Grist | Topics | 620 Results

RESULTS		Results 301 – 325 of 620
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Headline	Author	Published	Section
Exx Appeal U.S. Supreme Court to hear appeal of Exxon Valdez damage award		30 Oct 2007	News
Posted at 6:07 AM on 30 Oct 2007 The U.S. Supreme Court agreed this week to hear ExxonMobil's appeal of the $2.5 billion in damages it was ordered to pay for the disastrous 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill. An Alaskan jury in 1994 originally ordered the company to pay $5 billion in damages, but the amount was cut in half by an appeals court last December. Now the $39.5-billion-a-year company is hoping the Supremes will further ...
Topics: litigation, news, oil, United States (all these topics)

Here to stay Why I don't agree with James Kunstler about peak oil and the 'end of suburbia'	Joseph Romm	29 Oct 2007	Gristmill
The remarkably low fueling cost of the best current hybrids (like the Toyota Prius) and future plug-in hybrids are major reasons I don't worry as much about peak oil as some do. James Kunstler, for instance, argues in his 2005 book The Long Emergency (see Rolling Stone excerpt here) that after oil production peaks, suburbia 'will become untenable' and 'we will have to say farewell to easy motoring.' In Rolling Stone, Kunstler writes, 'Suburbia will come to be reg ...
Topics: cars, energy, fuel efficiency, hybrids, oil (all these topics)

Get used to high oil prices No supply-side energy solution will come to our rescue	Joseph Romm	25 Oct 2007	Gristmill
No one is going to come to the rescue on the supply side -- and, of course, we remain stuck with an administration that doesn't believe in demand-reduction strategies. As the Wall Street Journal (subs. req'd) reported in "OPEC's Lever Loses Its Pull on Oil": Oil prices are hovering near historic highs, but consuming nations shouldn't expect quick relief from OPEC, the world's only source for big, quick supplies. For several reasons, the Organization ...
Topics: energy, oil (all these topics)

Good News for People Who Love Bad News Reports bring various doomy and gloomy predictions		22 Oct 2007	News
Posted at 1:52 PM on 22 Oct 2007 Indeed, the depressing reports come fast and furious. German-based Energy Watch Group says the world has already reached peak oil, and predicts that production will now fall by 7 percent a year. The Worldwatch Institute suggests that 21 cities that will have populations of 8 million or more by 2015 are highly vulnerable to havoc wreaked by rising seas. The comprehensive &qu ...
Topics: business, climate, climate change impacts, energy, news, oil, severe weather (all these topics)

The book to read on 'freedom from oil' Sandalow explains the ins and outs of oil dependency	Joseph Romm	19 Oct 2007	Gristmill
For years, I have been looking for a good, readable book on the oil problem and its solution -- just as I'd been looking for a good book on clean technology. Well, I found the Clean Tech book in August, and now I've found the oil book. It is Freedom from Oil, by Brookings scholar and White House veteran David Sandalow. It is an unqualified success -- cleverly told as a series of policy memos from the cabinet of a near-future President, who begins the book by tellin ...
Topics: books, energy, international politics, oil, politics (all these topics)

What a Way to Go A review of a new doomer cult classic	JMG	13 Oct 2007	Gristmill
Some years ago I was alerted to the problem of peak oil by a friend from Bellingham, Wash., way up in the upper left corner of the continental U.S. A nuclear physicist and astronomer, the smartest guy I know, and no doubt someone who uses the serial comma, he had this to say about a new movie called What a Way to Go: Life at the end of empire:Before I committed the college to spend $500 for the viewing, I watched a copy a friend had purchased - all by myself. It was so powerful ...
Topics: energy, movies, oil (all these topics)

The tar sands Canada's version of liquid coal	Joseph Romm	11 Oct 2007	Gristmill
Canada has about as much recoverable oil in its tar sands as Saudi Arabia has conventional oil. They should leave most of it in the ground. Tar sands are pretty much the heavy gunk they sound like, and making liquid fuels from them requires huge amounts of energy for steam injection and refining. Canada is currently producing about one million barrels of oil a day from the tar sands, and that is projected to triple over the next two decades. The tar sands a ...
Topics: Canada, energy, oil, oil sands (all these topics)

Responsible development of fossil fuels? The energy department's strategic unconventional fuels fantasy	Joseph Romm	04 Oct 2007	Gristmill
The DOE's Strategic Unconventional Fuels Task Force has issued its surreal final report: Responsible development of America's oil shale, tar sands, heavy oil, coal, and oil resources amenable to recovery by carbon dioxide injection, by private industry, supported and encouraged by government actions to reduce uncertainties and stimulate investment, could supply all of the Department of Defense's domestic fuels demand by 2016, and supply upwards of 7 million barrel ...
Topics: energy, fossil fuels, oil, politics (all these topics)

