In following up on my last post about how insurance companies are retreating from providing coverage for the coal industry, here is information published by Sierra Club reaffirming that the retirement of coal plants is continuing unabated by anything that is happening in Washington right now. The information presented below speaks for itself but here are some of the highlights. …
The last post I sent you the other day was about what will shape up as a titanic battle between oil companies and electric utilities as cars and trucks switch from gas to electric. So, following up on that theme the following article is a fairly deep dive into the kind of investment and opportunity there exists in the transition.…
I’m sure that many of you read the New York Times and Thomas Friedman’s articles. This one I found particularly interesting not so much for the political commentary but for how he describes the current status of the climate. It’s worth a quick read of the entire article but here’s the most poignant parts for me. “it’s as if Mother…
“While electric-vehicle adoption remains small globally, and is expected to rise gradually, the prospect of a large-scale shift is setting up a showdown between oil companies and utilities over who will power tomorrow’s cars.” I am doing something a little different today. I am quoting the punch line above. Transition from fossil fueled vehicles to those powered by electricity (hopefully,…
As I have written about on many occasions, the world is increasingly moving on from fossil fuels to renewable and distributed energy. One of the reasons is that renewable energy now is cost competitive or cheaper that fossil fuels. This is especially true if the fossil fuel energy is from a new plant. Secondly, more and more it is being…
The following article appeared in the Wall Street Journal recently. It reveals how energy companies are viewing the future of automotive transportation. It also describes some of the investments that are being made in encouraging and preparing for a world full of electric vehicles (EV’s). While conventional wisdom continues to predict that a sizable portion of the market will still…
When Sierra Club began the effort to challenge the final permitting of a proposed coal fired power plant being built by Indeck in Elwood, Illinois southwest of Chicago near Joliet, we never could have imagined where we’d be some 16 years later. After 8 years Indeck threw in the towel and gave up. Now, burning coal to boil water to produce electricity is a…
If you go to my website, franklytalking.com, and look back over the years of posts, you’ll see quite a few are pointing out the economic and investment risk that climate change threatens. Gradually, over the past years, the alarm has been growing and growing. Undoubtedly, there is going to be disruption to “business as usual.” Enormous shifts of capital are…
There are some small obscure items that fly way under the public’s radar that can have an enormous impact on individuals and society. One of those is a regulation called NSR. That stands for New Source Review and falls under the Clean Air Act. This regulation for coal fired power plants controls the definition of what constitutes general maintenance and…
There are untold numbers of articles reiterating the fact that regardless of what the Trump Administration does about reducing the current CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) standards it would be insane for the auto manufacturers NOT to continue pushing forward on maximum fuel economy for their ICE’s (Internal Combustion Engines) and rollout of electric vehicles. The article below is one…