 Yes, we're back. We're back in more than one sense of the word. Marco Mangostorf is back. He's been traveling all over the place, and now he's back, and we have the joy of being able to talk to him on his home turf and talk about his trip. Marco, welcome back and welcome back to the show, too. Well, a very heartfelt sub-ID, which is the greeting and the Lao PDR, kind of similar in sound to Sawadika, which is a common greeting, of course, in Thailand. Sawadika, I remember that, yeah. Sawadika. So, yeah, I've missed you, Jay. It's been six weeks since we haven't spoken, I think, which is kind of a record of us not talking. So it's good to be back and good to be back on this Monday with my good buddy and fellow for all purposes and crusades. Good and worth fighting, Jay Fidel. So thank you so much for having me. Yeah, the truth lives here, Marco. Anyway, so, you know, when we did talk, you told me that you were studying energy in Southeast Asia, all those countries you visited, and that is really a turn-on because I want to hear all about it. Let's put a map up and see where you went. So interesting. Okay, I was zooming in now in Southeast Asia, and that would be, you know, north of Malaysia, and that would be Thailand, it would be Myanmar, it would be Laos, Cambodia, and it would be Vietnam. And you went to all those places, am I right? I have been to all five of the countries you just said, Jay, but this past trip was just Thailand and the Lao PDR, People's Democratic Republic, and my interest was kind of sparked in terms of energy, politics, and security for that part of the world. And when I was on my way to China several years ago and for an article in the English language China Daily as I was waiting for a flight from Beijing to Shanghai, and it was talking about a meeting of the four ministers of the five, actually six countries including People's Republic of China, because the Mekong River is kind of the artery that connects all six of those countries with the Mekong, one of the the world's mightiest rivers, so to speak, starting in the high altitude, high altitudes of southern China, and then flowing down South either through or by all five of those countries, Myanmar, Lao PDR, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand. Let's take one more look at the map and just sort of track on that while you're speaking of it. So the the river Mekong River starts in China and it enters, where does it enter in Myanmar? I believe actually, no. Well I'm sorry I didn't, I should have provided a map of the Mekong, but I believe you're right, it does first go into Myanmar or cruises by Myanmar before going into the Lao PDR. So it's one of these rivers in the world that affects all the countries that it either flows through or by, both from multiple perspectives. One of course is energy production with the building of many, many, many hydro electric dams, cultivating and harnessing energy, agriculture of course, irrigation, pollution. So when you have a river that is going through country A, B, C, D, E, F, G on down the alphabet, there is a strong motivation on the part of those countries to work together because even though the river may flow exclusively through your country, let's say upstream eventually it exits your country and goes to the next country, the next country, the next country. In this case before, it empties out in the Mekong River Delta, which is not far from the city of Saigon, also known as Ho Chi Minh City, off of the south, southeast China, southeast, southeast Vietnamese coast. So that's where I kind of focused on the Mekong being this thread that connects the these five countries and I see on the screen there you're showing a photo that I took when I went on a little bit of a river ride and it's really incredible how wide this river is and at this time of year, since it's still kind of the tail end of the rainy season, the monsoon season, how incredibly muddy it is, but I'm told that in the drier months of the year it becomes more kind of greenish. So you know when you think about historically that human beings have obviously needed water, right? We need water to survive and going back thousands of years where there's the Nile, the Mekong, the Brahmaputra River, which flows through India and southern China, Tibetan Plateau, that the rivers are a source of life, a source of commerce, a source of so many things. So I decided I would look at the Mekong and see how is it that these countries work or don't work together, how they conflict, how they cooperate in terms of managing the Mekong when it comes to power generation and the effects, in the case of the Lao PDR, the effects of having multiple dams, many dozens and dozens of dams on the Mekong or tributaries to the Mekong and that sparked my interest kind of intellectually and practically several years ago. So every time I go back, I dig a little bit deeper. I was able to talk to somebody from USAID, which is part of the State Department at the Embassy in the Enchanted Laos and had a really superb time kind of getting his on-the-ground, boots-on-the-ground impressions of energy issues there and kind of the, you know, one of the big takeaways, Jay, is we're talking about 230 plus million people in that part of the world. You know, compare that to United States