To the chagrin of more than a few, I’m generally not interested in picking up my club to go after politicians. They have enough problems; can you imagine getting up every morning to go work in those pits of manufactured animosity and gamesmanship and influence-peddling? After a full day of such debauched maneuvering, I’d feel like a plumber’s snake. Thankless job though it may be, they volunteered for it for whatever reason, and as our representatives, it is fully our right to point out … [Read more...]
Column: Canada is a high per capita emitter? How DARE you!
Do you ever feel like the mock-producer in “This is Spinal Tap”, engaged in a conversation with guitarist Nigel Tufnel, as Tufnel explains how his amps are special because they go to 11? The producer points out, yeah, but full volume is full volume, and you can call it whatever you want but it’s just full volume. Tufnel listens patiently then looks him dead in the eye and says, as if to an idiot, “These go to 11.” We, the great masses of Canada, are trying to explain to a dogmatic minority … [Read more...]
Column: Let’s get back to the business of innovation, adaptation and entrepreneurialism – the best antidote to destructive naysayers is success
My career in the petroleum sector began in a way that past generations of plains indigenous people might relate to, or at the very least their food source would. I was part of a great migratory herd, not unlike buffalo, moving across the grasslands in search of food (so to speak). Most members of my U of Sask graduating class migrated westward in the 1990s in search of a better future, as it was pretty bleak back home. We tried not to act like buffalo, we really did, and the gracious locals … [Read more...]
Column: Sorting wheat from chaff: Learning about electric vehicle progress from the media is like learning about a deal-of-the-century from a used car dealer
Ah, Saturday mornings. Nothing quite like them. First, take the poop machine for a walk in the fresh morning air, then back in for coffee and a multi-decade staple – US automotive show Motorweek. The show remains worth watching because it keeps up with the times, more or less (the host’s two-extra-yards-of–fabric suits have not), and now includes a regular and interesting electric vehicle component. What’s particularly fascinating about the show’s EV component is that it provides a glimpse … [Read more...]
Column: The auto-tuned wailing of child climate puppets drowns out a valid oil patch question: have we forgotten that necessity is the mother of invention?
What do OPEC, potash companies, and modern prairie farmers have in common? By process of elimination, it’s not the attire: flowing white form-fitting mumus vs. business suits vs. John Deere hats/worn plaid/missing fingers. It’s not beverages; sliced-fruit-flavoured water vs. red wine vs. Pilsner beer consumed in five-gallon quantities or five gallon pails, depending on the formality of the event (the former appropriate for weddings, the latter for everyday socializing). No, what these … [Read more...]
Column: I wasted eight minutes watching that? Canada’s tough, tough road ahead
A great sadness swept over me when a respected colleague asked if I would write about the election. The feeling is akin to being a lifer in prison and having someone ask you if you would rather go to Hawaii next week, or Fiji. If you weren’t in prison. You’d just want to bash their head in with a rock (because this is a prison analogy), and while I didn’t want to bash anyone’s head in with a rock (for the most part), I had zero enthusiasm to offer commentary, and that was even before the results … [Read more...]
Column: An open letter to Patagonia, Lush Cosmetics, and Ben & Jerry’s – your climate activism/lifestyle marketing/bipolar worldview begs the question: why do you exist?
Hi companies, A quick note from a puzzled customer/bystander. I’m trying to decipher the signals that you’re sending out to the world; there seems to be a sizeable paradox on display. All three of you made coincidental headlines in support of the global climate strikes, even halting business for a day to show that you mean business. It is awesome to see companies taking their environmental footprints seriously; that is the only way we’re going to make any progress – if entities and people … [Read more...]
A new Big Bang is brewing – unimpeded climate activists are assuming control and demanding a truly impossible energy transition. Things are about to get wild
It’s show time, everyone! Get comfortable, maybe make some popcorn, settle down in front of your electronic device of choice, and watch the world go Boom. Like an uncontrolled nuclear reaction, a meltdown of some sort is underway. That might be a huge helping of hyperbole, but it might not, and part of what makes this all so exciting is that we really don’t know what will happen. We have not been here before. I'm referring to the recent masterfully-orchestrated climate activist agenda, the … [Read more...]
Proposed General Terms & Conditions for Future Fossil Fuel Acquisition and Usage – time to sign on the line and say “I did that”
In the turbulence of modern daily life, a number of factors have emerged as constants. There are of course a great many, but a few in particular have become a staple of the weirdness that is modern life. One of them we can’t help but notice, and the other one we can’t help but ignore. Perhaps there is vast potential in marrying these current cultural oddities. The first factor is, of course, climate change. This past week saw the tension ratcheted up to a near breaking point. The climate … [Read more...]
Column: Carbon capture ingenuity shows resilience of petroleum sector whether activists acknowledge it or not
Whenever I mention Carbon Engineering, the Murray Edwards/Bill Gates-backed, Squamish-based company that’s developing large scale carbon capture technology, some wise monkey points out to me that the technology is too expensive or too impractical. They come up with some mechanical/cost yardstick, and say that it doesn’t make any sense. I have nothing against monkeys, but these sorts or replies do earn them a scowl. Oh, they may well be right about the cost being suboptimal. But the more … [Read more...]
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