The Great Texas Wind Swindle: Property Owners vs. the State (Part I)

By Sam Pakan -- March 8, 2011 16 Comments

Editor Note: Sam Pakan (full biography below) is a rancher and writer living in Wheeler County, Texas. Part II discusses the environmental controversy regarding Texas’s latest wind development push.

The eastern Texas Panhandle, a land of rolling sand hills, tree-lined creek beds and tall grass vistas, may seem a desolate place to outsiders. Still, it has its beauty, especially to the cattle ranchers and wheat farmers who work and live on it. But not for long.

Much of this land–the fragile habitat of the Lesser Prairie Chicken and the Whooping Crane–is scheduled to become industrialized if the Texas Public Utility Commission (Texas PUC), the Department of Energy (DOE) and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) have their way. Incongruously, the demolition of this mostly native grassland is being proposed in the name of green energy.…

Continue Reading

Unconventional Gas Riles and Refigures the World Energy Market: The Oil Market (Part III)

By Donald Hertzmark -- February 24, 2011 6 Comments

Author’s note: No, I have not been in a cave for the past two weeks.  The impacts of unconventional gas on energy markets will be measured in months and years, not in days and weeks.  There is essentially nothing that current unconventional gas production can do to moderate crisis-driven escalation of oil prices and oil-linked LNG prices in the next few weeks.

In Part I and Part II of this series, the impacts of unconventional gas discoveries in the U.S., Australia, Canada and elsewhere were explored.  Gas-to-gas competition was seen as a powerful force for price moderation.

U.S. shale gas discoveries and production from coal bed methane (CBM) have already provided great benefits for energy consumers in the Atlantic Basin.  Gas-to-gas competition – shale v. LNG – has led to interesting market outcomes and investments. …

Continue Reading

'Losing the Future' via Government Jobs: FDR's New Deal; Obama's New New Deal

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- February 18, 2011 4 Comments

“Our greatest primary task is to put people to work. This is no unsolvable problem if we face it wisely and courageously. It can be accomplished in part by direct recruiting by the Government itself, treating the task as we would treat the emergency of a war, but at the same time, through this employment, accomplishing greatly needed projects to stimulate and reorganize the use of our natural resources.”

– Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933)

“[The 1930s Great Depression and today’s Great Recession] were preceded by extraordinary expansions of bank credit, which fueled run-up’s in stock prices and real estate values…. The two economic crises also elicited similar (and equally counterproductive ) fiscal policy responses, combining substantial increases in federal spending, financed primarily by bollorwing, with higher taxes and more regulatory controls on the private sector.”

Continue Reading

Green Enron (Part IV Interview with Robert L. Bradley Jr.)

By -- January 28, 2011 4 Comments

[This interview of Robert L. Bradley Jr. by Stephen Hicks (website here) is part of a series: Part I (Libertarianism and Energy); Part II (Expanding Energy Horizons); and Part III (Enron as a Political Company).]

Kaizen: You mentioned that Enron was also involved in lots of alternative energy sources—wind power, solar power, “green” energy, and that it was one of the first at the political table. Did Enron think that with the right kind of farsighted investment the new energies could be profitable?

Or was this again part of a political strategy: Alternative energy was a political favorite, certainly during the Clinton Administration years, when Al Gore was vice president? So Enron is getting a seat at the table; and whether alternative energy actually succeeds or not, it’s a good business strategy at least in the short term.

Continue Reading

Oxymoronic Windpower (Part I: Howlers)

By Jon Boone -- January 18, 2011 26 Comments Continue Reading

Energy Density: Robert Bryce's Powerful Energy Message

By MR Administrator -- January 14, 2011 6 Comments Continue Reading

'Hey America': 'Wonky' Climate Alarmism Coming at You (Big Science, Big Environment want to scare you into energy, economic retrogression)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- January 4, 2011 2 Comments Continue Reading

Energy at the Speed of Thought (Part 4: Free-Market Alternatives in Illumination and Transportation Energy)

By -- December 23, 2010 8 Comments Continue Reading

Road to Nowhere: Lomborg’s $250 Billion Throw for Renewables a Step Back for the ‘Skeptical Environmentalist’

By Jon Boone -- November 11, 2010 10 Comments Continue Reading

AB 32’s “Political Symbolism with Consequences” (Will California vote for recovery?)

By Daniel Simmons -- October 18, 2010 2 Comments Continue Reading