population with somewhere over 300. So there's a lot of people there with the two biggest countries, population-wise, being number one Vietnam and then Thailand. And the economies of these countries, the Mekong Five, as they call them, to varying degrees, are growing by five, six, seven plus percent quantitatively on a year-to-year basis. And when you have that kind of economic growth, quantitative economic growth, you have a commensurate increase, if not a manifold increase in the amount of energy that those economies need more and more and more of. So, you know, it's kind of interesting timing in that the IPCC International Panel for Climate Change came up with a report this past weekend warning of rather dire consequences unless we get our act together in terms of carbon dioxide and the greenhouse gases and energy along with flatulence from cows, which we can't seem to do a whole lot about. But the consumption of energy, especially carbon and coal, plays a huge role. So how these countries develop, as they will develop and grow, is going to be substantially affected by the availability of energy. Where's the energy to come from? What's going to be the cost of the energy? Who's going to be buying it? So, I should probably... Yeah, and what they do, what these countries do, has a significant effect on the world. 200 and some odd million people, 30 million people, has an effect on the world. So, we want them to be clean if they can. Are they clean? It really depends on the country and to focus on Laos, which has become kind of new near and dear to my heart for a number of reasons. A country of about 7 million people that is ruled by one of only five in the world, five ruling dominant monopoly-control communist parties, a lot of people of Democratic Republic. The folks there have been able to tap into the Mekong and the Tributaries to electrify the country to well over 90%, which is pretty darn good for the developing world and compare that to an electrification rate in neighboring Myanmar, also known as Burma, of somewhere under 40%. And one of the ways that the Laos government and the party have been able to do that is by throwing up hydroelectric dams like crazy. There are now more than 50, 50, 50 major hydro dams on the Mekong and the Tributaries. And there are, get this, another 300 plus in the pipeline. So, the major source of export earnings, in fact, for that small country of 7 million is selling electricity to its neighbors, principally to Thailand, Vietnam, and also to the Chinese. So, one of the, which sounds all well and good because you think, well, hydro, that's not as bad as burning carbon or coal or petroleum. And I would agree with that. But at the same time, there was this tragedy earlier this year where one of the dams failed along the Mekong and caused serious flooding, damage, and death because of the failure of the dam. So, the government in Vien Chien is kind of put the pause, push the pause button in terms of full speed ahead on hydro, but I have no doubt whatsoever that after the pause and after the studies they'll do in terms of trying to come up with a failure mode for the dam, that they will put the gears into full, full speed ahead again, because, like I said, hydro power provides them the bulk of their export earnings and the Chinese and the Vietnamese and the Thais are going to want nothing but more and more and more power. Sure, for developing economies. But let me ask you this, though. When you have the upper part of a river and you use it, say for hydroelectric or maybe other things, you kind of control the flow of the water. And so there are geopolitical implications for a country that is higher up on the river as against one that is lower down on the river. There's that play out. I mean, do we find that there's geopolitical maneuvering going on over these rivers and the dams on the rivers and the sluicing off for agriculture? Absolutely, that's why the need for cooperation and regular consultations amongst the countries there that share the Mekong do take place on a regular basis. And I can't say at this point, I'm an expert enough to know just how well they're playing nicely together versus versus not. It appears to me that at least on the surface, the relationship between the the Lao Party, Communist Party and the government and the Vietnamese is very, very strong. The relationship between the Lao Central Party and government and Beijing is very, very strong. That said, in conversations I had with some of the locals there, both in Vien Tien and Luan Prabang, is that there is kind of a base level of fuss. I want to be careful here, distrust and discomfort that a lot of the Lao people feel towards the Chinese for because of fear that, you know, the Chinese money is coming in as such healthy clips into the Lao PDR that it is changing things not necessarily for the good. So even though on one level in terms of party to party relationship and government to government relationship, there's a strong dependency that the folks in the Vien Tien feel towards the Chinese, but at the same time on the more grassroots level, there is a distinct discomfort amongst typical Lao people in terms of more and more and more Chinese influence. But then again, that's not anything unique, right? Because if you look throughout the