidity concerns intensify amid mounting maturities, as per reports, global rating agencies have already lowered the scores of a record 44 Chinese developers this month. Earlier, Modern Land dropped a plan to extend the bond’s repayment period, and trading in its stock and debt securities was delayed until the company made another announcement. The trade embargo is still in effect, according to the newest declaration. The fact that the Singapore stock exchange will also face the pressure of this fall, means that other countries are now going to suffer for the bad policies of Xi Jinping.

Chinese companies report alarming dip in profits as the perfect storm hits the Chinese economy

The Chinese economy has been hit by a perfect storm. In the third quarter of the ongoing financial year, official Chinese data revealed that GDP growth stood at 4.9 percent, down from 7.9 percent in the previous quarter. This decline in GDP growth is directly eating into profits of big Chinese companies.

Rising prices and low consumer spending create a perfect storm in the Chinese economy:

There are two broad factors that are affecting business earnings in China-raw material inflation and low consumer spending.

Why People In China Are ‘Donating’ Money To Tesla CEO Elon Musk — The World’s Richest Person

CEO Elon Musk posted an ancient Chinese poem on Weibo on Monday and this led his millions-strong followers on the social media platform to open up their wallets.

What Happened: Musk posted an 1800-year-old poem, called “The Quatrain of Seven Steps,” composed by Cao Zhi, the brother of the Emperor of Wei Cao Pi without any clear context.

Subsequently, Musk, who has 1.9 million followers on Weibo, began receiving donations from the users of the Chinese social media platform, reported CnEVPost.

Partnership to Expand Effective Gene Therapies for Rare Diseases

Rare diseases aren’t so rare. Collectively, up to 30 million Americans, many of them children, are born with one of the approximately 7,000 known rare diseases. Most of these millions of people also share a common genetic feature: their diseases are caused by an alteration in a single gene.

Many of these alterations could theoretically be targeted with therapies designed to correct or replace the faulty gene. But there have been significant obstacles in realizing this dream. The science of gene therapy has been making real progress, but pursuing promising approaches all the way to clinical trials and gaining approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is still very difficult. Another challenge is economic: for the rarest of these conditions (which is most of them), the market is so small that most companies have no financial incentive to pursue them.

To overcome these obstacles and provide hope for those with rare diseases, we need a new way of doing things. One way to do things differently—and more efficiently—is the recently launched Bespoke Gene Therapy Consortium (BGTC). It is a bold partnership of NIH, the FDA, 10 pharmaceutical companies, and several non-profit organizations [1]. Its aim: optimize the gene therapy development process and help fill the significant unmet medical needs of people with rare diseases.

The Economy of EVE Online

A shift to digital life?

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EVE Online is a massively multiplayer online game that is probably best known for articles about massive space battles with tens of thousands of players, or stories about in-game con men screwing over their allies after years of friendship. BUT! EVE online is interesting for a bigger reason though that is often overlooked, and that is its amazingly realistic economy. In this video, we explore one of the player nation-states and see how crazy realistic the economy of a video game about spaceships can be.

This is not sponsored by the Imperium, EVE online, or its developer, CCP games (but they are more than welcome to send me a cheque!).

Enjoyed the video? Comment below! 💬

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