Category Archives: Energy

Dialling up the global thermostat another notch in 2022

It sounds almost a cliché to say that last year was a year of weather extremes. After all, which year out of the last 20 hasn’t been? After all, according to the WMO, the past eight years have been the … Continue reading

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Risky business for insurers as climate crunch bites

As extreme weather ratchets ever upwards, it seems inevitable that more and more locations will become uninsurable over time, whether as a result of coastal inundation, sea level rise or supercharged storms and flooding events. I took a look this … Continue reading

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Shadow of war throws new focus on nuclear energy

One source of near-zero carbon for energy production that is often overlooked and excluded from serious consideration is that of nuclear energy. In ordinary circumstances this might be understandable, but in a dire climate emergency, I find it baffling that … Continue reading

Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Irish Focus, Nuclear | Leave a comment

The 1.5C danger line draws ever closer

I contributed the article below to TheJournal.ie in mid-May to mark the publication of a worrying new report from the World Meteorological Organisation. Tried to stress for the umpteenth time that physics is indifferent to the many political, economic, social, … Continue reading

Posted in Arctic, Energy, Irish Focus, Sustainability | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Can we reimagine a better, safer world?

It sometimes feels like our collective inability to respond to the global climate and ecological emergency is first and foremost a failure of imagination. We are conditioned to see the world the way it is, and can easily assume there … Continue reading

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Food and energy insecurity mean double trouble

The long-banished spectre of food insecurity has returned to Europe for the first time since the 1940s. I wrote the below piece for the Business Post in late March which looked at the intersection of energy and food security in … Continue reading

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More power to our fledgling solar industry

The missing piece of the puzzle from Ireland’s transition to clean and renewable energy has long been solar power. While wind energy has grown in just a couple of decades from almost nothing to providing more than two fifths of … Continue reading

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A safer future for all means a better future for most

This article appeared in the Irish Times in early May, based around an intriguing paper published in the journal ‘Global Environmental Change’, titled “Providing decent living with minimum energy: A global scenario”. As the abstract begins: “It is increasingly clear … Continue reading

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Investors running for cover as allure of fossil fuels fades

The below piece was published in the Business Post in late February. By my usual standards, this probably ranks as quite optimistic, in pitching the argument that fossil fuel, the world’s most dangerous industry, is in the process of losing … Continue reading

Posted in Economics, Energy, Global Warming, Pollution | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

SUV fad puts us into fast lane towards climate breakdown

I’ll admit to having never been a big fan of SUVs. It’s fine if you’re one of a tiny handful of people who actually need a 4×4 in your trade, but there seems little reason for regular folk to be … Continue reading

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Sweden points way towards a lower carbon future

My debut contribution to The Business Post was published in early July on the paper’s Comment page. In the last year or two the Business Post has significantly upped its coverage and focus on environmental topics (reporter, Daniel Murray did … Continue reading

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Better late than never for Irish political action on climate

My take on the Programme for Government and why I think it represents a real opportunity to break the decade-plus logjam on meaningful climate action was published in late June on Thejournal.ie  THE BATTLE FOR the hearts and votes of … Continue reading

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Irish LNG plan ‘dead in the water’

The spectre of massive quantities of imported (fracked) gas flooding into Ireland via a new terminal in the Shannon estuary was dealt what looks like a fatal blow when both Fine Gael and Fianna Fail accepted the Green Party’s position … Continue reading

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LNG at Shannon: selling our future down the river

Below, my article as it appeared on DeSmog.uk on May 15th.   ENVIRONMENTAL groups have united in opposing a massive new terminal that would receive fracked gas from the US in a protected area on Ireland’s west coast. They fear … Continue reading

Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Irish Focus, Pollution | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

In deep water: Naughten approves major offshore oil drilling plan

Below, my story, as it appeared a few days ago on DeSmogUK: IRELAND’S first minister for Climate Action, Denis Naughten, quietly signed off this month on the Druid/Drombeg exploration field off Ireland’s west coast which is eyeing an estimated five billion … Continue reading

Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Irish Focus, Sustainability | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments