That's why Russia's engineering schools as they realize automation is their only path given Russia's demographic problem. Putin has said many times the Russian workforce must be skilled and highly skilled, running robotics and creating other methods of heightened productivity. I'm sure you've watched video of China's automated assembly lines and the level of highly skilled automation is awesome to the point of being intimidating. Asimov tried to get the public to discuss robotics starting in the late 1940s onward via his Robot SciFi Series, but as we both know nothing of the sort occurred. As the 1990s began, it became clear to me that the economy of the future would be a knowledge-based economy, not heavily material based as was the case from @1880-1980, at least for a small portion of the world. How much of that heavy material-based economy the Global Majority will be able to bypass remains to be seen--a great deal of basic infrastructure requires those heavy materials, however.
No competitive economy for the foreseeable future can thrive without steel. Even small countries that want to advance their economies produce steel, e.g. Qatar produces 2 million tons of steel on its own.
Before I could even start finding out where Cleveland Cliffs has been getting its capital for its spree of gobbling up of other steel companies, I learned the federal grant of half a billion $ is to replace the existing blast furnace with a far less polluting process of direct iron reduction. The money comes from via the DOE because of its energy efficiency and reduction of CO2 pollution. Without explaining the chemistry of it, blast furnace produced steel results in two tons of CO2 release per ton of steel. The dri process has been slowly implemented around the world over the last 25 years, This Middletown Steel investment will be the very first dri process in the US. Meanwhile for most of a decade, more than 10% of Russia’s #5 in the world steel output has been via the dri process. India is the world leader with already built dri producing five times as much as does Russia, 34.5 million tons vs. 7.7 million tons. DRI and another still experimental competing low polluting process are the technology of the future. Once again, the US is slow out of the starting block, hampered by its private capitalization system as opposed to centralized planning models of Russia, China, and even India.
NYT article on Vance’s rust belt hometown Middleton Ohio and its distressed steel mill. Just what we’ve been discussing!! It seems Biden’s infrastructure bill is giving $500 million to the mill for modernization. The mill is now owned by the nation’s #2 largest steel company Cleveland Cliffs. I’m not as current on status of the US industry as I used to be or should be, so am unaware of what the planned modernization entails. In my day Cleveland Cliffs had one mill—in Cleveland, of course, and it was among the more distressed and least modern companies. Recently I’ve noticed reports of the company’s rebirth of sorts, with it purchasing other small steel companies and gradually rising in rank for total US tonnage. Cleveland Cliffs is the US bidder for US Steel, and would acquire US Steel if the government disallows the purchase by Nippon Steel. Buy American, indeed. I will have to research where Cleveland Cliffs is getting its money from and the degree to which it has been modernizing and how the workforce has been affected….
Nicely put. And beyond the shortage of skilled workers is the fact that new factories will have assembly lines more automated than ever….
That's why Russia's engineering schools as they realize automation is their only path given Russia's demographic problem. Putin has said many times the Russian workforce must be skilled and highly skilled, running robotics and creating other methods of heightened productivity. I'm sure you've watched video of China's automated assembly lines and the level of highly skilled automation is awesome to the point of being intimidating. Asimov tried to get the public to discuss robotics starting in the late 1940s onward via his Robot SciFi Series, but as we both know nothing of the sort occurred. As the 1990s began, it became clear to me that the economy of the future would be a knowledge-based economy, not heavily material based as was the case from @1880-1980, at least for a small portion of the world. How much of that heavy material-based economy the Global Majority will be able to bypass remains to be seen--a great deal of basic infrastructure requires those heavy materials, however.
No competitive economy for the foreseeable future can thrive without steel. Even small countries that want to advance their economies produce steel, e.g. Qatar produces 2 million tons of steel on its own.
Before I could even start finding out where Cleveland Cliffs has been getting its capital for its spree of gobbling up of other steel companies, I learned the federal grant of half a billion $ is to replace the existing blast furnace with a far less polluting process of direct iron reduction. The money comes from via the DOE because of its energy efficiency and reduction of CO2 pollution. Without explaining the chemistry of it, blast furnace produced steel results in two tons of CO2 release per ton of steel. The dri process has been slowly implemented around the world over the last 25 years, This Middletown Steel investment will be the very first dri process in the US. Meanwhile for most of a decade, more than 10% of Russia’s #5 in the world steel output has been via the dri process. India is the world leader with already built dri producing five times as much as does Russia, 34.5 million tons vs. 7.7 million tons. DRI and another still experimental competing low polluting process are the technology of the future. Once again, the US is slow out of the starting block, hampered by its private capitalization system as opposed to centralized planning models of Russia, China, and even India.
Russia's clearly keen on greening its heavy industry while expanding it--continual modernization as Xi would say.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/16/us/jd-vance-middletown-ohio.html?unlocked_article_code=1.8U0.OLcJ.AOmMqmv5B1BP&smid=url-share
NYT article on Vance’s rust belt hometown Middleton Ohio and its distressed steel mill. Just what we’ve been discussing!! It seems Biden’s infrastructure bill is giving $500 million to the mill for modernization. The mill is now owned by the nation’s #2 largest steel company Cleveland Cliffs. I’m not as current on status of the US industry as I used to be or should be, so am unaware of what the planned modernization entails. In my day Cleveland Cliffs had one mill—in Cleveland, of course, and it was among the more distressed and least modern companies. Recently I’ve noticed reports of the company’s rebirth of sorts, with it purchasing other small steel companies and gradually rising in rank for total US tonnage. Cleveland Cliffs is the US bidder for US Steel, and would acquire US Steel if the government disallows the purchase by Nippon Steel. Buy American, indeed. I will have to research where Cleveland Cliffs is getting its money from and the degree to which it has been modernizing and how the workforce has been affected….