Articles by David Roberts
David Roberts was a staff writer for Grist. You can follow him on Twitter, if you're into that sort of thing.
All Articles
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Bodman on board
Good catch from Mike at GCC: U.S. Energy Secretary Sam Bodman, in a speech before the National Petroleum Council, basically admitted the core peak oil argument -- that supply is declining and remaining reserves are going to be harder and harder to get to.
So someone in the U.S. government, at least, knows what's coming. Maybe he should chat with his colleagues.
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Markets
One of my pet peeves is the argument that clean energy is inferior because it relies on government subsidies -- as though oil, coal, and nuclear simply rose to the top of the market heap through pure merit. Bullsnot.
So, in the grand blog tradition of linking to posts that agree with you, do go check out this Brad Plumer post on the ancient practice of market-gaming by industries, with a special emphasis on oil.
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Efficiency
Jamais at WC just put up a long and fascinating post, but I warn you number-phobes -- it's got numbers. If you just want the short, sweet point, here it is:
An aggressive focus on improvements to efficiency amounting to an average of 3-4% annually over the century could mean a world where everyone can live well without risk to the climate. To say that the effect of improving the efficiency of use is dramatic is perhaps an understatement. Without it, avoiding disastrous greenhouse effects will be nearly impossible; with it, avoiding the worst-case scenarios is almost over-determined.
