Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Steve Athearn Abstract: It is sometimes held that U.S. motivations in Iraq and the Persian Gulf, while indeed “largely about oil” (in the well-publicized words of Alan Greenspan), are not (or at least not much) “about access” to the region’s oil per se. This essay critically examines that claim, arguing that the current U.S. resort to force cannot really be understood without regard to the current precariousness of U.S. energy supplies.
Slight majority Of U.S. energy CFOs disagree that world has reached peak oil
60 Minutes on oil: did anyone verify anything?
What 60 Minutes missed on oil speculation
Jim Rogers sees oil at US$200 as world is running out of reserves
A visit to Shell’s Perdido Project in the Gulf of Mexico. The spar itself is about the same height as the Eiffel Tower. But even this $3 billion, state-of-the-art, deepwater project can’t begin to replace the declining “giants” like Cantarell, a few hundred miles to the south.
The environmental impact of Google searches
How you can help reduce the footprint of the Web
Google’s response
“Green” billboard ready to light up Times Square
Oil execs see growth in renewable energy
Ambitious solar plans in France
Wind in Wyoming
Advice to Obama: an actuary’s impractical perspective
Why (and how) we may survive peak oil
From Connecticut: a novel plan for economic stimulus
The six-hour work day solves the problem
Cash crunch slows high-speed rail project
A move toward veggie power aloft
Toyota to build electric town car, plug-in hybrids
What will save the suburbs?
The ‘McMansion’ trend in housing is slowing
US Housing and the Passive Home Standard
Post Carbon Institute today announced the release of “The Real New Deal: Energy Scarcity and the Path to Energy, Economic, and Environmental Recovery,” a proposal to the incoming Obama Administration. The plan calls for responding to the current economic crisis with a massive policy and investment shift towards a fossil fuel-independent economy. The plan has been endorsed by Bill McKibben, Michael Moore, Randy Udall and Lester Brown. The 24-page report is available online.
At the time when the national banking fraternity was on its knees in Washington, begging for money, news all over the media reported that Hometown Heritage bank in Lancaster County, Pa., was having its best year ever. Hometown Heritage may be the only bank in the world, surely one of the few, that has drive-by window service designed to accommodate horses and buggies. Some 95% of the bank’s customers are Amish farmers. The banker, Bill O’Brien, says that he has not lost a penny on them in 20 years.
Several steps come before energy policy: we need to get the worst of our financial problems behind us and we need to understand where we are, before we can make intelligent decisions going forward.
Montreal Gazette: The age of oil is ending
Politics, geopolitics, and choke points (ASPO conference video)
Let’s “hope and pray that Hirsch is wrong”
“Cheap oil era” is ending soon
Rock star Julian Cope: ‘very close’ to peak oil
Toyota to build electric town car, plug-in hybrids (cites PO)
