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Comment by akira2501 | Hacker News Reader

The costs are rooted in Africa, the benefits are exported to Europe. I feel like it's more a recognition of the colonial aspects of this project.

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That makes no sense, that's like saying the costs of oil are rooted in Saudi Arabia, Oman, UAE, Russia etc. and all the benefits go to other countries. Those countries have immensely benefited from selling oil to the world. How is solar power different?

The environmental cost of oil is global while the wealth and profits are concentrated in those nations. It’s the opposite problem.

As opposed to what alternative? Would we rather Iran/Russia/etc be poorer or redistribute the wealth to other countries as if oil isn't a geographic right? Punish oil nationalization or pro-nationalize but be more like Venezuela where everyone gets even poorer despite a boom in oil prices?

I don't see who this is an 'inverse problem' without a realistic alternative.

> Those countries have immensely benefited from selling oil to the world.

I certainly wouldn't assume they have "western" working conditions there.

So, yea, "some" have greatly benefited. There's a really common pattern to who those lucky few are; too, history hasn't changed here.

This is the typical blindness caused by any propaganda.

Africa gets a lot of jobs they would otherwise never get. How is exporting your labor something bad? Countries try hard to get more exports, but once an African country does so, it's bad all of the sudden.

Depends on how that labor is valued. Just because a project creates jobs with export value in country doesn’t mean that project is a net benefit for the people of that country. A project like a waste reprocessing facility might create exportable labor for the country that hosts it, while simultaneously harming the health or people who work in the facility and those who live around it. Does it generally make for a just system if rich countries are allowed place facilities they don’t want in poor ones?

I think the answer depends on how well labor in those countries is rewarded for working at such facilities. So I certainly hope countries that are considering hosting those projects drive a hard bargain on price, starting by acknowledging that what they are giving up is real. The land use is a real concern, yes even in the desert.

This is not a waste processing plant though. Even waste processing can be lucrative, Sweden buys trash to burn from neighboring countries. How can people say with a straight face that land use in the Sahara is a concern is beyond me. I guess global warming really is over-hyped, if we got to worry about land use in Sahara.

> The land use is a real concern, yes even in the desert.

Could you probide some examples of these concerns?

It’s geopolitically a terrible idea. Didn’t anyone learn any lessons from COVID about globalization? Or the Russia-Ukraine War? Even among countries that are close allies (EU) energy politics are a huge problem and countries that import energy always get the short end of the stick when there is a conflict of interest with the exporting country.

How is Russia-Ukraine war relates to that? Is it even a war (neither Russia nor Ukraine declared a war officially)?

USA works for many years on destroying German industry. Starting from not allowing to build gas pipelines from Russia to Germany and eventually destroying them (I don't think that even brainwashed western population believes in that bullshit theory that 5 guys on a yacht destroyed Nord Stream). To the Volkswagen emissions scandal and plundering Deutsche Bank.

Russia always wanted to be a friend with Germany because that would be highly beneficial to both parties. USA always looked for a way to make that never happen and to destroy German industry.

USA succeeded, Germany has a bleak future ahead. But that is only tangentially related to energy import/export.

Stop spreading FUD.

> Is it even a war Even Russian state-sponsored media/propaganda calls it a war these days. Denying the "Special Military Operation", as Putin wants it called, its approriate label of "war" only acts to support Russian propaganda and lies. Call it a war, because that's what it is. The 380th day of war of Putin's 3-day spec^Wwar.

> [USA] eventually destroying [Nord Stream] Who the actor for the destruction of Nord Stream was is still unknown, there have been multiple different stories about it now, all of them with some plausible and inplausible parts about them.

> Russia always wanted to be a friend with Germany Russia doesn't want to be friends with anyone. They (Putin and his mistresses) only strive to become a political, military and geographical superpower again using the same tactics other tyrants like Kim Jong-un are using.

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