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Crude oil, refined product prices jump after Colonial pipeline cyberattack
Crude oil, refined product prices jump after Colonial pipeline cyberattack HIGHLIGHTS Colonial pipeline primary artery for gasoline, refined products for South, East Coast US declared a state of emergency following the attack ICE Brent July contract up about 0.4% from previous settle Singapore — 0346 GMT: Crude oil and refined product prices jumped during the mid-morning […]
Clean energy minerals shortage: Who knew it could happen?
Clean energy minerals shortage: Who knew it could happen? The race for so-called green energy has spawned another race, one for the minerals needed to make the devices such as solar panels and batteries that produce, store and transmit that energy. A hitherto largely unchallenged economic idea—that we will always have supplies of everything we […]
Cyberattack Forces Shutdown Of Largest Gasoline Pipeline In United States
Cyberattack Forces Shutdown Of Largest Gasoline Pipeline In United States The largest gasoline pipeline on the East Coast, and the US in general, was shut down on Friday after its operator struggled to contain a cyberattack which threatened its systems. The 5,500-mile Colonial Pipeline, which is the single largest refined-products pipeline in the United States, halted transit […]
Placing Energy In A Battery Results In A Loss Of Power
Placing Energy In A Battery Results In A Loss Of Power Anyone that thinks we can simply store huge amounts of energy in large banks of batteries to use at any time has lost touch with reality. The brave new world of energy storage may not prove to be all it is cracked up to […]
What Would a Deep Green New Deal Look Like?
What Would a Deep Green New Deal Look Like? Wind turbines in the Columbia Gorge. Photo: Jeffrey St. Clair. The Green New Deal has attracted perhaps the greatest attention of any proposal for decades. It would guarantee Medicare-for-All, Housing-for-All, student loan forgiveness and propose the largest economic growth in human history to address unemployment and […]
How the World’s Energy Problem Has Been Hidden
How the World’s Energy Problem Has Been Hidden We live in a world where words are very carefully chosen. Companies hire public relations firms to give just the right “spin” to what they are saying. Politicians make statements which suggest that everything is going well. Newspapers would like their advertisers to be happy; they certainly […]
Our rapid ascent in energy and resource use has distorted our view of “normal”
Our rapid ascent in energy and resource use has distorted our view of “normal” The new reality warns we are on a collision course with Earth’s finite limits —– Tom Murphy “The delirious ascent in energy and resource use witnessed over the past few centuries has been accomplished via the rapid, accelerating expenditure of a one-time […]
New Booklet on False Solutions to Climate Change
New Booklet on False Solutions to Climate Change Starting last summer, people from several organizations have been working to update a booklet on false solutions to climate change (I was involved with this effort for awhile and wrote the first draft of a couple of the sections). Now Hoodwinked in the Hothouse: Resisting False Solutions to […]
The anti-colonial politics of degrowth
The anti-colonial politics of degrowth As degrowth ideas speed their way into social movements and academic research, they have encountered some interesting critiques. In a recent contribution to this Virtual Forum, Huber (2021) dismissed degrowth as a preoccupation of middle-class environmentalists in the global North who feel “anxiety” about excess consumption. Such a movement, he argues, can […]
The Ugly Truth About Renewable Power
The Ugly Truth About Renewable Power When Texas literally froze this February, some blamed the blackouts that left millions of Texans in the dark on the wind turbines. Others blamed them on the gas-fired power plants. The truth isn’t so politically simple. In truth, both wind turbines and gas plants froze because of the abnormal weather. And […]
Today’s Contemplation: Collapse Cometh X
Today’s Contemplation: Collapse Cometh X Monte Alban, Mexico (1988) Photo by author Circumstances have kept me sidetracked from writing for a few months. As life has settled a bit, although the spring weather keeps me busy working in the food garden, I felt it time to post again. Here is a comment I wrote this […]
Myth of Utopian energy
Myth of Utopian energy
Climate scientists: concept of net zero is a dangerous trap
Climate scientists: concept of net zero is a dangerous trap Sometimes realisation comes in a blinding flash. Blurred outlines snap into shape and suddenly it all makes sense. Underneath such revelations is typically a much slower-dawning process. Doubts at the back of the mind grow. The sense of confusion that things cannot be made to fit […]
The coming oil shortage – Part I
The coming oil shortage – Part I The oil price crash on the back of the COVID-19 lockdowns has accelerated the coming supply crunch. Both national and international oil companies have slashed CAPEX and maintenance spending, which will push up decline rates and US shale drillers finally focus on profitability instead of growth. Current longer-dated […]
Gen IV SMR nuclear reactors
Gen IV SMR nuclear reactors Preface. Peak conventional oil, which supplies over 95% of our oil, may have peaked in 2008 (IEA 2018) or 2018 (EIA 2020). We are running out of time. And is it really worth building these small modular reactors (SMR) given that peak uranium is coming soon? And until nuclear waste disposal exists, they should […]
