In terms of decency, it hasn’t been a good day for the oil companies. First it was the ExxonMobil CEO’s mocking renewable energy, and now it’s more news on Chevron’s refusal to clean up its mess in Ecuador. For those …
Author: craigshields
Sour Grapes from ExxonMobil’s CEO
“Any fool can despise what he can’t have” is the moral of the most famous of the Aesop’s fables (“The Fox and the Grapes“). Sadly, Big Oil is incapable of participating in the rapid migration to renewable energy; oil and …
A Lesson from Linus Pauling
I was just telling my daughter’s best friend (pictured here facing my camera, perhaps seven years ago) about Linus Pauling, how remarkable he was, and what we can all learn from his incredible life. One important lesson is that we …
The Energy End-Game: Huge Money Flowing Into Renewables
A reader notes (and I paraphrase): The oil companies are the strongest force on the planet, and they are the problem with respect to a path toward a sustainable approach to energy. I don’t think we can expect oil companies …
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Apple Pie, Environmentalism, and Motherhood
I often kid my mother on her political views. She’s a Republican, though she’s a kind and sensitive person who believes that what we’re doing to our environment is “deplorable” (one of her favorite words). I wrote just now: Mom: Looks …
Bans on Fracking
With his characteristically lucid writing style, frequent commenter BreathOnTheWind asks me to clarify my position on fracking. It’s largely the result of conversations I’ve had with energy analyst Glenn Doty and other senior scientists. I’m convinced that: • Despite widespread …
Tagged with: Bans on Fracking, fracking perpetuates the overall concept of fossil fuel extraction and consumption, natural gas acts to promote the integration of variable resources (solar and wind) into the grid-mix, natural gas derived from fracking offsets huge amounts of coal, no evidence that fracking causes harm
Hard To Get Excited About Bio-Energy
Here’s a tome (700 pages!) on bio-energy for anyone looking for a comprehensive study on the subject; an enormous amount of time must have gone into this. Personally, I don’t see the reason to get excited about any of this.
Tagged with: bio-energy, biofuels replace gasoline and diesel rather electricity, cheap available wind charge electric vehicles, half a billion acres of arable farmland, Hard To Get Excited About Bio-Energy, large amounts of water and fertizer, tiny efficiency with which sunlight can be transformed into useful chemical energy via photosynthesis, wind turbines convert about 20% of the energy in their swept area into electricity, wind turbines run at capacity factors that often exceed 30%
Books on Renewable Energy Sometimes Made Part of College Syllabi
A reader notes: I want to share with you my recent appointment at (a leading management and technology university) as an Adjunct Professor. I will be charged with teaching and mentoring students in their doctoral and graduate management programs, and …
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Why Venture Capital Isn't Embracing CleanTech
In 2011, I did a talk on clean energy and transportation at the incredibly palatial Biltmore in downtown Los Angeles (pictured), at the conclusion of which a gentleman introduced himself and told me about a zero-emissions vehicle he was building. …
More on a Progressive Energy Policy
Frequent commenter MarcoPolo objects to my recent post on a progressive energy policy for two central reasons: • It would be disastrous economically. He writes, “The fossil fuel industry represents 28% of the US economy….Your plan would immediately lessen confidence …
