Michael Giberson I second Lynne’s recommendation of Yergin’s column in the Saturday Wall Street Journal. On the topic of Hubbert’s peak and peak oil generally, I particularly recommend these two paragraphs: Hubbert insisted that price didn’t matter. Economics—the forces of supply and demand—were, he maintained, irrelevant to the finite physical cache of oil in the …
Michael Giberson To Julian Simon-inspired resource optimists, this is news of the most ho-hum sort. Oh, so we think more resources now are available than previously expected because of improvements in technology? Nothing new under the sun. Humanity’s many-centuries-long trend of energy resources becoming cheaper continues into the indefinite future. If you believed that world …
More Oil Available in North America Than Previously Thought Read More »
Michael Giberson Yesterday the staff of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Az) conducted a “Solar Summit” in Washington, D.C. You can watch all three hours of the program here, or maybe you’d rather read the overview provided by Phil Riske at the Rose Law Group Blog, “Mayes, Spitzer bemoan congressional Republicans ‘retrenching’ against renewable energy funding and …
Interstate Commerce in Electric Power – Arizona Policymaker’s Two-faced View Read More »
Michael Giberson George Priest, professor of economics and law at Yale, clearly outlines the main errors of the Obama administration’s decision to oppose the AT&T/T-Mobile merger and cites relevant evidence backing the view: It is very difficult at an abstract level to know what the effects of a merger or acquisition will be on competition …
Another Good Response to the Obama Administration’s Mistaken Antitrust Policy Read More »
Michael Giberson Can Beacon Power patent the idea of using flywheel technology for frequency regulation? Apparently the answer is yes, at least according to Beacon’s press release. “Beacon Power invented the idea of using high-energy flywheels to regulate grid frequency, so it’s appropriate that we’ve now been awarded a core patent for the idea,” said …
Beacon Power Patents Idea of Flywheels for Frequency Regulation? Read More »
Michael Giberson Tony Wrigley’s new book is Energy and the English Industrial Revolution. He provides some flavor of the fundamental thesis of the book in a post at VoxEU.org: “Opening Pandora’s box: A new look at the industrial revolution“: The most fundamental defining feature of the industrial revolution was that it made possible exponential economic …
Michael Giberson Wisconsin didn’t have an anti-price gouging law in 2001, so the state government’s response to post-9/11 reports of gasoline price gouging was pretty limited. While the Wisconsin governor called for an investigation of gasoline retailers, for all practical purposes the investigation was limited to fighting collusion in price setting and instances in which stations …
Michael Giberson The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, created a great deal of uncertainty and fear among Americans. In the retail gasoline market, some (but not all) consumers reacted to the uncertainty and fear by heading to a gas station to fill up their tanks. Some (but not all) gasoline retailers reacted to the …
Post 9/11 Gasoline Price Gouging in Wisconsin: Two Views Read More »
Michael Giberson The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) have issued their report on the events surrounding electric power and natural gas supply interruptions around the Southwest United States in early February, 2001. The culprit? According to the press release: “the task force found a majority of the …
Michael Giberson At the Freakonomics blog, transportation scholar Eric Morris favors President Obama’s recent deal to dramatically raise CAFE standards (Corporate Automobile Fuel Economy standards) by 2025. A gasoline tax would be far superior public policy, he said, but it won’t work politically. Because he thinks CAFE standards do work, technically and politically, he said we should go with …
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