I don't agree with everything in this article such as the imperative to wean ourselves off fossil fuel, the absence of reference to nuclear as well as the likely unimaginable breakthroughs that almost surely will arrive. Nevertheless, I found parts of the article interesting and refreshing.

In the deep ocean, occasionally, a whale carcass falls to the bottom of the sea. Most of the time, in the state of nature, creatures have just about enough to survive. But the first creatures to find the whale have more food than they could ever eat. These scavengers live lives of extraordinary plenty — some of the smaller, faster-breeding species might do so for several generations. There is enough to go around a thousand times over. For a while.

And then the whale is gone, and the creatures go back to their lives of crushing pressure, constant darkness, and an eternal knife-edge struggle for survival. As Thomas Malthus had it in his bleak vision: organisms, which increase exponentially in number, will rapidly outgrow their resources, which can only grow arithmetically. So of course, the excess population which has grown up on this brief glut must die off

We are currently living in a time of whalefall, suggests the scientist Vaclav Smil in his new book, How the World Really Works. He doesn’t use the word, of course: credit for the macabre whale metaphor must go to Scott Alexander. But modern humans are animals, products of evolution like any other, and yet we noticeably do not spend every minute of every day struggling to get the material required to survive. Instead, we build cathedrals and watch football, we make art, we waste time on Twitter. And that is because we live on the gigantic, blessed whale carcass that is our fossil fuel inheritance.

Continue reading at the following weblink:

https://unherd.com/2022/01/how-long-can-humans-survive/

As electric rates rise, gas-fired power emerges as both scapegoat and savior (Press Herald)

BY TUX TURKELSTAFF WRITER

A study in contradictions, natural gas is both helping to keep the lights on and contributing to the risk of rolling blackouts. Here's why the role it plays in the region's energy grid will remain a factor in Maine for years to come.

WESTBROOK — In a building bigger than a football field, one of two 185-ton natural gas-fired turbines inside the Westbrook Energy Center is ramping up on a cloudy December afternoon.

A day earlier, the region’s electric grid operator in Massachusetts told the energy trading desk at Calpine Corp. in Houston to start the plant at 2 p.m. the following day and run until midnight.

Calpine is obligated every day to offer up to 550 megawatts of capacity from this plant to a wholesale energy bidding process run by regional grid operator ISO New England. That’s enough electricity to meet the needs of 550,000 homes.

These “day-ahead” bids are meant to assure that on each following day, the region will have enough generating capacity every second of every hour, regardless of weather or demand.

Westbrook doesn’t get selected every day. But when it does, it’s not hyperbole to say the plant is helping to keep the lights on in New England.

Despite its essential role, natural gas is under fire. In mid-November, the Maine Public Utilities Commission directly blamed high wholesale natural gas prices for the more than 80 percent jump in “standard offer” electric supply rates that most Central Maine Power and Versant Power home customers are starting to see in their bills this month.

Even more ominous, ISO New England warned in early December that limited gas pipeline capacity and liquified natural gas deliveries could put the region’s electricity supply in a “precarious position” if there’s an extended cold snap between now and spring.

So as winter deepens, natural gas is a study in contradictions. It seems to be simultaneously keeping the lights on, raising electric bills and contributing to the risk of rolling blackouts.

It’s a confusing set of circumstances for Mainers to pick apart.

Policymakers in Maine and the rest of New England are pushing an urgent transition to renewable energy to fight climate change, largely by encouraging solar and wind power. But despite the growth of renewables, natural gas plants such as the one in Westbrook will still make up half of the region’s generating capacity in 2022.

A look back at ISO New England data on that cloudy December day highlights the enduring role of natural gas. Fifty percent of the 20,913 megawatts of available capacity in the region was gas-fired. Thirty percent came from nuclear power and 6 percent from hydroelectric stations. Other renewables made up just 15 percent, mostly from wind farms.

Even in Maine, where the bulk of the state’s generating capacity is made up of hydro, wind and biomass, natural gas plays an outsize role. Gas plants generated 70 percent of the standard offer supply that the PUC approved for residential customers in CMP’s service area for a period in 2020 and 2021.

Read the full article at the following weblink - AND BLAME THE LOSER "ENVIRONMENTALISTS AND BRAINDEAD BRAINWASHED COMPROMISED DEMOCRATS THROUGHOUT THE NORTHEAST AND WASHINGTON DC FOR NATURAL GAS SUPPLY CONSTRAINTS IN A COUNTRY WITH EXTRAORDINARY NATURAL GAS ABUNDANCE:

As electric rates rise, gas-fired power emerges as both scapegoat a...