region, with the Chinese, especially under Xi Jinping, spreading their economic wealth and also growing their military influence and military assets in the South China Sea and elsewhere, that there's more and more kind of pushback on the part of the Vietnamese, even Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines seems to be pushing back a bit more against Beijing after being buddy buddy initially after he was elected president. So there's an interesting dynamic going out with clearly China is the dominant player in that region. But there's it's coming at a cost, I think. And I think there's going to be more and more pushback on. Oh, yeah. And it's happening in Africa to the same way. It's all about infrastructure, infrastructure like ports, infrastructure like dams. And as China expands west with the one belt one road into Africa, these small countries don't have the capital nor do they have the construction resources. China comes in and makes a big loan. And then China takes the contract to build the infrastructure. And when it's when it's all said and done, it's not feasible. And so what happens is the country doesn't have the revenue from the project to pay the loan. And China often often is not winds up owning the infrastructure, and still having a substantial loan. So small countries resent that and the words getting around about it, I, I think that China will have to reorganize its policy over that. Otherwise, these small countries are going to be very suspicious, not only in Southeast Asia, but everywhere along the one belt one road. But only ask you one question, oh, Marco. And it dawned on me when we first started covering Southeast Asia, you know, they have a lot in common. They have the Mekong in common. They have cultural points in common. They have their agriculture, their food even in common. Southeast Asia should be, don't you think one country that should come together? Now right now there's the ASEAN group, but that's really not very together. And, and the question I put to you as I have put to many people over time is do you think there's a chance, you know, having traveled and come back recently, do you think is a chance that Southeast Asia will come together in our lifetimes? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. I think the, the forces, the nationalists, ethnic forces in that region of 230 million are far too disparate. And I mean, I can't, they're, as you probably will recall, there's been a pseudo military, I won't call it a dictatorship because they have kind of a veneer of democracy to some extent in Thailand. But there has been in a civilian government, extra civilian government in the past 10 or so years that have been overthrown by the Thai army. And it's been that way military rule essentially for the past several years since the last overthrow of the duly elected civilian government. And I just see the forces for fragmentation to be way fragmentation and distinct nationalism to be far too strong for the foreseeable indefinite future that would make any type of integration of these five countries given their history, Jay, which goes back, of course, hundreds and hundreds of years. I mean, lest we forget, there was a war between China and Vietnam in 1979. There was a war between Cambodia and Vietnam in 1979. There are continuing military activities and rogue areas of Myanmar up in the north that make it a no-go zone for the military there, and it's off limits for US embassy personnel to travel. So there are, there is a fragmentation and disintegration going on in a number of those parts of the world that I, there's no way I could see there being some type of unification amongst people of different language, different culture, different histories that would allow them to put it aside. I mean, So sorry to hear that they'd be so much happier if they could get together and be a significant, you know, consolidated group of countries. Anyway, let me let me take a break right now, Marco, we'll be right back. When we come back, I would like to talk about the, the energy, the clean energy other other than hydro that you have seen, you know, being developed in Southeast Asia. We'll be right back with Marco Mangostorf. Aloha, my name is Mark Shklav. I am the host of Think Tech Hawaii's Law Across the Sea. Law Across the Sea is on Think Tech Hawaii every other Monday at 11am. Please join me where my guests talk about law topics and ideas and music and Hawaii Anna all across the sea from Hawaii and back again. Aloha. Hello and welcome to Out of the Comfort Zone. I am your villainous host, RB Kelly. Today we are playing two truths and a lie and I will tell you two truths and you will tell me which one is the lie. Truth number one, this is a real mustache. Truth number two, I want you to watch my show on Tuesdays at 1pm. So tune in and let me know which is the truth and which is the lie. I'm RB Kelly without of the comfort zone and show up next Tuesday to see my mustache live. We are back. We are so happy to to get together with Marco Mangostorf again. It's really wonderful to hear him back and to hear him talk about his trip to Southeast Asia. So Marco, I wanted to ask you as I made indicated before the break about the non hydropower that we see that you saw in Southeast Asia on your trip. For