Energy featured

In a surprise move, US president Joe Biden has announced a “temporary pause” on liquified natural gas (LNG) terminal expansion.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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?

The unique risk profile of nuclear wastes has therefore in recent decades compelled governments and other authorities to seek a remedial strategy which is commensurate with the challenge whilst also being effective,

At 9:30 am on March 12, 1963, in Room 1-B of Manhattan’s Rockefeller Institute, six experts gathered to discuss the implications of a newly identified atmospheric phenomenon: the rising level of carbon dioxide (CO2) caused by the burning of fossil fuels.

The COP28 text does not simply call for transitioning away from fossil fuels but rather stipulates that this transition must be “just, orderly, and equitable,” a much more challenging prospect.

If we put all our efforts into creating a system of electric heat, what we’re going to produce is very little warmth for most people, a whole lot of wasted resources and toxic trash — and no capacity to produce any energy at all within a few decades.