Hydraulic fracturing, also known as “fracking,” is a technique for recovering oil and natural gas from shale rock formations once too costly to develop. The use of fracking is sweeping the nation, resulting in a surge in production that has made the U.S. the single-largest producer of both oil and natural gas in the world, a feat that was unthinkable just a decade ago.
Ohio sits above the Utica and Marcellus shales, two geologic formations that have rich energy potential waiting to be unlocked by the process of hydraulic fracturing, commonly referred to as “fracking.” Increased energy production has the potential to be a powerful economic engine for unemployed Ohioans, but the debate over hydraulic fracturing has served to highlight the natural and political fault lines running through the state.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Government · Regulation
Panel 8 of the 9th International Conference on Climate Change was on the subject of “Costs and Benefits of Renewable Energy.” The panel was focused on the subject of renewable energy, specifically the high cost and potentially devastating economic consequences produced by the federal government’s efforts to replace the current energy sources with renewables.
Almost every day we hear about severe weather events—wildfires in Colorado, droughts in California, polar vortexes in Wisconsin. Often we are told it’s all our fault, that the carbon dioxide we release into the atmosphere by driving our cars, having a summer campfire, even when we exhale, is causing dangerous climate change. And regardless of whether the evidence supports these claims or not—we must change our ways, we are told.
Newton’s 3rd law of motion, if applied to bureaucracy, would state: “Whenever politicians attempt to force change on a market, the long-term results will be equal and opposite to those[…]
While we weren’t paying attention, post-war Iraq grew into a major force in the global oil market. Reaching a 30-year high, its production and exports have climbed steadily since 2011—making Iraq the second largest producer in OPEC, the seventh globally. The International Energy Agency (EIA) has forecast that Iraq has the fifth-largest proven oil reserves.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a technique to remove natural gas and oil from shale formations, has been under withering assault from environmental groups for much of the last decade. Fracking has been blamed for contamination of drinking water, air pollution, earthquakes, water shortages, global warming, radiation discharge, and even cancer. But it appears that environmentalists have lost the battle against fracking.
Several Hollywood elites were recently caught red-handed on videotape, agreeing to take money from a Middle Eastern oil sheikh for another anti-fracking movie. Their actions were shameful, but they felt no shame – only anger at the folks who caught them in the act. Indeed, the ironies are matched only by their hypocrisy and disdainful disregard for the consequences of their anti-fracking fervor.
U.S. oil and natural gas production has skyrocketed in recent years thanks to hydraulic fracturing, a technology that allows engineers to access deep-underground resources from rock formations once too expensive to develop. This technology has made the United States the largest producer of natural gas in the world and on track to surpass Saudi Arabia as the leading producer of oil by 2015. The entire U.S. public benefits from this inexpensive domestic source of fuel.
Following my appearance on the Daily Show, I’ve received emails and phone calls from people who don’t agree with my views about energy and the advantages America’s energy abundance provides—benefits that drive both progress and prosperity.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Politics
Despite the war-like hostility of the Obama administration to the traditional carbon based energy that fueled the industrial revolution, the entrepreneurship and modern technology of America’s private economy is producing a boom in oil and gas production that is overwhelming President Obama.
After the global warming-battling Edwardsport coal gasification power plant used more power than it generated during the September-to-November time-frame, earlier this month information filed with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission showed the Duke Energy facility operated at less than 1 percent of capacity in February.
The global energy outlook has changed radically in just six years. President Obama was elected in 2008 by voters who believed we were running out of oil and gas, that climate change needed to be halted, and that renewables were the energy source of the near future.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Legal Affairs · Liberty
In a little “frontier” community in northern New Mexico, a national property rights battle is playing out with huge national implications and almost no one knows it is taking place. The outcome of two lawsuits that are pending against Mora County and its Community Water Rights and Local Self-Government Ordinance have the potential to impact an individual’s ability to use and profit from his or her own land—not just in New Mexico, but from coast-to-coast.
California loves to be seen as the trendsetter on energy and environmental policies. But can we really afford to adopt their laws and regulations in the rest of America? Heck, can the once Golden State afford them itself? The path to hell is paved with good intentions, counter-productive policies – and hypocrisy.
Many readers will surely agree with me that Hotchkiss launched us into successful and fulfilling careers, mine as a scientist, physicist and engineer continues actively 60 years past graduation. Among my specialties has been the study of climate, present, past and future, ever since the 1970s when the popular press was warning of an advancing ice age, and on into the 90s when global warming took over with unsubstantiated anecdotal evidence and mathematical models.
Having spent decades trying to convince everyone that carbon dioxide (CO2) was a “greenhouse gas” that was going to cause the Earth to heat up, the same environmental charlatans are now embarking on a campaign to do the same with methane. In the U.S. the first move was announced by the White House in late March.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Regulation
The story of rancher Cliven Bundy has captured an abundance of media attention and attracted supporters from across the West, who relate to the struggle against the federal management of[…]
Economics · Environment/Energy · Government · Politics
The Ukraine Crises is an example of future events until the United States develops fossil fuel energy production superiority. The Ukraine Crisis–just as the 1973 Oil Embargo– is a great gift to stop the environmental movement’s eliminating fossil fuel production and insistence on relying on solar, wind, ethanol from corn, etc. as energy sources. These renewable energy sources are of no consequence in conduct of foreign policy. Do we want peace and prosperity or “green energy”, poverty, and the possibility of nuclear war?
Environment/Energy · Featured · Media
On Thursday, February 27, I received an email inviting me to be part of a segment “The Daily Show” with Jon Stewart was doing on fracking. This is how it went.
NEWS: The Heartlander
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