Energy

Let’s talk about “value.”  Value, at its simplest, is merely the consequences of acting upon the world in a manner which “improves” (some might say despoils) some part of it.  If, for example, someone takes a pile of timber, a saw and some glue and nails, and then turns it …

There is a story, attributed to Richard Buckminster Fuller, which uses the development of bridges as an example of technological progress.  The story begins with two groups of humans separated by a large ravine.  They can shout across to each other, and they soon come to understand each other’s language.  …

Neoliberalism’s greatest success is about to be revealed as its greatest weakness.  In the 1970s – the previous inflation that the central bank generals are trying to fight – the perceived threat came from over-powerful trade unions and a too-protective welfare safety net, which together, the neoliberals argued, had driven …

Here’s something which will likely be universally unpopular:  The government shouldn’t do anything to subsidise energy prices.  I say this in the face of a £700 or so increase on annual bills announced today.  And this is just the beginning, because, as Nils Pratley at the Guardian points out, when …

It’s half past three on a cold Friday afternoon in mid-January.  The temperature is just five degrees centigrade.  The sun is already low on the winter horizon.  There is barely a breath of wind.  Once again, Britain sits beneath cold high-pressure air.  And once again we have had to turn …

The establishment media are suspiciously silent about the energy crunch facing Europe in general and the UK in particular.  In October, when the wholesale gas price spiked at 400 percent above its January 2021 level, energy prices were headline news.  So too was the sight of energy supply companies falling …

The recent, spectacular increase in the price of gas has created a sense of crisis not seen outside the financial sector since the early 1980s.  In Europe in general and the UK in particular, it has begun to expose the folly of having an economy entirely dependent upon imports; including …

Elizabeth Holmes, Chairman and CEO of Theranos, is a living archetype for the modern age.  Lauded by upmarket glossy magazines and heralded as a symbol of modern feminism, Holmes was the world’s first female tech billionaire.  In the tradition of Apple’s Steve Jobs and Tesla’s Elon Musk, Holmes was a …

It is of some interest that people have been contrasting images of British petrol queues this weekend with the petrol queues which formed back in 1973 as a result of the OPEC oil embargo.  Not least because a more accurate comparison is with the fuel protests in September 2000.  That …

Believe it or not, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has every right to stand before the nations of the world and lecture them on climate change.  Not that Johnson himself has done much to address the crisis (indeed, given that having children is the single biggest cause of climate change …