Aug
16th
Book Review: Turning Oil into Salt
By Sandor Schoichet
Turning Oil
Into Salt: Energy Independence Through Fuel
Choice
by Anne Korin, Gal
Luft
This slim volume is the clearest and most direct analysis I've yet seen of oil's position as a strategic commodity, and the potential for open fuel standards to enable a market-based pathway to transportation fuel choice. Especially notable for its independent perspective ... we hear so much about the need for 'drop in' petroleum equivalents and the 'ethanol blend wall', but not nearly enough about other approaches that might emulate the open interface model that has driven the phenomenal growth of the internet. Absolutely required reading for anyone interested in clean energy, the potential contribution of biofuels to achieving energy security, and the practical steps that we need to take to move down the path.
This slim volume is the clearest and most direct analysis I've yet seen of oil's position as a strategic commodity, and the potential for open fuel standards to enable a market-based pathway to transportation fuel choice. Especially notable for its independent perspective ... we hear so much about the need for 'drop in' petroleum equivalents and the 'ethanol blend wall', but not nearly enough about other approaches that might emulate the open interface model that has driven the phenomenal growth of the internet. Absolutely required reading for anyone interested in clean energy, the potential contribution of biofuels to achieving energy security, and the practical steps that we need to take to move down the path.
Aug
14th
Book Review: Why We Hate the Oil Companies
By Sandor Schoichet
Why We Hate the
Oil Companies: Straight Talk from an Energy
Insider
by John Hofmeister
Hofmeister writes with refreshing directness
and lack of pretense about two key ideas: the disconnect between
"political time" and "energy time" that drives legislative
dysfunction in energy and environmental planning; and his own
proposal for an independent Federal Energy Resources Board to fix
it. Most of the book is a walkthrough of the current US energy
business and infrastructure ... the "straight talk from an energy
insider" part. He convincingly lays out an array of problems with
the approaches advocated by just about everyone, from left-wing
environmentalists, to right-wing "infotainers", to the energy and
utility power industry itself ... with special scorn for the
disastrous and long-running failure of our elected officials of all
stripes to address our energy needs in a serious manner. The book
provides a prescient and unnerving in-depth background to current
newspaper reporting on the BP spill disaster in the Gulf (it went
to press just before the explosion and blowout). Hofmeister is on
less firm footing, however, when he switches to his proposal for an
independent energy regulatory agency modeled on the Federal
Reserve. While he surely gets an 'A' for boldness and for thinking
outside the box, how this is supposed to work and how we are
supposed to get there in advance of a national energy disaster akin
to the Great Depression, are both left up to "grassroots pressure."
All I can say is that I hope his non-profit, Citizens for
Affordable Energy.org, is successful at pushing his ideas onto the
national stage, and helping to build a consensus focus on practical
solutions. Highly recommended ... wherever you stand on these
complex issues, Hofmeister will push your buttons and make you
think about what a real solution might look
like.
Viewing 1 - 2 of 2
