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- What will future societies be like after fossil fuels are gone?
- Phosphate: All hopes for food and LFP batteries rest on Morocco with up to 85% of remaining reserves
- Floating Solar Farms add plastic, metal, PFAS & cut off light and oxygen to life below
- Peak Lithium
- Trump eliminates birth control abroad
- In a world without people, how long would NYC last?
- Network States to replace democratic governments with billionaire Silicon Valley CEO dictators & Republicans
- Why the kerogen in oil shale will never fill up your tank
- ‘The oil we eat’. Following the food chain back to iraq
- Vanishing open spaces: population growth and sprawl in America
- Admiral Rickover 1957: Energy Resources & Our Future
- The Green New Deal is not a solution for the real problem: Overshoot
- A transition from fossil fuels to renewables could take a century – if it ever happens
- Electrifying freight trains in the U.S. is a bad idea
- Why Nuclear Power can’t replace fossil fuels
Author Archives: energyskeptic
Admiral Rickover 1957: Energy Resources & Our Future
Preface. I’ve shortened and reworded this prescient speech. You can see all of it at “Energy resources and our future” – remarks by Admiral Hyman Rickover delivered in 1957″ archived at http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2011/ph240/klein1/docs/rickover.pdf and resilience.org has a speech by Congressman Roscoe … Continue reading
The Green New Deal is not a solution for the real problem: Overshoot
Preface. Seibert & Rees’ paper is important and well-written, without unintelligible scientific jargon. It explains overshoot in just 13 pages, and covers the most important issues we face and real solutions. It explains why the Green New Deal is a … Continue reading
Posted in Limits To Growth, Overshoot
Tagged biocapacity, climate change, ecological limits, energy transition, overshoot, renewable energy, social justice, sustainability
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A transition from fossil fuels to renewables could take a century – if it ever happens
In 2024 and the previous 60 years, primary energy consumption was 80% or more fossil fuels. An energy transition is not happening, fossil fuel growth exceeds renewable growth, reliability requires fossil fuel electricity generating plants to remain, they are not … Continue reading
Posted in An Overview, Infrastructure & Fast Crash, Vaclav Smil
Tagged diesel engine, energy transition, vaclav smil
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Electrifying freight trains in the U.S. is a bad idea
Diesel-electric locomotives use electricity to drive forward motion despite the name ‘diesel’. A large diesel engine turns a shaft that drives an AC generator which makes electricity. This electrical energy powers large electric motors at the wheels called ‘traction motors’ … Continue reading
Posted in Electric Grid, Electrification, Railroads
Tagged diesel-electric, electrification, electrify, electrify rail, rail, train, train electrification
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Why Nuclear Power can’t replace fossil fuels
Preface. Economic reasons are the main hurdle to new nuclear plants now, with capital costs so high it’s almost impossible to get a loan, especially when natural gas is so much cheaper and less risky. But there are other reasons … Continue reading
Energy, Water, & Climate Change are interdependent
Preface. This is a very long post with summaries of two GAO reports on interdependencies of energy, water, and climate change from 2014 and 2012, which are still true today. While cheap and plentiful oil remains, these problems can be … Continue reading
Posted in Climate Change, Energy Infrastructure, Energy Production, GAO Government Accountability Office, Interdependencies
Tagged climate change, energy, infrastructure, interdependency
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Why fusion power is Forever Away
Preface. When my husband Jeffery Kahn was a science writer at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, astrophysicists told him fusion was 30 years away and always would be. ITER was supposed to be ready in 2016, but the completion date for … Continue reading
Climate Change dominates news coverage at expense of other existential planetary boundaries
Preface. Almost all environmental stories in the media are about greenhouse gases. Yet there are dozens of others in the meta/polycrisis and existential boundaries (Rockström 2009). Overpopulation is the driver, but the severity and magnitude is made possible by fossil … Continue reading
Excerpt from “The Geopolitics of Resource Wars”
Preface. This is an excerpt from Philippe Le Billon’s (editor) anthology “The Geopolitics of Resource Wars.” The coming energy crisis and climate change are likely to trigger resource wars as nations sink into starvation and poverty. Indeed, this is already … Continue reading
Posted in War Books, Where to Be or Not to Be
Tagged resource war, war
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Homes & Buildings
Preface. To prepare for the day when there is no natural gas, oil, or coal to heat homes and buildings, the best possible way to prepare for the future and lessen suffering would be retrofitting homes to use less energy … Continue reading
Posted in Conserve Energy
Tagged buildings, cooking box, homes, insulation, retrofit
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