Article round up - Obama climate plan, nuclear energy crunch and Egyptian unrest
It's been a manic couple of weeks which is why I haven't had a chance to update this blog. So here I am!
Toward the end of last month, I wrote critically about Obama's new climate plan. A lot of big names in the environment movement - including Bill McKibben and Dr Grist - praised the Obama plan and welcomed it as an important step forward. To some extent they were right, but what they missed completely - or certainly didn't say loud and clear - was that Obama's plan would do nothing to stop our current trajectory toward climate catastrophe well within this century. So I laid out the facts here, highlighting Obama's insistence on promoting fracking and nuclear energy.
At the beginning of July, I put an exclusive based on a new scientific paper claiming that we're heading of a global nuclear energy crunch due to uranium mining production shortages and price spikes that could lead to electricity blackouts for countries heavily invested in nuclear power. Check that out here. I plan to follow that up soon with more on the pros and cons of nuclear energy.
Then the Egyptian coup happened, toppling Morsi, and bringing in a new Army-run regime that swiftly went on to commit a massacre against Muslim Brotherhood protesters. Unfortunately, the structural dynamics fueling civil unrest in Egypt (and other countries in the region) are little understood, so I weighed in with a deeper analysis of how peak oil, climate crisis, urban poverty and IMF mismanagement conspired to keep people on the streets - and will do so for the foreseeable future unless there is a prospect of dramatic and radical social transformation. Read that here.
Toward the end of last month, I wrote critically about Obama's new climate plan. A lot of big names in the environment movement - including Bill McKibben and Dr Grist - praised the Obama plan and welcomed it as an important step forward. To some extent they were right, but what they missed completely - or certainly didn't say loud and clear - was that Obama's plan would do nothing to stop our current trajectory toward climate catastrophe well within this century. So I laid out the facts here, highlighting Obama's insistence on promoting fracking and nuclear energy.
At the beginning of July, I put an exclusive based on a new scientific paper claiming that we're heading of a global nuclear energy crunch due to uranium mining production shortages and price spikes that could lead to electricity blackouts for countries heavily invested in nuclear power. Check that out here. I plan to follow that up soon with more on the pros and cons of nuclear energy.
Then the Egyptian coup happened, toppling Morsi, and bringing in a new Army-run regime that swiftly went on to commit a massacre against Muslim Brotherhood protesters. Unfortunately, the structural dynamics fueling civil unrest in Egypt (and other countries in the region) are little understood, so I weighed in with a deeper analysis of how peak oil, climate crisis, urban poverty and IMF mismanagement conspired to keep people on the streets - and will do so for the foreseeable future unless there is a prospect of dramatic and radical social transformation. Read that here.