Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The California Energy Commission reports that in the second quarter of this year, 25% of new vehicle registrations in that state were zero emissions electric cars. Moving rapidly to electric vehicles makes the US more secure geopolitically, since oil states such as Saudi Arabia and Russia can no longer use […]
Oceans Hit Hottest Average Temperature ever Recorded, endangering Ecosystems on which We Depend
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The world’s oceans hit an average temperature of 20.96°C (69.728°F ) this week, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service. It is the highest average ocean temperature ever recorded, beating a previous record from 2016. So reports Rosie Frost at Euronews. Climate scientists at the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change […]
Israeli Extremists Shamefully propose “Puerto Rican” Model for Palestinians
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Yair Wallach in a post at X notes that Jewish Power Party member Amihay Eliyahu proposes that Palestinians be treated by Israel as Puerto Ricans are by the United States. This is a horrible and outrageous idea from the extremist corner of the Israeli far right, which Tamir Pardo, a […]
Climate Change is the New Mideast Extremism — Iraq Hottest Place on Earth, as Iran goes into Lockdown
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The deadly effects of ideological extremism in the Middle East for the past few decades have caused governments and journalists to focus on it. The Arabic word is al-taṭarruf. I was interested, however, to see the word put to a different purpose in a Sky News Arabia article , where […]
Trump’s Indictment for Jan. 6: Revisiting “Psychopathocracy”
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – A Grand Jury empaneled by Special Prosecutor Jack Smith has issued an indictment (full text here) against Donald John Trump on four counts, Smith delivered a statement, saying, “Today, an indictment was unsealed charging Donald J. Trump with conspiring to defraud the United States, conspiring to disenfranchise voters, and conspiring […]
In 2024, China will hit Peak Gasoline, with its Demand on a Downward Spiral ever After
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Yale Environment 360 points to recent energy reports as suggesting that China will hit peak gasoline next year. That is, after 2024 the country’s demand for gasoline to fuel automobiles will fall every year. China was one of the last advanced economies to lift COVID-19 restrictions, as President Xi Jinping […]
Could Solar Panel Arrays in Earth Orbit provide all the Clean Electricity We’d Ever Need?
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The European Space Agency isn’t as well known in the U.S. as NASA or even Roscosmos, the Russian space agency. The $7 bn.-a-year agency funded by 22 European states, however, has what could turn out to be a game-changing idea for solar power. ESA is contemplating installing a solar panel […]
WMO: July to be Hottest month on Record, as World enters era of Global Boiling, Global Burning
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The World Meteorological Association said this weekend as July comes to a close that it will have been the hottest month in recorded history. Its first three weeks were certainly the hottest on record. It likely will have been the hottest month in 120,000 years. Modern homo sapiens as a […]
Renewable Energy poised to overtake Coal, Providing 1/3 of Global Electricity: IEA
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The International Energy Agency’s report on electricity markets is out and it has some good news. Depending on how cold the winters are, the IEA expects renewable sources of energy to outstrip coal in 2024, and forever thereafter. It calls this change “structural.” That is, it isn’t a blip or […]