Environment

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Favors More Energy Costs for All

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America, with 4.1 percent of the world’s population (330 million vs 8 billion) professes to be the leader of everything but tightening the National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for particulate matter is ludicrous when China, India, Indonesia, Japan, and Vietnam are sending their existing PM2.5 across the Pacific Ocean to America, particularly California, and building new coal power plants that will emit even more PM2.5.  read more »

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America Has An Oedipus Complex

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As in Sophocles’s tragedy Oedipus Rex, we are witnessing a generational drama in which inheritors kill their proverbial father to marry their mother, in this case Mother Earth. The psychology behind this pattern is above my pay grade, but many of the richest people on the planet, and their heirs, now seem anxious to disparage the economic system that created their fortunes.  read more »

The Democrats' New Climate BIll Abandons Green Zealotry

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The Senate has passed the Democrats' mega climate, health care and taxation bill along party lines and after much griping from Republicans.  read more »

Joe Manchin: Climate Hawk

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The clean energy spending in the recently unveiled Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) marks a victory for the sort of bottom-up, incrementalist, behind-the-scenes climate policy that progressive climate advocates have decried as inadequate for over a decade.  read more »

Banning Modern Agriculture and High Crop Yields?

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In just seven decades, America’s conventional (non-organic) farmers increased per-acre corn yields by an incredible 500% – while using steadily less water, fuel, fertilizer and pesticides – feeding millions more people.  read more »

Green Dreams, Inflationary Realities

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Global policy and politics, particularly in the high-income world, have been obsessed with dreams of a green economy. Imposing ever-more rigid methods to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as the way to “save the planet” is almost unchallenged in the media, academia, and corporate boardrooms of the developed world.  read more »

The Similarities Between ESG and Fascism Are Scary

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As Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) divesting in fossil fuels progresses, by many of the masters of the financial universe, the short memories of petrochemicals’ golden goose contributions to societies are leading the world to an era of Extreme Shortages Guaranteed (ESG) like we had in the decarbonized world in the 1800’s!  read more »

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Learning From Las Vegas: Sustainable vs. Susceptible

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I hear a great deal about sustainability in the built environment that sounds both encouraging and delusional. These messages come from well intentioned environmentalists as well as corporate marketing departments. The general tone of the conversation is similar either way. Everyone can continue to live the way we do now, but by making a few minor adjustments we’ll transition away from coal, oil, and natural gas to benign materials and clean renewable energy. This transition will save households money, preserve nature, and be profitable for private enterprise.  read more »

Biden is Disconnected from American’s Reluctance to be Regulated Out of Fossil Fuel Prosperity

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Civilization has benefited from more than 6,000 products made from the oil derivatives manufactured out of raw crude oil at refineries. None of these products were available to society before 1900. With no known replacement for crude oil in the foreseeable future, President Biden has stated “we are going to get rid of fossil fuels” implying that he is going to change society’s lifestyle and economy demands for the products made from fossil fuels that were not available before 1900.  read more »

Dark Clouds on the Horizon for Electric Vehicles

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There are a couple of dark clouds hanging over the optimistic growth of electric vehicles (EV’s) that may decimate the supply chain of lithium to make the EV batteries, and how to safely transport EV’s across wide oceans:  read more »