Hint: Two words that both start with 'c' Why $100-per-barrel oil would be no big deal	Tom Philpott	01 Oct 2007	Gristmill
At current levels of around $80 per barrel, oil prices have leapt nearly eightfold since 1998. Many observers would have predicted economic disaster from such a leap, but the global economy just keeps chugging along. An interesting article in Saturday's Wall Street Journal reports that many analysts figure that $100/barrel oil is on the way -- and that the global economy will shrug that off, too. I was working in Mexico as a finance reporter in 1998-99, and wro ...
Topics: business, energy, oil (all these topics)

The War on Error Inspector general's report finds problems with royalty-collection program at Interior		26 Sep 2007	News
Posted at 6:57 AM on 26 Sep 2007 A new report by the U.S. Interior Department's inspector general points to a "profound failure" of the technology that the Minerals Management Service uses to monitor the roughly $10 billion in oil and gas royalty payments from energy companies each year. But it's not just the technology. Higher-ups in the agency apparently decided that even after cat ...
Topics: business, Department of Interior, news, oil, politics (all these topics)

Greenspan vs. Naomi Klein and Amy Goodman A remarkable bit of radio on Democracy Now	Tom Philpott	25 Sep 2007	Gristmill
I agree with Joseph Romm that Alan Greenspan is way overrated. Sure, he declares in his new book that "I'm saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows -- the Iraq war is largely about oil." But he adds in his very next sentence, to paraphrase: And that's a good thing. Yes, he supported the war because he saw it as essential to maintaining a smooth flow of oil. Everything else, for him, was political window dressing. ...
Topics: climate, energy, oil, politics (all these topics)

Alan Greenspan is very overrated: Part I Greenspan on energy	Joseph Romm	22 Sep 2007	Gristmill
Greenspan is no polymath, to go by the discussions of energy and climate in his instant bestseller, The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World. During his nuclear power love-fest, he writes (p. 453): Nuclear power is not safe without a significant protective infrastructure. But then, neither is drinking water. Wow! That's an analogy I bet you never heard before. Greenspan is actually comparing drinking water infrastructure -- which is needed mainly to p ...
Topics: books, energy, oil (all these topics)

Knowing as little as possible: a candidate competition Thompson and Romney quibble over oil drilling in the Everglades	Brian Beutler	20 Sep 2007	Gristmill
Here's a fun game for campaign reporters: Ask Fred Thompson questions. The results are often hilarious: Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson seemed taken by surprise when asked Tuesday about oil drilling in the Everglades, apparently unaware it's been a major Florida issue. Before answering, he laughed at the question. 'Gosh, no one has told me that there's any major reserves in the Everglades, but maybe that's one of the things I need to learn whi ...
Topics: energy, Florida, Mitt Romney, national parks, oil, oil and gas drilling, politics (all these topics)

O Canada, what are you doing? Tar sands are the enemy of the planet	Jon Rynn	14 Sep 2007	Gristmill
Our civilization's addiction to oil is being displayed in all its nefarious glory in the tar sands of Canada. According to Chris Nelder: What we have here is arguably the most environmentally destructive activity man has ever attempted, with a compliant government, insatiable demand, and an endless supply of capital turning it into 'a speeding car with a gas pedal and no brakes.' It sucks down critical and rapidly diminishing amounts of both natural gas and water, paying ...
Topics: Canada, energy, oil, oil sands (all these topics)

The Spillage Voice EPA says oil spill in Brooklyn, N.Y., may be larger than originally thought		14 Sep 2007	News
Posted at 6:04 AM on 14 Sep 2007 A giant oil spill that's been languishing underground in Brooklyn, N.Y.'s Greenpoint neighborhood since at least the 1950s might not be as big as first thought -- it's likely even bigger! Initial estimates pegged the spill, which came from a number of petroleum facilities in the 1950s, at 17 million gallons, but a new U.S. EPA report says the spill could be as large as ...
Topics: New York City, news, oil, toxics (all these topics)

A slippery (upward) slope Demand for oil remains strong despite price increases	Clark Williams-Derry	13 Sep 2007	Gristmill
I was wrong. Back in the summer of '05, when oil prices were flirting with $60 per barrel, I predicted that oil would surpass $70 before it fell below $50. That is, I thought that oil prices would continue to rise in the short term. I got that part right. Oil prices on the futures market briefly touched the $70-mark that fall, and reached the mid-$70s by the following spring. But I also predicted that oil would fall to $40 per barrel before it rea ...
Topics: climate, energy, oil (all these topics)

