Imagine one of your kids freezing to death in your home. Eleven-year-old Cristian Pineda's mother found her son dead during the Texas blackout in February 2021. Or you have a power outage for three days, losing a couple of hundred dollars worth of food because your refrigerator didn’t work, as Michelle Jones did last summer. The food she had just bought to feed herself, her daughter, and her granddaughter spoiled without electricity. This is likely to become all too common … [Read more...]
Rolls-Royce’s SMR Needs 10,000 Times Less Land Than Wind Energy, Proves ‘Iron Law Of Power Density’
Last month, Rolls-Royce said that it expects to receive regulatory approval from the British government by 2024 for its 470-megawatt small modular reactor and that it will begin producing power on Britain's electric grid by 2029. Will that happen? Time will tell. Many nuclear projects and startups have blown past their projected in-service dates. But Rolls-Royce’s announcement is important for two reasons. First, it adds more credence to the notion that a global nuclear renaissance is, in … [Read more...]
Wary of the new green wave, India continues to increase its coal capacity
A steady stream of anti-fossil policies has been introduced across the world since the inception of Paris agreement in 2016. Be it the reduction in consumption of fossil fuels in some countries or the rapid increase in renewable installations across Europe and Asia, the changes forced by those policies have been quite tangible. There were some major exceptions to this movement. Trump’s stance against anti-fossil energy policies, Australia’s continued export of coal, India and China’s … [Read more...]
Wind and solar dependency on fossil fuels is a fact we cannot ignore
Newly inaugurated President Joe Biden is moving forward with his Clean Energy Agenda. At the heart of the proposed energy transition plans is the assumption that wind and solar offer cleaner and greener energy than fossil fuels, thus saving the world from a potential climate disaster. Chuck Schumer, the Senate Democratic leader, tweeted on January 20, 2021, "The Senate Democratic majority will take up bold legislation to defeat the climate crisis by investing in clean … [Read more...]
Newsom vows to fast track toward Germany’s failed climate goals
He wants an electrical grid of intermittent electricity free of fossil fuels before 2045 California Governor Gavin Newsom announced on Friday, September 11, that he is about to take one giant step toward following Germany’s failed climate goals, which should be a wake-up all for governments everywhere. Like Germany, California’s renewables are becoming an increasing share in intermittent electricity generation, but at a high cost. Power prices in Germany are among the highest in … [Read more...]
Oahu’s Energy: Irony, Hypocrisy … or Both?
On Oahu’s west side, a Hawaiian green sea turtle snuggles up to a reef for an afternoon nap. But this is no ordinary reef. It’s the warm water outflow structure for Oahu’s biggest electric power producer, the Kahe Power Plant. Built in the early 1960’s, the 651 megawatt (MW) workhorse often provides over 40% of Oahu’s power. Hawaii being what it is, you are probably imagining Kahe runs on clean, renewable energy. Guess again. Kahe runs on oil. You read that right, the power plant that … [Read more...]
Pope Francis’s Misguided War on Fossil Fuels
It seems that Pope Francis has learned little since his 2015 papal encyclical calling on the world to fight climate change by limiting the use of modern technologies and fossil fuels. At a recent Vatican meeting he called many of the world’s leading oil company executives to the carpet. Francis told the executives they should shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources to fight “global warming.” Pope Francis has myriad misguided beliefs about climate science, almost all of which he … [Read more...]
