We Need a Plan for the Transition to Renewable Energy
Radical societal transformation is inevitable; a plan could make a difference between catastrophe and progress.
Energy featured
Hydro Power’s Conundrum: Rising Demand in a Drier Climate
Climate change is drying up the reliably ample sources of water that hydro power depends upon. It is depleting glaciers. It is reducing snowmelt. It is increasing flood and drought extremes. And it is accelerating water evaporation and demand.
Lessons from Germany for a Just Transition
As the experience of Germany’s traffic light coalition shows, a successful strategy against the far right requires meaningful public investment and engagement in order to bring about a just transition to a green economy and social justice.
Peak Oil, AI, and the Straw
In this Frankly, Nate shares his perspective on the new all-time high in oil production in the context of AI’s growing influence in the financial markets and technology space. While ‘all liquids’ just hit an all time high, the varying categories of what is considered oil obfuscates a long plateau that is starting to decline.
Money & Grief
When it takes one barrel of oil to produce a new barrel of oil, it’s game over. That will be the moment when growth, debt and grief will achieve singularity. That will be the moment when the value of money will erode, and we will face an imperative to finally metabolize the grief that was so long stored in that value.
Utilities Are Buying Pricier ‘Responsible Gas.’ But for What Climate Benefit?
Ratepayers are increasingly on the hook to pay the extra costs for “certified gas” promising low-pollution but that critics warn is rife with problems.
Q&A: What does Biden’s LNG ‘pause’ mean for global emissions?
In a surprise move, US president Joe Biden has announced a “temporary pause” on liquified natural gas (LNG) terminal expansion.
Good trouble on the Bad River
Bad River—a new documentary premiering in early March—is entirely unambiguous fact, not dramatized at all; if anything, some of its power comes from underplaying the tragedy it describes, that of an indigenous community forced to defend its remaining chunk of land from a heedless and rapacious oil company.
The rich don’t understand we’re in an emergency. Or don’t care
Today is one of those days when I feel sucker-punched; more melancholy than angry, a little despairing at the contemptible cowardice of the rich and powerful men who run our banks and hence our lives. But they were frightened by Greta et al before they were frightened by Jim Jordan et al, so back to work.
A New Report Maps Canada’s ‘Daunting’ Path to Net-Zero Carbon
Canada’s road to net zero by 2050 will be bumpy, winding and “daunting.” That’s the mathematical conclusion of David Hughes, one of Canada’s foremost energy analysts, in a comprehensive new report for the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives released today.
Has the White House Gone Green?
A mix of celebration and scrutiny has followed Biden’s announcement of a pause on LNG export approvals. Whether this dramatic policy shift was spurred more by dogged activism, desperate vote-seeking, saturated markets and pissed off gas execs, or simply by resource depletion, it is a win for frontline communities and the environmental justice movement.
Inexhaustible Flows?
It should not be surprising that we have not yet been—and may never be—able to engineer long-term-sustainable modernity (i.e., high-tech). I strongly suspect that’s not even a thing. Why on Earth would we just assume that it’s possible?