At any given moment, 20 million people are video chatting with friends and relatives in distant lands. Skype, the ingenious software that makes this possible, was developed in Estonia, a tiny nation in northern Europe, hard on the Baltic Sea. Ocean-going tribes, sometimes called “pagan raiders,” have lived in Estonia for thousands of years. During World […]
Randy Udall
Posted inWotr
High Noon for solar
You know what fries my bacon? In 2011, Germany installed more solar power in one year than Americans have in 50. If it were just the industrious Germans, I could probably handle it. But the laid-back, Fiat-driving Italians did the same thing. The Italians! The technology was invented at Bell Labs back in the 50s, […]
Posted inWotr
Fracking is the big new gun
New technologies are riderless horses. They have a mind of their own and go where they want. Someone invents the personal computer, and 40 years later you spend hours each day surfing the Internet. Travel agents disappear, software engineers are born. Outside Las Vegas, soldiers sit in darkened rooms piloting drones with joysticks, raining hellfire […]
Posted inDecember 21, 2009: Wind Resistance
The big bonfire
The U.S. already has a de facto climate policy
Posted inAugust 17, 2009: From Corn to Cabernet
Mission critical
Can natural gas help save us from global warming?
Posted inJune 15, 2009: Let's Get Small
Renewables: The Final Frontier
Why historian Vaclav Smil thinks there are no easy solutions to our energy problems
Posted inMarch 2, 2009: How low will it go?
The little island that could
Last fall, a Viking washed up on my doorstep. His name was Soren Hermansen. For the past 10 years, he has spearheaded one of the most audacious experiments in the world: the attempt of 4,000 people living on the small Danish island of Samso to liberate themselves from fossil fuel. A few weeks after being […]
Posted inAugust 4, 2008: Hostile Takeover
Drilling with Charlie
Drilling holes into the earth is an audacious act with an ancient history. Many centuries ago, the Chinese were drilling wells 1,000 feet deep. In the 1860s, as the giant marine mammals grew scarce, American whalers came ashore and began harpooning the planet, hoping to strike “rock oil.” Earth may resemble a big rock, but […]
Posted inWotr
The energy we take for granted is becoming scarce
A modern snowmobile is more powerful than any machine that existed on the planet 200 years ago. In an hour you can be 20 miles from the nearest road, high-marking a corniced ridge. But if the engine breaks or you run out of gas, how quickly the tables can turn. One minute you are omnipotent, […]
Posted inMarch 17, 2008: Seeking the Water Jackpot
Falling off the heat ladder
Or … Daniel Boone never dug a snow cave
Posted inWotr
It’s time to call the gas industry’s bluff
There’s been a steep falloff in friendly chitchat around the local gas pumps, and no wonder. With diesel at $3.40 a gallon and gasoline only somewhat cheaper, it’s common to see someone drop $100 on a tankfull. A typical American family will spend more than $3,000 on liquid fuels this year, and another two grand […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Time to call the gas industry’s bluff
There’s been a steep falloff in friendly chit-chat around the local gas pumps, and no wonder. With diesel at $3.40 a gallon and gasoline only somewhat cheaper, it’s common to see someone drop $100 on a tankful. The Pump N Pay is as glum as a morgue. A typical American family will spend more than […]
Posted inWotr
Oil shale is still a pig in a poke
More than half the world’s oil shale is found in Utah and Colorado, and for a century, men have tried to unlock this energy source. The rocks have proved stubborn, promising much, delivering little. “I find it disturbing that we import oil from Canadian tar sands, even though our oil shale resource remains undeveloped,” complains […]
Posted inDecember 23, 2002: In search of the Glory Days
An ode to the Marstons
Dear HCN, Your readers are probably drowning you in Marston tributes, as they should. Here’s mine: Ed and Betsy: Thanks for coming West, And caring so much, and working so hard, on behalf of the paper and the region. You cared about the people here, and about all our prickly Western dilemmas. And you loved […]
Posted inNovember 19, 2001: Bringing back the bosque
We are the Oil Tribe
I’ve been visiting drilling rigs lately. For an environmentalist, it’s an education. Rugged tattooed men, macho diesel pickups and in-your-face bumper stickers: EARTH FIRST! WE’LL DRILL THE OTHER PLANETS LATER. In a country with 210 million automobiles, only 250 rigs search for oil in America. That seems a small number until you realize that the […]