example, photovoltaic. Did you see it? How much of it did you see? And what form did you see it? What did you learn about it there? Is there anything we could learn and use from Southeast Asia? Questions back into that which just said, Jay, so kind of in no particular order. In Laos, solar has taken a back seat in terms of large scale power development to hydro because hydro has been so much easier picking, so to speak. But that said, I've looked at some some government reports and and predictions, the projections over the next handful of years and they're expecting a an increase in solar PV to 165 fold. But as you and I both know, if you're starting off from a very low baseline, it's easier to do 165 fold in terms of increase. But nonetheless, they are recognizing that having solar PV is a good thing. In fact, one of the biggest plants is a rooftop solar, not sorry, rooftop parking shade structure in the Vintian Airport, which is about 300 kilowatts, fairly small size compared to utility scale. And it was provided largely by the Japanese. And in the past year, there was a several megawatt plant outside of the intent, which was also commissioned. So I asked the guy from the US Embassy, Andrews, in Bowdoin with USAID a couple weeks ago, three or four weeks ago, said, I don't understand why would they would want to go with more solar when there's so much cheaper hydro? He said, Well, that's a great question. And the reason is because there are areas where stringing large transmission lines is going to be rather cost prohibitive. In other words, you need to bring the hydro to the end user, which can be difficult in terms of terrain or however far it is from the hydro station. So where you have the advantage of a solar plant, you can plunk it down much more easily and have distributed generation where you need it. So that's reason number one. Reason number two is there are times of the year during the drier months, which typically are from say November to May. In other words, the non-monsoon season where there's a lot less water. So you supplement whatever reduction in hydro that you have with the addition of solar, which means it's a good combo. So the sun is more bound to full less rain, you have more solar and once the other way around, you have more hydro. This reminds me of coal and ice, the old coal and ice dichotomy. It's the same thing with solar and hydro. When you don't have solar, use the water. When you don't have water, use the solar. You know, in terms of the players, given the fact that they're nearest neighbor, I mean, you can see Thailand right across from the Mekong in Vien Nguyen. I mean, across the river, there's Northern Thailand. So in Thailand, being one of the two economic heavyweights in the region, along with Vietnam, the Thais are very heavily involved in Laos and there's a similar kind of ethnic bonds and language similarities between the Thais and the Laos. So they're on friendly terms. So it would make sense that you would have Thai companies working actively in the Lao PDR to develop both hydro resources, transmission, distribution into Thailand and also solar. So there's a lot of cooperation which goes on. And I see that continuing. So I have no doubt there's going to be more and more solar. Who's building it? Did you see Americans, for example, building it? Did you see American equipment, American portable tech cells and accessories? Did you or did you see Chinese? Did you see European? Where does it come from? And who is developing the grids? Because at the end of the day, you can have great panels, but it doesn't mean too much unless you have a great grid also. I think largely the Chinese and the Thais are the ones who are working with the Lao government and the utility folks there to develop both the infrastructure, generating facilities and the infrastructure to get power where it needs to go because they have, you know, easier source of financial resources to do stuff that typically ain't cheap to do. So the Chinese have established a number of PV manufacturing facilities in Thailand to be able to serve the region. So I think it's more likely to see Thai equipment, Chinese equipment rather than stuff from the United States. That said, it's important to note that the number, for example, the number of embassies and consulates in Vienn Chan is somewhere under 30. Okay, we'll put that in the context. There are somewhere close to 200 countries in the world total. So if there was an embassy or consulate for each one, each country in the world, then there would be somewhere close to 200. But for, you know, mostly economic reasons, only 24 or so countries have chosen to have physical representation in the Lao PDR in terms of an embassy or consulate in the capital of Vienn Chan. The US is one of them. We're one of the 24. In fact, we have a new embassy right on the Mekong, about 20 minutes out of Vienn Chan, which I've driven by, haven't actually gone inside. It's this very imposing structure right on the river there. It looks very American. And it shows to me, to our credit, that the United States is one of only a couple dozen or so along with many European countries, including my other, the other heritage that I have, which is I'm half Swiss. So the Swiss have an embassy there, the Europeans do, the Chinese, of