Articles by JMG

Oregon tries to undo ethanol leg. while ‘enviros’ lobby for biofuels subsidies

Oregon is struggling to undo bad ethanol legislation. Meanwhile, the Oregon Environmental Council continues to shill for ethanol subsidies because there might someday be a magic pony of ethanol created in an entirely different way, using entirely different plants and processes, and if we don’t support agribusiness with subsidies and mandates now, why, why, they […]

George Monbiot cautions against grasping for environmental miracle cures

George Monbiot is the best environmental writer in English. On biochar: Whenever you hear the word miracle, you know there’s trouble just around the corner. But however many times they lead to disappointment or disaster, the newspapers never tire of promoting miracle cures, miracle crops, miracle fuels and miracle financial instruments. We have a bottomless […]

High energy requirements make the manufacture of algal biofuel prohibitive

Robert Rapier has an important post on the prospects for algal biodiesel:

Why not medium-speed rail?

The always-excellent Sam Smith, a keen observer of politics and society as a journalist for over 50 years, introduces an outstanding long piece on the high-speed rail money in the stimulus:

There's nothing wrong with high speed rail except that when your country is really hurting, when your rail system largely falls behind other countries' because of lack of tracks rather than lack of velocity, and when high speed rail appeals more to bankers than to folks scared of foreclosing homes, it's a strange transit program to feature in something called a stimulus bill.

One might even call it an $8 billion earmark.