United States & Canada – July 9

Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens wants to supplant oil with wind
Is it safe now to admit Jimmy Carter was right?
Oilsands image fight targets U.S. politicians
Labour’s plan for dealing with high energy prices
Ex-EPA aide tells of White House censorship
In energy, there are no easy answers

Peak toil

Peak toil: A fable of the future?

It’s happening in Belgium, Scotland, and Spain, in India, South Korea, Nepal, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong, Nigeria, Italy, Portugal, Greece, France…

What might we expect from the average working-class American, as economics in this country continue to worsen? Will they organize in labor unions or protest as isolated individuals expressing their individual sense of hopelessness and despair? Will it be sparked by some “organized” movement, or from some shift in their internal emotional reality? Frank Lee gives his future fantasy version of what he sees could be coming, and folks, it isn’t pretty…Kathy McMahon

Beware those evil speculators

I’ve refrained up to now on commenting on the “speculators” theory in so far as I mainly believe that it merely represents another form of denial about the alarming oil market fundamentals. But with Congress ready to act to further regulate futures trading on the NYMEX, it’s time to look at the situation more closely.

Is oil independence an illusion?

Robert Bryce’s new book, Gusher of Lies, provides a refreshing counterpoint to many simplistic, political discussions about energy, but in the end, his blithe optimism about fossil fuel availability, U.S. financial resources, and global warming’s consequences leaves his arguments as dangerously deluded as those he criticizes.