course, do. So the United States does see that in the value with the necessity of continuing to remain very engaged in the region. That raises the whole question that's come up, you know, about isolationism, about withdrawing from international relations in this administration. And it raises the question about other countries like China, Russia, and European countries, for that matter, filling the void and taking our prerogatives away from us while we withdraw. And I wonder if you saw indications of that while you were there. And I wonder also what the local people, I guess it might be different from country to country, but what they feel about the US and its policies of withdrawal? I think they continue to see a very engaged American presence in the Laos PDR. In fact, the ambassador there is a career foreign service officer whose name I'm picking up. I'm looking up right now who gets quite a bit of press and is very, very highly thought of. Her name is Ambassador Reena Bitter, B-I-T-T-E-R. And she has been very active in terms of connecting with the locals and going to areas that need to disaster help due to flooding of the monsoons and the collapse of this dam. So surprisingly, Jay, and I'll tell you a little story, which really kind of stabbed my stab at my heart. My guide in Luang Prabang was a local fellow by the name of Kamlac, and he took the American name Alec, because it was close to his Lao name, educated in Switzerland, my half home country was Switzerland, and probably late thirties, early forties, and a very charming fellow. And he was comes from a family of eight or nine. And his sister, his older sister, three months ago, she had three grown kids or in their late teens, because she was a farmer and she was working in her farm. And one of her farming implements hit UXO unexploded ordinance, which is, I'll say in a very tragic case. years and years after with two years and decades, Jay, you know, 40, 50 years ago, since the Laos was the most bombed country in the history of the world from roughly 1964 to 1973. So when he shared with me that his sister was killed in here, I'm an American, they're talking to him. I mean, I felt his pang of shame. And I said, how is it that you can, you know, what does that cause you to feel towards the Americans and, and he just kind of shrugged and said, Well, you know, that's that's the way it was, but we're, we're working together now. So to answer your question, I found the energy towards Americans to be very, very positive. And you'll find the same thing in Vietnam, as well, keep in mind that more than half the population of Vietnam was born after 1975, which is when the country was reunified when the, the communist North took over the South. So it's just really striking to me the powers of, of forgiveness, despite the fact that the American presence there over decades continues to kill people continues through UXO and the use of massive amounts of defolium. But unbalanced, unbalanced, you know, taking that aside and, and taking, you know, the creature comforts, I'm sure you experienced putting that on the side. Having spent, what, six, seven weeks over there, you must have a feeling about the future of Southeast Asia, about where it's going, where it's going in energy, where it's going in economy, in geopolitical issues, relationship with China. And so now, you know, I think it's the right time for me to ask you that, that question. Are you optimistic? Where do you see it all going? What kind of role will Southeast Asia play in the countries in Southeast Asia, East Asia play in the years going forward? You must have a feeling about that, Marco. That's a great question. We could talk another half hour or an hour about that. I see the region is incredibly dynamic, and just kind of focusing on one country, because I know we don't have too much time left, but now we only have a minute left. So make, make it short. Laos has an increase in visitors 10% per year. You do the math. You come up with 60% more visitors in the next five years, 250% compounded over the next 10 years. So I'm convinced that more and more Americans, more and more Europeans, more and more Chinese, more and more Japanese are going to come to the region for investment, for vacation, for exploration. And I see that part of the world becoming more and more, playing more and more of a role, whether through ASEAN or, or into, or through independent states. I see the profile of Southeast Asia, and then you add in countries like Malaysia to the south and Indonesia off the coast to be adding to the cloud, both in terms of economic energy resource issues and its position in world politics. We got to watch it. We got to stay fixed on it, focused on it, and watch it. And you've got to go back and I'll take your, your bag alongside and help you, help you travel. That's Marco Mangelsdorf just came back from a trip to Southeast Asia. It's so interesting to talk to him about that. Our discussion is not finished. We can drill down next time and talk some more about what he learned and what we can learn from them. Thank you so much, Marco. It's great to have you back. It's great to talk to you again. Always a great pleasure, Jane. You can be my, my faithful man, Serma J. Fidel, anytime. I'm writing that down. Thank you, my friend. Thank you.