iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

This is globalisation at its absolute best

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Love to see a successfully decommissioned coal power plant #helsinki

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Your regular reminder that GM’s best-selling model line globally is not the Silverado 1500 but the Wuling Hongguan Mini EV, a Chinese electric car that costs less than $10,000

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

American musician overstays Italian vacation

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

Hong Kong neighbours fail to hook up

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

The mine I visited was first opened in 1917; closed in 1920 after the end of World War I; opened on the eve of WWII in 1938, and closed when the Cold War ended in 1990. They are hoping to start extracting ore from the flooded underground mine in the coming months:

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

You might think that this would make tungsten mines outside of China into hives of activity and speculative investment dollars. In fact, it’s just the opposite: Because cheap Chinese tungsten is so dominant, it’s been a constant struggle to raise capital and make sustainable profits.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

Chinese export controls and fears of war since the start of the Trump administration have sent its price soaring almost ninefold since the start of 2025:

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

China has the best geological resources, by far. In some critical minerals such as gallium and lithium, China has acquired a crucial market share by dominating processing. The list of minerals where its dominance is innate and geological is pretty short: rare earths, tungsten, maybe antimony.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

There’s a forgotten history of the 20th century where tungsten is one of the very most important materials for a country in wartime, alongside steel and oil. Nowadays, 80% of it comes from China. That’s an obvious vulnerability.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Europe has an oceanic climate which means you normally get cool nights in summer, so until recently existing buildings did a good job of keeping residents cool. People seem to have this idea that Europeans have been sweating through hot nights for decades and just putting up with it. It’s weird.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

The French-Swiss mind cannot conceive of modern buildings like this

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

This is what the average housing unit in (left) Italy and (right) France looks like. Tha challenges of doing AC in Europe are absolutely not “everyone lives in heritage buildings”

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 19/06/2026

Imagine if you managed to avert World War I, but then enduring peace depended on nothing kicking off while a bunch of Franz Ferdinands and Gavrilo Princips chased each other round some globally live-streamed Squid Game.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

Renewables-plus-storage is so cheap that in large parts of the world it is cheaper to build a whole new clean power plant than just pay for the fuel and maintenance for a fully-depreciated gas generator. Renewables aren’t just threatening new-build gas — they are undermining existing plants.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

In 2018, the IEA’s main scenario reckoned gas generation in Asia would grow by a third by 2025, and still be almost twice as big as solar in 2040. In fact, it has barely grown at all since 2018, and solar overtook last year.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

You can point to forecasts that this will magically change — in 2026, when clean energy is a fraction of the cost, and after the biggest-ever disruption of LNG markets — but then consider some former forecasts:

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

As @ember-energy.org and @carbonbrief.org have pointed out, solar has already overtaken gas in Asia. But the most striking thing for me in this chart isn’t the rising solar line, it’s the almost-flat gas one. There is no growth there!

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

Still think that there’s a booming future market for LNG? Look at how solar has crushed gas in California over the last few years. Now consider that LNG markets pay 2x-3x as much for their gas as California. www.eia.gov/todayinenerg...

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

<you-are-not-serious-people-succession.gif> politicalwire.com/2026/05/12/p...

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

3. Look at that list of countries where they are already competitive on price. These are some of the biggest diesel markets: China, India, the US, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, France, Turkey, Brazil etc etc As with EVs, we may be seeing emerging markets leapfrogging richer countries.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

Why do I say this could be a bigger deal than EV cars? 1. Trucks consume more fuel! Their numbers are far fewer, but trucks and buses consume as much petroleum as all the cars and motorbikes in the road. Add in off-road mining and port trucks and construction equipment, and it’s a lot more.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

Truck owners are in a low-margin industry so really, really care about this stuff. Right now, FORTY PERCENT of diesel is consumed in countries where the multiple is at least 10x. Even at pre-Hormuz prices, a third of diesel is used in places at a 9x multiple or higher.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

Take scooters. EVs are within spitting distance of the cheapest big-selling petrol scooters in India *right now*, running costs are already far lower, and Delhi is banning new registrations for petrol scooters from 2028. Biggest two-wheeler market by far. www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

But China spent last year sticking roughly 1 million barrels a day into reserves, to protect itself against a crisis like the one now unfolding. www.eia.gov/todayinenerg...

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

This is a commodity cost curve. The vertical axis is price, the horizontal axis is demand. When demand goes up, it unlocks higher-cost production, and vice versa.

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 16/04/2026

A very normal dinner party with Keith Richards and Patti Hansen

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 16/04/2026

She was absolutely taking no shit from notorious sleazeball modeling agent and Trump/Epstein crony Johnny Casablancas:

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 16/04/2026

Grace Jones was not a fan of 1970s French public toilets

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

Curious whether in a Hungarian context, having a candidate called Peter Magyar is like having a US Presidential candidate called Captain America

Cartoon panel of Captain America as US President

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 12/04/2026

Meanwhile over in the Bad Place, we’re still waiting for signs that an election has even been held

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 05/04/2026

I remember writing about this at the time, reading the dismissal of wind and solar in Pakistan’s latest grid plan, and talking to people who saw no prospect of this changing: www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

Personally I always check in on the price of cloves from Comoros, just to know where Mr Market’s mind is at

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

Not Harry Belafonte’s version, the Lord Flea original:

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 25/02/2026

Does this bag look black or gold to you?

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 21/02/2026

Mind blown by this photo of a 10-year-old Orson Welles from 1926:

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David Fickling @davidfickling.bsky.social · 05/02/2026

Help me out here: has anything useful come out of the Epstein files yet about the enduring mystery of how, exactly, he made his money? www.ft.com/content/a07b...