For at least four decades, we have been faced with some difficulties in the production and delivery of electricity in the United States. More recently, the primary concern has been the advent of a large increase in demand, mostly due to data centers, cryptocurrency “mining,” and the apparent transition to EVs and appliances. The next concern is the aging national electric grid delivery system. In addition to refurbishment for age, the grid is not ready to accept the huge rising demand … [Read more...]
False Pretense of Energy Transition: Long on Facts, Short on Truth
While listing many of the barriers to abandoning fossil fuels for “green” energy, three writers in Foreign Affairs magazine skip over an important truth: The once ballyhooed but now moribund “energy transition” was and remains unnecessary and undesirable.Instead, the article’s title, “The Troubled Energy Transition: How to Find a Pragmatic Path Forward,” suggests (1) that the so-called transition has legitimacy and (2) that it still somehow should happen. Both are false.The writers are … [Read more...]
The Future of Clean Energy Looks Increasingly Nuclear
When New York Governor Kathy Hochul, whose state has banned natural gas pipelines because “climate change,” goes all in for nuclear energy, you know the revolution is under way. For decades, the anti-nuclear movement moved from protesting nuclear weapons to oppose nuclear energy as well.But not today. Gov. Hochul, in an adjunct to her state of the state speech in January, said her administration supports a grant request by Constellation Energy for federal funding to build one or more small … [Read more...]
Climate Change: Ebb and Flow of the Tide
Emotional, agenda-driven politics confronts sound, evidence-based scienceThe topic of global warming and climate change is far more scientifically complex than the public is led to believe.Myriads of newspaper, magazine and TV items over decades have tended to simplify the science to the point at which the general public believes that it is all so simple that any fool can see what is happening. Public groups often accuse world leaders and scientists of being fools, if they do not instantly act … [Read more...]
Nuking the Anti-Nuke Crowd: Experts agree the tide has turned in nuclear’s favor
How has the Trump Administration fared in meeting the multiple challenges that have slowed the growth of nuclear energy in the U.S. to a near-halt? And what are the prospects for nuclear energy in a Biden-Harris Administration?It is now seventy-five years since the U.S. ended the war against Japan by dropping nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (both currently thriving). Eight years later, President Eisenhower, in his world-famous “Atoms for Peace” speech before the United Nations, … [Read more...]
The Global Nuclear Push: Pathway to a Bright and Secure Energy Future
I believe the future of energy is nuclear. Many others do, too.Despite the unfounded fears surrounding their safety, almost all major economies in the world have embraced nuclear technology with both arms.Here is a look at the current nuclear energy scenario and recent developments that offer a hope of a bright and secure energy future.Nuclear Energy: Standing Tall and StrongIn 2017, nuclear plants supplied 2,487 Terra Watt-hours (TWh) of electricity, constituting nearly 11 percent of all … [Read more...]
Nuclear Conflict and Political Scandal Eclipse Climate Change as Existential Threat
Despite their incessant drumbeat about global warming, mainstream media knows climate doomsday is not imminent and are probably uncomfortable when doomsayers like Congresswoman Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) say, “The world will end in 12 years” unless we do something, drastic, now.But they are well aware that political catastrophes could cause much greater harm to humanity—not in the far distant future, but within months, weeks, or even a single day.That’s why climate change and the “Green New … [Read more...]
Climate Change 1922
The Arctic Ocean is warming up, icebergs are growing scarcer and in some places the seals are finding the water too hot according to a report to the Commerce Department yesterday from Consulate at Bergen Norway. Reports from fishermen, seal hunters and explorers all point to a radical change in climate conditions and hitherto unheard-of temperatures in the Arctic zone. Exploration expeditions report that scarcely any ice has been met as far north as 81 degrees 29 minutes. Soundings to a … [Read more...]
Why Should America Expand its Nuclear Energy Sector?
I've long thought the primary obstacle to the great expansion of nuclear power's contribution to America's energy needs is excessive regulation imposing safety standards that go far beyond what's necessary and thus pushing costs prohibitively high. I still think so, and one of the challenges Republicans in Congress should take on is revising bringing those rules into conformity with the reality: that nuclear energy generation as practiced in the United States, in both military and civilian … [Read more...]
What’s the Real Motive Behind German Green Party’s Plan to Ban Petrol-driven Vehicles?
Der Spiegel reports (partial English translation here, courtesy of the Global Warming Policy Foundation) that the German Green Party has announced that it intends to get petrol-driven (gasoline and diesel) vehicles off German roads, aiming to have no more such vehicles registered from 2036 onward. "'We Greens want to get away from oil on the road over the next 20 years. We want to give cities, cyclists and pedestrians enough room that is free of toxic emissions,' it says in the draft of their … [Read more...]
