Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
For four decades, Amory Lovins has been a leading proponent of a renewable power revolution that would wean the U.S. off fossil fuels and usher in an era of energy independence. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, he talks about his latest book, which describes his vision of how the world can attain a green energy future by 2050.
Brent oil briefly touched $128/barrel on Thursday as pressure on Iran over its nuclear programme continued, the latest development being demands from Israel on the US to be more explicit in its threat of military action. The sharply rising prices are already impacting the weakened economies of Europe and the US making some wonder whether sanctions intended to hurt Iran could be backfiring…
In recent years African countries have enjoyed interest from abroad, thanks in part to a great amount of available land apparently ideal for cultivating crops for providing food security and for the production of biofuels. However, insufficient legal protection for the local population often leads to the signing of contracts that deprive these people of their source of subsistence…And if the locals are in fact consulted at all on the matter, they can typically count on a campaign of misinformation from the government.
Iran’s announcement on Sunday that it was cutting off oil sales to Britain and France ahead of the EU embargo sent Brent crude oil prices soaring to a 9 month high of $124/barrel and an all-time UK high of over £78. The price of oil is now firmly back in the news alongside a rash of articles rejecting peak oil, declaring imminent US energy independence, and discussing the changing balance of geopolitical power away from OPEC…
All this new technology seems to say there may be some hope for life after oil. For now the two biggies seem to be cold fusion and cheap hydrogen, but neither of these are as yet sure for the immediate future. It seems likely we are going to have much more efficient motor vehicle within the next 10 years and probably longer range electric vehicles. There might even be enough biofuels to run our airplanes.
When I first approached the topic of societal energy in 2004, I became aware for the first time that our energy future was not in the bag, and proceeded to explore alternative after alternative to judge the viability and potential pitfalls of various options. I have retraced my steps in Do the Math posts, exposing the scales at which different energy sources might contribute, and the practical complexities involved. My spooky campfire version of the story, a la Tolkien: The Way is Shut.
El informe explora alguno de los escenarios de transición de energía propuestos actualmente, mostrando por qué, hasta el momento, la mayoría son demasiado optimistas, ya que no tienen en cuenta todos los factores relevantes que limitan la expansión de fuentes energéticas alternativas.This is a Spanish translation of the Post Carbon Institute and International Forum on Globalization and report ‘Searching for a Miracle’.
– Interview with ex-Shell CEO Hofmeister: changes tune after debate with peak oil researcher?(video and transcript)
– The Achilles’ Heel of Algal Biofuels – Peak Phosphate
– What EROI tells us about ROI
– Prix de l’essence record : le pouvoir en place n’anticipe rien, c’est consternant
Outrageous, snarky, “madly engaging,” bileful—these are a few of the terms that have been used to describe author and social critic James Howard Kunstler. But he’s actually a great deal more than these things, as anyone who’s really come to know him, even if only through his books and Internet postings, can tell you. His most personal writings reveal a human, vulnerable, wonderfully versatile, cheerful side that few people know exists.
‘Peak Oil Scare Fades as Shale, Deepwater Wells Gush Crude’ was the title of one of the lead articles in Bloomberg’s newly launched ‘Sustainability’ section this week. The report echoes a growing number of press reports announcing the end of the “myth” of peak oil. So what gives?
That conventional oil has peaked and will be in decline over the next decades is no longer controversial – so in that sense peak oil has been and gone, and the economic consequences are evident.
Breathe, Neo. I’ve been running a marathon lately to cover all the major players that may provide viable alternatives to fossil fuels this century. Even though I have not exhausted all possibilities, or covered each topic exhaustively, I am exhausted. So in this post, I will provide a recap of all the schemes discussed thus far, in matrix form. Then Do the Math will shift its focus to more of the “what next” part of the message.
– Kunstler interviews Arthur E. Berman, Petroleum Geologist: Magical Thinking and Fracking (audio)
– Coal Lobby Warns Wind Farms May Blow Earth Off Orbit (video from The Onion)
– Energy.gov: Where information goes to die
