Tag: history

Best in Energy – 29 August 2023

China’s conception of strategic space under the Qing (NBAR)

Europe gas consumption and industrial malaise (Bloomberg)

U.S. policymakers reconsider electricity tariffs (Utility Dive)

Building energy efficiency key to decarbonisation (Canary)

Europe’s homes unsuitable for hotter weather (Bloomberg)

China’s passenger aviation set for big rebound (Bloomberg)

South Asia’s air pollution cuts life expectancy (Reuters)*

Commuting costs and benefits vary by city size (FT)

LNG prices frothy as strike threat lingers (Reuters)

Global energy projections through 2050 (Exxon)

Freight consolidation and backhauls (BBC)

Solar cycle intensifying more rapidly than expected (NOAA)

Routine, economising on mental effort and stress levels (FT)

* Between the late 1990s and early 2010s, air pollution in Beijing and other cities in northern China was said to be so bad it reduced average life expectancy by five years. Severe urban air pollution impacting on life expectancy seems to be a phase all rapidly urbanising and industrialising societies pass through. The United Kingdom in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is a classic example. Initially policymakers prioritise industrialisation, raising incomes and prosperity. Then a more comfortable middle class and increasing awareness of the burden and cost of pollution spark efforts to control smoke from both industrial and domestic sources by moving energy-intensive industries out of urban areas and switching to smokeless fuels. See for example The Big Smoke: A History of Air Pollution in London since Medieval Times (Brimblecombe, 1987);  The Chimney of the World: A History of Smoke Pollution in Victorian and Edwardian Manchester (Mosley, 2008); and The Politics of Clean Air (Ashby and Anderson, 1981).

U.S. OIL AND GAS drilling activity slowed for the eighth consecutive month in August in response to the fall in prices since the middle of 2022. The number of active rigs declined to an average of just 647 in August 2023 down from 780 in December 2022:

CHINA’s coastal ports handled containers equivalent to 23.7 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in July 2023 an increase of just +1.8% from 23.3 million TEUs in July 2022. The container ports are entering what should be peak season for exporting to ensure products reach retailers in time for Christmas in North America and Europe. But many retailers are still carrying excess inventories from 2022 which is depressing orders and shipments:

Recommended reading on energy

The energy bibliography contains the books and articles I have found useful in my own research on energy – defined broadly to include production, consumption, transportation, markets and pricing, but also risk management, technology, elements of economic history and geography, international relations and strategy. The bibliography started out as an aide-memoire and in response to requests for recommendations on particular topics. It has since grown very large so I have introduced an index page with hyperlinking. I update the list every three months with new items. 

The selection is a personal one. These are books and articles I have found most useful and insightful (and well-written in most cases). The latest version contains a lot of new entries about the rise of the coal industry in Britain, including changes in mining technology, transportation, market management, cartels, the economy and society. The expansion of the coal industry provides a lot of lessons about the oil industry in later centuries as well as some of the industries emerging rapidly in the 21st century. 

The latest version can be downloaded here: 

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