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A Try at Electric Vehicles: Samuel Insull a Century Ago

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 3, 2023

Ed. Note: The current government-led drive for battery electric vehicles (EVs) can be informed by history. In the 1890s through about 1920, electric vehicles went from market dominance to market rejection, outcompeted by the gasoline-powered internal combustion engine. This post, and others at MasterResource (here and here), revisit the early history of the electric vehicle.

Electricity was the early front runner for horseless carriages, and the great man of electric utilities, Samuel Insull, got out in front. In 1898, Chicago Edison opened battery-charging stations and offered promotional rates to jumpstart this market. “Load-leveling” rates meant cheap off-peak charging at wholesale to serve this embryonic market.

In 1899, Insull became president of the $25 million Illinois Electrical Vehicle Transportation Company, the western branch of the Columbia Automobile Company of New York, to market electric cabs and carriages in Chicago.…

Wind-financed Exposé against Kevon Martis Backfires

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 1, 2023

“Delegitimization is a favorite tactic of the climate alarmist/forced energy transformation lackeys. They cannot conceive that a moral, reasonable person can be against a scheme to impose ‘clean’ energy on townships (really ‘machine up’ the great outdoors). Kevon Martis proves them wrong, and they cannot accept it. What will they come up with next?”

Kevon Martis has been profiled numerous times at MasterResource. His grassroots-truth-to-wind-power has been a game changer in Michigan and elsewhere. And he is a regular fellow, the epitome of the hard-working, successful American.

A news story by Michigan Capitol Confidential (Mackinac Center for Public Policy) tells the backstory of an attempted ‘hit job’ on Martis by a Leviathan. The article by Jamie Hope (March 28, 2023), “Wind industry declares war on Michigan man,” is one that should resonate with every citizen of every town threatened by government-enabled industrial wind turbines and/or solar arrays.…

The Infrastructure Overload of Renewable Energies

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 25, 2023

“The planned energy transition towards ‘net zero’ using ‘renewable’ energy, will inevitably lead to massive environmental destruction, with a six-times increase in environmental damage by 2050. This is concluded by scientists in a recent study [in Nature].” (below)

Highlighting a Nature scientific report, “Spatial Energy Density of Large-scale Electricity Generation from Power Sources Worldwide” [1], Hans Wolkers, science journalist, photographer, and writer, recently reported on social media:

Renewables lead to more destruction of ecosystems

The planned energy transition towards ‘net zero’ using ‘renewable’ energy, will inevitably lead to massive environmental destruction, with a six-times increase in environmental damage by 2050. This is concluded by scientists in a recent study (https://lnkd.in/emQwZBi2).
 
The EU has adopted a net-zero strategy that comes with the installation of even more wind turbines and solar panels.…

Resourceful Earth Day: Fred Smith on Julian Simon

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 22, 2023

Federal Fiscal Reform: The Economists’ Letter

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 21, 2023

Solar Optimism and Coal Alarmism a Century Ago

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 19, 2023

“Degrowth” (Last refuge for climate alarmists?)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 18, 2023

Battery Weight: Hidden Costs of EVs versus ICEs

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 16, 2023

On RCP 8.5 IPCC Exaggeration

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 12, 2023

Southeast Ratebase Debacles: Tony Bartelme Revisited (nuclear, CO2 capture)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 6, 2023