Oil, Oil, Oil and Trouble Six explosions rock oil and gas pipelines in Mexico		11 Sep 2007	News
Posted at 6:06 AM on 11 Sep 2007 In what appears to have been a string of politically motivated attacks, explosions rocked at least six oil and natural-gas pipelines in Mexico's state of Veracruz on Monday. The pipelines that were hit are all owned by Mexico's petro-monopoly Pemex and occurred at opposite ends of Veracruz state. Some 15,000 people were evacuated from various towns and cities near the explosions afterw ...
Topics: Mexico, news, oil, politics (all these topics)

Give Bush some (perverse) credit for emissions drop Spike in gasoline prices is partially due to Bush's weak energy policy	Joseph Romm	04 Sep 2007	Gristmill
The Washington Post reported that President Bush made the following claim at a fundraiser: Do you realize that the United States is the only major industrialized nation that cut greenhouse gases last year? The Post noted immediately that the White House 'was unable to substantiate the claim' because they really don't know what other industrialized nations have done. But does Bush deserve any credit for the unusual U.S. drop in emissions? I say yes, but only in a ...
Topics: energy, George Bush, oil, politics (all these topics)

The Shrimp and Petroleum Festival... ... for real	Roz Cummins	30 Aug 2007	Gristmill
It sounds like an unappetizing combination, I know, but it's for real: http://www.shrimp-petrofest.org/
Topics: fishing, food, funnies, Louisiana, oil (all these topics)

Rule four of offsets: No enhanced oil recovery Injecting CO2 into oil wells is not real carbon sequestration	Joseph Romm	24 Aug 2007	Gristmill
Capturing CO2 and injecting it into a well to squeeze more oil out of the ground is not real carbon sequestration. Why? When the recovered oil is burned, it releases at least as much CO2 as was stored (and possibly much more). Therefore, CO2 used for such enhanced oil recovery (EOR) does not reduce net carbon emissions and should not be sold to the public as a carbon offset. Yet a company, Blue Source, LLC, proposes to do just that: to capture the CO2 from a f ...
Topics: carbon offsets, carbon sequestration, climate, climate change mitigation, energy, oil (all these topics)

Victory, with a catch BP promises to stop dumping waste into the Great Lakes	Jon Rynn	24 Aug 2007	Gristmill
On July 15, the Chicago Tribune reported that BP wanted to significantly increase the discharge of ammonia and toxic wastes into the Great Lakes. The outcry was enormous -- even Republican congressmen from the area joined in the criticism, and several powerful congressional members, including Rahm Emanuel in the House and Barack Obama in the Senate, threatened hearings. The city of Chicago was considering legal action, and a large petition drive began. Apparently the pol ...
Topics: business, Chicago, energy, George Bush, Indiana, oil, waste, water pollution (all these topics)

Big Oil's biggest toadies And the 'Climate Balls of Steel' award goes to ...	Glenn Hurowitz	22 Aug 2007	Gristmill
A new report penned by the environmental movement's genius uber-strategist Daniel J. Weiss of The Center for American Progress and his alliterative sidekick Anne Wingate examines exactly how big Big Oil's influence on individual members of Congress is. Working with OpenSecrets.org, Weiss and Wingate found that the 189 members who opposed a Democratic measure to redirect $16 billion in oil and gas subsidies to clean energy like wind and solar received on average $109,2 ...
Topics: Big Oil, energy, oil, politics (all these topics)

Don't go to BP Amoco! And don't piss off Pearl Jam	Sarah van Schagen	21 Aug 2007	Gristmill
BP's sludge dumpage into Lake Michigan has a whole mess of people pissed off. Including green-leaning band Pearl Jam, who performed an angry li'l ditty at this year's Lollapalooza festival. The lyrics are pretty simple; sing it with me: "Don't go to BP Amoco!"
Topics: business, energy, music, oil, waste, water pollution (all these topics)

Pricey oil, more carbon From the Boston Globe, the dirty truth about 'alternative energy'	Tom Philpott	21 Aug 2007	Gristmill
Referring to high oil prices, the billionaire airline magnate Richard Branson recently declared, "Thank God it's happened ... A high oil price is what we needed to actually wake up the world" to the reality of climate change. (This from a man who openly pines for a techno fix that will allow us to burn through all the fossil fuel we want, and enjoy our climate, too.) David and others have made the point before, but it bears repeating: High oil prices do ...
Topics: energy, oil (all these topics)

How bad is peak oil, really? Would the biosphere care?	Jon Rynn	20 Aug 2007	Gristmill
Recently we've had a couple of discussions here at Gristmill concerning various aspects of peak oil; that is, the assertion that very soon (if it hasn't happened already) the global supply of oil will peak, and even though demand is going up, supply will start to come down, so prices will skyrocket. It seems to me that some of the contention in these discussions boils down to the question: would it really be so bad if the oil started running out? After all, we would ...
Topics: biofuels, climate, coal, energy, oil, placemaking, public transportation (all these topics)

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