Environmentalists fighting to ban oil and gas need to learn about the 30 percent of the barrel they ignore when they espouse a world powered exclusively by electricity generated by renewables. Replacing the organic properties of petroleum is a life-threatening void in the hubris of the enemies of mineral energies.

…it is estimated industrialized nations currently consume petrochemical products at a rate of 3.5 gallons of oil per day per person.

A recent opinion column in the Wall Street Journal, “You Can’t Build Roads Without Oil,” pointed out the fallacy of the “keep it in the ground” movement against fossil fuels. Forced energy transformationists want an end to the internal combustion engine and shuttered fossil-fuel-fired power plants. It is a wind-and-solar world with existing nuclear plants maybe to continue.…

Ed Note: This excerpt is from Erich Zimmermann, World Resources and Industries: A Functional Appraisal of the Availability of Agricultural and Industrial Resources (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1933).

“Harnessing the air for generating electric power … [is] engrossing the attention of scientists and technicians and may revolutionize the German electric industry. [Hermann] Honnef claims to have … overcome the drawback of the inconstancy of air currents which hitherto has been a handicap to the utilization of this source.” (1932)

Erich W. Zimmermann’s World Resources and Industries (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1933) is one of the towering tomes of energy and mineral thought. The treatise (850 pages) in the old tradition, wherein a scholar presents a unified system of thought and considers differing viewpoints.

It is a tradition that seems to have stalled, with the next-best-thing being the latest book from Vaclav Smil.…

“Assaad Razzouk needs to dial back the alarmism and comprehend the twin, inherent, fatal drawbacks of wind and solar: diluteness and intermittency. The scholarly work of Vaclav Smil, who has entered the mainstream as a voice of realism, is a great place to start.”

The business social-media site LinkedIn has an active traffic in energy and climate opinions. There can be legitimate debate, and some good first-hand knowledge about energy technology is imparted. “People are the best University” applies.

Recently, one Assaad Razzouk, Chief Executive Officer at Gurīn Energy, posted on greenwashing. In the climate alarmist camp, he wants radical energy transformation (government enabled, of course) and not the stuff we see all around us that qualifies as “look green” and get-the-tax-favors.

His new book, Saving the Planet Without the Bullshit, “clears a path through the clutter surrounding our daily efforts to do the right thing.”…

“… fossil fuels are a convenient, condensed source of energy that has helped raise living standards throughout much of the world.”

“We must all be aware that demands for effective policies will yield only superficial change as long as the role of special interests in government remains unaddressed.” (- James Hansen)

James Hansen speaks truth to power in a number of areas regarding energy and climate. There is a lot to like. But when it comes to public policy, he refuses to go where his sober analysis tells him. He is not ready to make a tectonic shift toward adaptation rather than mitigation, despite the latter’s impossible economic and policy math.

“Magical Thinking”

Magical thinking has plagued climate policy. Vaclav Smil has explained the problem with little pushback. Smil, in fact, is in the mainstream as shown by the NYT’s April 2022 article, “This Eminent Scientist Says Climate Activists Need to Get Real.”…