Latest Articles
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Michael Klare makes the case.
Michael T. Klare has another great piece up on Tom Dispatch, this one about the logic of global energy, which is pushing pretty inexorably toward conflict.
With prices rising all over the world and serious shortages in the offing, every major consuming nation is coming under increasing pressure to maximize its relative share of the available energy supply. Inevitably, these pressures will pit one state against another in the competitive pursuit of oil and natural gas.
Read the whole piece for the gory details....
Indeed, once a problem like energy security has been tagged as a matter of national security, it passes from the realm of economics and statecraft into that of military policy. Then, the generals and strategists get into the act and begin their ceaseless planning for endless "contingencies" and "emergencies." In such an environment, small incidents evolve into crises, and crises into wars. Expect a hot couple of decades ahead.
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Activists fight new round of proposed LNG terminals
While President Bush extols the virtues of liquefied natural gas (LNG) in speeches, energy companies have been at work, planning some 50 new LNG import terminals across North America, most slated for U.S. ports. Meanwhile, citizens and officials in Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, and Rhode Island, where new terminals are proposed, are fighting […]
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Wait — They Drilled for Gas With a Nuclear Bomb?!
Oil company hopes to drill near nuclear-blast cavity in Colorado Some 36 years ago, the Atomic Energy Commission and a Texas oil company put a nuclear bomb in an 8,000-foot shaft on Colorado’s energy-rich Western Slope and detonated it, hoping to reach a reserve of natural gas lying beneath the subterranean rock. They succeeded in […]
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Like Apples and Radioactive Oranges
Claims that nuclear energy can reduce oil use are largely hokum President Bush hearts nuclear — or in the argot of the day, nucular — claiming that a boost in nuclear energy could reduce oil imports and help America reach the Shangri-la of “energy independence.” But people who, um, know stuff about nuclear energy are […]
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Now we know where it all went.
According to a new report, U.S. drivers stuck in traffic wasted 2.3 billion gallons of fuel in 2003 -- 69 million more than in 2002. This sobering fact brought to you by the Texas Transportation Insitute's most recent -- and somewhat incongrously named -- Urban Mobility Report.
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Kenn Kaufman, birding guru, answers questions
Kenn Kaufman. What work do you do? I’m associated with National Audubon Society (currently as field editor for Audubon magazine), and I cooperate with other groups, but 90 percent of my work is freelance. All of my focus is on getting more people interested in nature: not just nature as an abstract idea, not just […]
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Even the beer industry is running out of energy
Noted, in a Slate article about declining domestic beer sales: "Why are brewers crying in their beers? In part, they're facing the same difficulties as other manufacturers. Costs for raw materials and energy are rising, and they're having difficulty passing costs along to consumers."
The writer goes on to say, at great and happy length, that the real reason Bud and its ilk are a bust is because Americans have turned into a bunch of namby-pamby Cosmo drinkers. But his quick economic aside is a nod to the fact that the energy crisis creeps into all kinds of corners. How long do you s'pose the brewers will "have difficulty" passing those costs along?
And you thought the only environmental beer fear was genetically modified crops.
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Umbra on winning environmental arguments
Dear Umbra, I’ve recently been debating my cousin about the merits of environmentalism, and he consistently attacks my positions by claiming that the studies that make the case that the environment is in trouble are funded by groups that have a vested interest in maintaining that position. In other words, groups that are devoted to […]
