This curated list offers information in a variety of formats, sources, and styles – intended to make this topic accessible for inquisitive people from a range of backgrounds.
What’s happening at The Ditch? ◀️ ◀️ EAST OF THE DITCH: A couple miles toward Port Isabel from The Ditch, the Rio Grande LNG export terminal is under construction. LNG tankers will be up to 50% bigger than the cargo ships we’ve seen pass by The Ditch historically. So, that means a few more wind shadows floating by… Read More What’s happening at The Ditch? (Impact of industrial development in the Brownsville Ship Channel on kiteboarding)
This year’s Ethereum conference in Denver, Colorado, included a half-day series of (scantily attended) presentations on Web3 technology in carbon markets. Coincidentally, on the very next day, a leading climate advisory firm held its annual “State of the Voluntary Carbon Market” (VCM) webinar. The two back-to-back discussions offered strikingly different opinions and outlooks, presented to… Read More Carbon Credit Market Fantasy and Feud: A Dialogue (that should have happened) in March 2024
[20 minute read] Climate denialism has changed its clothes. On my London-Dubai flight to COP28 in November 2023, the seat next to me was occupied by a climate denier — an American man who explained that his small NGO had attended 22 annual COPs in protest of global action on climate. I did not care… Read More A new variant of climate denialism is coming from inside the house
(3-minute read) My favorite poem. Written in 1877 by the English poet and Jesuit priest, Gerard Manly Hopkins: As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;As tumbled over rim in roundy wellsStones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’sBow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;Each mortal thing does one thing and… Read More As Kingfishers Catch Fire
“Mad Libs”-style comparison of the Dhu-l-Qarnayn story in the Quran (18:83-102) and the Syriac Alexander Legend. The Alexander Legend which was crafted in 629-630 CE as propaganda for the victorious Eastern Roman Empire at the conclusion of its 30-year war with the Sassanian Empire. (This is a preview of one chapter in my next book… Read More Apocalypse at the Caspian Gates
There is no current, published greenhouse gas abatement supply curve for the United States [as of January 2022]. Scores of supply curves (aka marginal cost curves) have been published with a global scope (notably, Goldman Sachs’ 2020 “Carbonomics” report, and McKinsey’s 2010 version). And some supply curves for individual U.S. states are available (notably, reports… Read More Decarbonization Supply Curve for the United States
(19-minute read) There are many Spanish-language placenames in United states. A few examples: the states of Nevada (“snowy”), Arizona (“dry area”), Colorado (“red”), Florida (“flowered”, as in “flowered holy day”, meaning Easter), and Montana (“mountain”); the cities of Las Vegas (“the meadows”) and Los Angeles (“the angels”); and Key West, which combines an Anglicized spelling… Read More How California Got Its Name
The electronic house music thumps underneath, in the basement. Five of us partygoers are sitting in the front parlor, away from the fray. An elliptical wooden coffee table separates us, a too-small rectangular piece of cardboard mostly covering it. One of the parlor people has been entrusted with staffing the front door (keep out the… Read More An evening in the life of a thinking person among the masses