I would have said that you were crazy for heading to your local Starbucks for a latte when this whole coronavirus thing blew up in the spring.
Yet, here we are in August and I have seen lines at the drive through ten cars deep at 2:00 PM on a Wednesday afternoon. WTF? Apparently, “everyone” is read for the pumpkin spice to drop soon. Ugh.
Stay safe out there.
On to the links…
How did Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump Earn as Much as £120m Last Year?—I have a pretty good idea how dollar store Barbie and the poster child for failing upward made money…corruption on the coattails of daddy.
Rescue of Troubled Trucking Company With White House Ties Draws Scrutiny—If it works for the kids, it works for donors. Send money to the Trump campaign or inaugural slush fund and you can have whatever you want from Washington D.C. as long as it does not cut into the ability of anyone named Trump to continue their grift.
New Analysis Shows How Electrifying the U.S. Economy Could Create 25 Million Green Jobs by 2035—We could have green power and a lot of jobs or we could have a racist cheese puff—as my twelve year old daughter refers to Donald Trump—bloviating about “beautiful coal.” Your call.
Watching The Baseload Paradigm Fail—The current energy ecosystem—particularly electricity—is based on old paradigms that were laid down in the Nineteenth Century. We can do better.
‘Solar For Coal’ Swaps: A Financial Innovation That Could Accelerate The Carbon Transition—Solar for coal sounds like some kind of financial instrument that will cause the whole renewable energy market to collapse like sub-prime housing circa 2008. Maybe I am just skeptical of anything that comes from the high finance community.
Coal’s Continued Decline Defies Political Narratives—Apparently, the free market has been kicking coal’s ass for years and Republicans have just tried to blame anything else. Your pick…Obama…solar…Biden…wind…yeah, it’s pretty much word salad.
In Massachusetts, More Houses of Worship are Turning to Solar Power—Sure, it’s a relatively liberal state but no one is going to accuse churches, synagogues, and mosques of being radical. Well, if we actually look at history these places were centers of radical politics as defined by the mainstream. Abolition? Check. Civil rights? Check.
China Poised to Power Huge Growth in Global Offshore Wind Energy—Now offshore wind is going to be subject to the “China price.”
China’s New Coal Projects Account for 90% of Global Total in First Half of 2020—Too bad China is still hooked on coal.
10 Countries With 5–10% Plugin Vehicle Market—What is the tipping point where the market share of electric vehicles really begins to dim the prospects of fossil fuels? We will probably see the trend emerge in Europe based on these market shares.
Use of Plastic Bags in England Drops by 59% in a Year—I will be curious what the numbers look like in 2020, but the moral of the story is that small changes—5p for a plastic bag—can lead to dramatic changes in behavior.
A Sales Tax Bump to Fight the Climate Crisis gets some Space on Denver’s November Ballot—This is a good idea. Take it a step further and add a tax on every gallon of gas, BTU of natural gas, and ton of coal taken out of the ground or pumped into a fuel tank to help pay for climate change mitigation. Add a surcharge on every airline flight while we are at it.
They Tried to Tame the Klamath River. They Filled it with Toxic Algae Instead.—Dams ruin river ecosystems. Some dams provide a lot of hydroelectric power or flood control, but a lot of dams are just poorly designed and poorly sited. These dams need to go.
The Texotics—It reads like the beginning to some post-apocalyptic novel for young adults where vast stretches of Texas become depopulated and now African animals roam free. Tiger King eat your heart out.