Britain has – apparently – been thrown into crisis overnight.  Meanwhile across the channel, French president Macron is desperately trying to extinguish the flames of another weekend of mass protests that have now spread to Belgium and Holland.  In Eastern Europe the hard-right are gaining support; even undermining the previously …

There is a mismatch between the fracking companies’ investment brochures and the cash flow recorded in their accounts.  In the years after the financial crash, this did not seem to matter too much.  In the face of near zero percent interest rates elsewhere, the fast-growing US fracking industry offered one …

Rather like being pregnant or dead, you are either in or not in the European Union.  We now know this because, at the end of two years’ negotiating, Theresa May has come back with a bodged Brexit deal that is unacceptable to both the Vote Leave and the Vote Remain …

Despite a series of stock market scares, see-sawing oil prices and central banks jacking up interest rates, it seems likely that we are going to get through 2018 without experiencing the economic crash that many expected at the start of the year.  But while we may breathe a sigh of …

Recession was expected to follow when oil prices spiked up to $80 per barrel earlier this year.  Instead, increased output from Saudi Arabia and a series of exemptions for countries importing Iranian oil have helped prices fall back to a less recessionary $50 per barrel. In response, US President Trump …

Among the many disagreements between environmental campaigners, government ministers and business leaders, there is one central point of agreement – renewable energy harnessing technologies are the solution.  While campaigners may rail against the lack of commitment to deploy these technologies, only a minority among them is prepared to contemplate an …

If there is one thing economic journalists love it is a “mystery.”  A popular favourite in recent years has been the famous “productivity mystery” in which, despite full employment, both output and wages have remained depressed.  This month saw another – somewhat similar – conundrum; the “energy-GDP mystery.”  A peculiarly …

Repeat after me, very slowly: There is no such thing as EXTERNAL on a finite planet.  This phrase ought to be printed in 24pt text at the very start of every economics textbook.  And no, I am not being pedantic here.  The prevailing belief among economists that there are things …

For all the talk about electric cars and renewable electricity, global oil production rose above 100 million barrels a day last month.  For all the policy pronouncements to the contrary, the stark reality remains that our insatiable demand for oil, the products of oil, and all of the stuff that …

Renewable energy campaigners were quick to welcome a European Court decision to ban the UK’s electricity capacity auctions last week.  The court ruled that the auctions – which are designed to ensure that additional capacity is available at times of high demand (such as during the “Beast from the East” …