Dear Fast Eddy, Thank you for collecting all those links. I can see that you struggle to be heard at times and have tried to be thorough.

I pretty much agree with you, cheap energy has driven population growth to a point that it is directly dependent on cheap energy. Fossil reserves as you realise are more than energy reserves and will be impossible to completely replace even with free energy. This has been my contention for promoting reduction of fossil energy even if I am still on the fence about humans being able to affect global CO2 levels significantly.

The very dangerous reliance on energy to prop up global population and hoping that science will invent new cheap energy is a very big gamble given the downside if the gamble fails.

Most nitrogenous fertiliser is made from natural gas since the thousands of years of stored guano were mined out in a few decades. The simple embargo on Russian fertiliser will have ripple effects that comparatively few are even thinking of.

The large investment houses also have a monopoly on magnesium fertilisers after the Dead Sea salt works was sold to competitors.

Humanity is going to have to downscale and fast and those who resist will suffer more.