“The blame for the current energy crisis also falls on our industry for too often compliantly going along with the endless anti-hydrocarbon fashion of today.”
“If it is not for us to speak candidly, honestly and loudly about the critical role hydrocarbons play in the modern world, and most critically for those desiring simply to join the modern world, then who else will play this role?”
Playing offense against the critics of oil and gas is good business. It was courageous back then, and it is ESG’ish today. After all, none other than the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA), Fatih Birol, said More Oil Now. And so did U.S. DOE Secretary Jennifer Granholm.
Remember when Innovex Downhole Solutions called out North Face when the latter refused to fill a shirt order because the customer was an oil company?
…“… fossil fuels are a convenient, condensed source of energy that has helped raise living standards throughout much of the world.”
“We must all be aware that demands for effective policies will yield only superficial change as long as the role of special interests in government remains unaddressed.” (- James Hansen)
James Hansen speaks truth to power in a number of areas regarding energy and climate. There is a lot to like. But when it comes to public policy, he refuses to go where his sober analysis tells him. He is not ready to make a tectonic shift toward adaptation rather than mitigation, despite the latter’s impossible economic and policy math.
“Magical Thinking”
Magical thinking has plagued climate policy. Vaclav Smil has explained the problem with little pushback. Smil, in fact, is in the mainstream as shown by the NYT’s April 2022 article, “This Eminent Scientist Says Climate Activists Need to Get Real.”
James Hansen, father of the climate alarm, and a major activist today, also recognizes what Michael Mann, Andrew Dessler, and Mark Jacobson et al.
…“Extinction Rebellion (XR), Insulate Britain, Just Stop Oil and the other forces … what will you think if their actions take new, ever-more disruptive forms? … the only real options [are] meaningful and radical action or nothing at all.”
“[T]he people now lying in roads and charging into airports and refineries have conveyed the urgency of climate breakdown more successfully than anyone in a suit.” The Guardian, July 24, 2022
They are losing intellectually and in the court of public opinion. Yet the coercionists do not want to check their premises with intellectual rigor and practical application. Instead, they want to be angry and uncivil to the great majority who do not buy their exaggerations–and just want affordable, reliable energy now.
Here is a post from Zoe Cohen, self-described as having the passions of “safeguarding the future of our one, shared planetary home; with enabling and encouraging people to shine and to take action.”
She writes:
As I’ve been sharing and resharing here for three and a half years now….
…