Dana Blankenhorn

The Renewable Energy Sweet Spot is Storage

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 17 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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While most attention in renewable energy is focused on solar panels, or wind turbines, or the use of pine pellets and algae for fuel, the real sweet spot is in storage.

Imre Gyuk , energy storage program manager at the Department of Energy, says it's not just because solar and wind are intermittant. It's also because an increasingly computer-driven society requires cleaner power.

You know this in your own life. If you have a desktop PC, chances are you have a Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) sitting under your desk, or at least a “power conditioning” power strip next to you – maybe both. Spikes can damage critical components.

The Great Deception of David Stockman

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 14 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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I know that liberal economists like Paul Krugman want to dismiss David Stockman's latest book, The Great Deformation as the work of a “cranky old man”

But it's not. It's the finest form of political jiu jitsu. And it's dangerous stuff, very dangerous.

Stockman, who was briefly a Reagan budget director, and who was then made wealthy by Wall Street, reveals here that his heart is in the Austrian economics brought to this country by followers of Ludwig von Mises.

Round Two of the Copyright Wars

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 13 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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I have been following the copyright wars since their inception, in 1997. I watched the passage of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) in 1998, and the No Electronic Theft Act.

Both had a similar aim, to keep people from stealing making and re-selling copies of material subject to copyright, now that technology allowed for clean (or nearly clean) copies.

My sympathies here are purely with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and blogs like Boingboing, which hate these laws as attacks on freedom of speech, of association, and the free exchange of ideas.

The 1973 Game: The Year Of Going Too Far

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 11 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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There's a natural progression to a generation's historical arc.

A crisis for which current thought has no answer creates new stories from the old opposition, which overthrows the old older and is then validated by a new political coalition.

Until this point it's possible to see the failures of the past as emanating from some extremist fringe, some virus within the old order that, once eradicated, makes it viable again. But then the old mainstream goes too far, the new majority identifies the whole of that mainstream as anathema, and a new generation's politics are made solid, the way starch exploding in heated liquid creates a stable pudding.

I saw this a generation ago, in 1973. Liberals, desperate to gain the last possible advantage they could through court action (since courts are the branch of government that most resists change) handed down decisions like Roe vs. Wade. Roe was a great decision for women but, as even feminist lawyer (now justice) Ruth Bader Ginsburg noted, it was a decision that held within it the seeds of a profound backlash, since it went beyond what legislators and voters were willing to do and enshrined abortion as a natural right.

The Real Enemy is England

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 10 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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The greatest threat to America now comes from England.

Strange to say but hear me out.

The banksters' lair is the roughly one square-mile of central London known as “The City.” The country has become entirely dependent on profits from The City. Without The City, London fails, England fails, the UK fails.

Graphene and the Nature of Change

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 9 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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Change can be slow, and change can be sudden.

Those who practice the theory of “oh noes,” the idea that it's all about to go pear-shaped, either see slow change that can't be undone, or a sudden change that others see as unlikely.

The people I meet on Seekingalpha.com, the ones who are certain that we're about to go into another Great Depression, believe in sudden change. Those who talk about climate change tend to see slow change that can't be undone.

But most of the time, disaster does not strike. And sudden change can be good as well as bad.

This is one of the great things about being a science reporter, the idea that someone, somewhere, might suddenly come up with a mighty idea, one that will drive out big problems at a stroke.

Jack Bogle's Last Lament

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 8 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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As a recent entrant into a new beat, finance, I have to find new heroes.

One of them is John C. "Jack" Bogle.

Jack Bogle is sort of the Richard Stallman of the investing world. He stands on principle, he stands for the customer, and he doesn't waver.

Unlike Stallman's, Bogle's principles have made him wealthy. He founded Vanguard Funds. He's retired, but he can't keep himself out of the fray, preaching the simple gospel that if you put a little away every week, and put that money into the broad market, your fortunes will rise.

It's called investing.

Tax Carbon in the Name of Growth

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 7 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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The following is going to annoy my liberal friends, but hear me out.

The decisive turn in a generation's political thesis, which is a collection of myths and values driving power, the point at which you go from winning elections to winning them for a generation, comes when business moves to your side.

You don't need all of business. You only need the rising tide of business to be on your side, that element of business driving economic growth.

Without significant business support, your side of the political world is always swimming upstream. That's because the business of America is business, even its political business is business, and anyone who questions that doesn't know America. (This Rising Tide is a restaurant in Scarborough, Maine. We hear good things about the lobster.)

Will Biofuels Join the War Against Oil?

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 6 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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I haven't gotten into the nitty-gritty of the War Against Oil here in some time.

For those who need a quick refresher, the War Against Oil is the chief economic necessity of our time. The Sun shines, the wind blows, we live on a molten rock, yet we still power our world like cavemen did, by digging up shit we can burn and burning it. As a result we're burning up our planet.

There are still (believe it or not) idiots who deny that methane and carbon dioxide are responsible for increased global temperatures, for more extreme weather, and for the melting of ice caps around the world. Some are paid shills for folks who want to dig shit up and burn it. Others are ideologues who scream “no” at anyone saying yes. And some are indeed idiots.

The political winds toward burning shit grew to hurricane force during the Bush years, with the wholesale takeover of the country by the fossil fuel industry. The results were war and (ta da) rising fossil fuel prices. We're now accustomed to paying $4/gallon for gasoline, just as the “boiling frog” got used to hot water, and the industry wants to apply more pressure.

All the fracking in the U.S. is not going to drop gas prices one dime. It's not in the frackers' interest to do it, they control the process of getting fracked oil to market, it's just not going to happen. Besides, fracking costs big money. Margins are thinner from fracking than they are from sticking a straw into the ground and sucking.

The only way we're going to get a thumb down on prices is with an alternative to fracking. And right now, that means biofuels.

Why the Crisis Continues

Think of this as Volume 17, Number 5 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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Previous crises in American political history were pretty much settled by this point after the crisis election.

By January of 1865 the Confederacy was all but dead. By this time in 1901 the Populists were a spent force. The initial crisis that created the New Deal was settled by 1937, although the struggle for democracy was just beginning. By 1973, we were well past the 1960s and talking full-time about Watergate.

While the course of our future politics seems settled, however, the political crisis that began in 2008 is ongoing, and the underlying economic cause – the War Against Oil – seems barely to have been launched.

You may ask why. I'm here to tell you: