Unconventional Gas Riles and Refigures the World Energy Market: The Pacific and Asia (Part II)

By Donald Hertzmark -- February 17, 2011 1 Comment

In Part 1 of this series, the trends in U.S. unconventional gas output in were explored. The impacts on gas markets — $3–5/MMBtu — were noted. If unconventional gas puts pressure on LNG and Gazprom, can this supply and supplier turn to Asia as their new market? Maybe, and just for a while. (1)

1.1.1 Australia’s Experience with Coal Seam Gas

CSG accounts for almost 15% of Australia’s growing gas production, and as much as 30% of probable reserves. LNG plants based on CSG are slated to commence production in 2014, with production of 794 Bcf/y (~16.7 mtpa). Australia’s CSG is believed to occur roughly above shale gas basins, raising the possibility of further unconventional production. Figure 1 shows the CSG, conventional gas fields and transmission infrastructure in Australia’s Queensland State.…

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'Sustainability': Some Free Market Reflections

By -- February 11, 2011 20 Comments

A few months ago, I participated in a symposium entitled, “A Sustainable Energy State — How Remote Is the Possibility?” I prepared some talking points for the event and, heeding the injunction to re-use and recycle, turn them here into a MasterResource column.

The following reflections make three main points: (1) A “sustainable” energy system, as that term is commonly used, will likely not materialize in our lifetimes; (2) except for heavily-subsidized wind, solar, and biofuel energy, the current, largely fossil fuel-based energy system is already sustainable; and (3) the “sustainable energy” agenda imperils the improving state of the world and, therefore, is politically unsustainable.

Just around the Corner (Not!)

How “remote” is the “possibility” of a “Sustainable Energy State”? That depends, of course, on the meaning of sustainability. When environmental advocates call wind farms, solar power, or “next generation” biofuels “sustainable,” they imply that energy is sustainable only if it is carbon-neutral or non-emitting.…

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Oxymoronic Windpower (Part II: Windspeak)

By Jon Boone -- January 19, 2011 17 Comments

Windspeak: Language used by those who profit financially, politically, or ideologically from wind technology that disguises, distorts, or reverses the meanings of words in order to promote the technology. Oxymorons, which combine incongruous or contradictory terms, abound in windspeak—viz, windpower, wind capacity, responsible windpower (double oxymoron), windfarms, windparks, wind jobs, wind reliability workshops, and wind as alternate energy. Generally any claim made for the technology in windspeak produces the virtually opposite effect in reality.

With the right story and no accountability, Madison Avenue can sell fantasy wholesale. Rock Hudson’s ad executive did just this 50 years ago in the charming send-up to our commercial culture, Lover Come Back, when he successfully marketed a non-existent product, VIP.

Nothing illustrates this idea better than the au courant fantasia about wind technology, where public relations legerdemain has deployed the power of windspeak to give wind a complete makeover, transforming a klutzy pretender into a seemingly benevolent superhero unbound by the laws of physics and even its own history.…

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Oxymoronic Windpower (Part I: Howlers)

By Jon Boone -- January 18, 2011 26 Comments

Definitions:

Howler: A ridiculous idea or proposition, one that elicits howling laughter; also, a type of magic spell from the Harry Potter series.

Bellyfeel: A blind, enthusiastic acceptance of an idea, taken from George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, where any good Oceanian internalizes Party doctrine such that it becomes gut instinct—a feeling in the belly.

Blackwhite: In Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, a word that has two contradictory meanings, used to convey how people have been propagandized to believe that black is white while never realizing that the reverse might be true. It is the ultimate achievement of newspeak that requires a continuous alteration of the past made possible by a system of controlled thought.

Every major claim made by those who would profit, either financially or ideologically, from wind technology is replete with Owellian doublespeak.…

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2010: The Year that Climate Alarmism Melted

By -- January 3, 2011 5 Comments Continue Reading

Energy at the Speed of Thought (Part I: The Original Alternative Energy Market)

By -- December 20, 2010 16 Comments Continue Reading

“Clean Energy Standards”: The Sky is the (Price) Limit

By -- December 17, 2010 8 Comments Continue Reading

Climate Hearings in the 112th Congress: GOP Chairmen Will Need Talent Like Jim’s

By -- December 14, 2010 6 Comments Continue Reading

Cape Wind: Spreading the Pain

By -- December 13, 2010 8 Comments Continue Reading

Energy and Poverty – What is Really at Stake in Cancun

By Donald Hertzmark -- December 6, 2010 8 Comments Continue Reading