What is a healthy room temperature? On releasing its Cold Weather Plan for 2014, Public Health England has recently revised its recommended minimum levels to keep in good health. No longer, they say, do…
Powering into the night. The Drax plant in Yorkshire.
Gareth Davies
Winter is coming. And the UK has a real chance of [brownouts](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownout_(electricity) or even blackouts from lack of power. The long predicted capacity crunch in electric power…
Gas guzzled: OPEC’s 1973 oil embargo threw America into crisis and underlined the political power of energy.
David Falconer/Wikimedia Commons
The Australian Financial Review recently trumpeted America’s “re-emergence as a world oil power”. It is an accomplishment four decades in the making and its success is still under debate. Energy security…
The International Energy Agency was set up to avoid a repeat of the 1973 oil crisis - but four decades later the rules need updating.
David Falconer/US Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons
Next week, Brisbane hosts the final meeting of the G20 Energy Sustainability Working Group before the main G20 summit in November. Government officials and energy experts from 20 of the most powerful countries…
Is the sun setting on West African oil? A platform in Limbe, Cameroon.
VirginieVV
After the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the US made a point of diversifying its sources of oil to reduce dependence on the Middle East. It was a strategic move which promised a huge boost to West African…
The escalating situation in Ukraine has focused the minds of Europe’s leaders on their countries’ energy needs and how to meet them. Energy security has quickly become a strategic priority for the EU…
The rapid escalation of the situation in Crimea has led us faster than we might have thought to consider if and how Russia might unleash energy policy as part of its geopolitical strategy. President Vladimir…
A potential government investigation into British Gas has offered up the chance to restructure the market in a way that has not happened since the industry was privatised, and could skew the market to…
Germany’s Philippsburg nuclear power plant. Is Australia preparing to follow suit?
Lothar Neumann/Wikimedia Commons
Nuclear power is back on Australia’s radar. In its recent issues paper released as a preface to September’s Energy White Paper, the Abbott government reopened the debate thus: With environmental considerations…
Brisbane’s annual City of Lights show, which is sponsored by an oil and gas company.
Flickr/Wei Lun Koh (some rights reserved)
From flicking on a light to travelling around town, our lives are utterly dependent on energy. That’s why it’s so surprising that Australia has been so bad at thinking about our country’s future energy…
Building in their backyard will annoy them - but the public know energy decisions have to be made.
John Giles/PA
On a clear day one can see North Somerset – the future site of Britain’s Hinkley Point C new nuclear power station – from Cardiff Bay, across the Severn Estuary. Deep in hilly Powys, arguments rage around…
Solving energy problems requires more than just putting on a jumper.
Steve Parsons/PA
The nights are drawing in, leaves are changing from green to gold, and energy suppliers are announcing price hikes. Along with animals disappearing into hibernation, energy price rises have become what…
10% price rises are becoming the new normal.
Rui Vieira/PA
Energy prices seem seldom out of the news. Politicians show their frustration with the energy market in proposing various solutions. This week Tory grandee and former prime minister John Major has called…
The future Hinkley Point C nuclear power station (centre), with older reactors.
EDF
There has long been talk of the need for a “nuclear renaissance”, and now it seems underway. The deal has been struck that would see the first new British nuclear power station in a generation. But is…
Oil and gas production is growing in the US, mainly thanks to unconventional production methods.
EPA/Jim Lo Scalzo
A recent article in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported: The U.S. is overtaking Russia as the world’s largest producer of oil and natural gas, a startling shift that is reshaping markets and eroding…
Monica Giulietti, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick
Ed Miliband is right to be concerned about the lack of competitiveness in the UK energy retail sector. His worries are shared by many observers in the media and those of us in the regulatory and academic…
Electricity prices, renewable energy, climate change, uranium exports: what does the Coalition plan to do about our energy future?
akeii/Flickr
The Coalition has returned to government at a time of uncertainty and rapid change in almost every area of energy policy. With an energy policy released and a responsible minister named, what can we determine…
The Coalition will retain the Labor government’s onshore extension of the Petroleum Resource Rent Tax.
AAP
Along with repealing the carbon tax, scrapping the mining tax is one of the Abbott government’s first orders of business. Deeming it damaging for jobs and investment, Prime Minister Tony Abbott promised…
Recent reports reveal that the cost of environmental damage far outweighs the cost of business model restructuring.
Image from www.shutterstock.com
One of the most depressing and puzzling features of the current election campaign is the lack of emphasis on the costs that environmental risks pose to industry and business. Australian politicians appear…
An aerial view of the Cononaco River in the Ecuadorian Amazon, with a huge emergent Ceiba tree in the foreground.
“Nothing would do more to rapidly decrease the risk of climate change than a major plan to protect global rainforests” – Opposition climate action spokesman Greg Hunt, media release, 30 August. Launching…