Asking the Right Question on Climate Change

Since we can’t be certain that the globe is warming, and we can’t be certain that it isn’t, we are essentially in the position of a homeowner deciding whether to buy fire insurance. Buying insurance is generally a good idea. Ask yourself whether Donald Trump is right that global warming is a “hoax,” or whether […]

Aramco’s IPO and Investors’ Discontent

“First you say you do, and then you don’t, and then you say you will, and then you won’t, … Now you want to play.” This Ella Fitzgerald golden oldie best describes Saudi/Aramco policy now that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, MBS to friends and columnists short of space, announced early this summer, “We are […]

We Will Pay at the Pump for a World Without Iranian Oil

In Washington a group of elderly (mostly) men in suits, led by the President of the United States, has gathered to make sure that the world has an ample supply of oil to keep prices low enough to avoid voter unhappiness. In London hundreds of mostly young protestors, some semi-naked or in colorful costumes that […]

Sensible Climate Policy for the Age of Trump

Climate policy is frozen. The Trump administration does not believe the globe is warming as a result of carbon emissions. The preferred policy of those who believe change is occurring is a carbon tax. But it is politically unattainable, at least for now. The attached discussion paper assumes that there is sufficient possibility that human-induced […]

Trump Looks to Saudi Oil for Help

Don’t look now, but gas prices are climbing. In the great game that is the international oil industry, you can’t tell the players without a scorecard. There is Iran (the world’s largest state sponsor of terror), its mullahs joined with Russia (international dispenser of exotic poisons), in an alliance to preserve the murderous Assad regime […]

Oil Prices Are Sky-High: What Happened to Fracking?

Remember the good old days when experts decided that the power of the OPEC oil cartel to control oil prices had come to an end? That fracking had made the United States the swing producer, ramping up production any time prices started to rise? That the future of the world’s economy would be based on […]

Energy Policy: Abandon

ENERGY POLICY: ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE BY IRWIN STELZER No energy policy discussion is worth having if it does not start with a hard fact: there is no practical alternative to continued U.S. dependence on crude oil imported from nations that at best do not wish us well, and at worst wish […]

The Economic Consequences of COP21

12/14/15 Irwin Stelzer The international conference on climate change attracted thousands of delegates from almost 200 nations. The Conference of the Parties21, so named for the parties that signed the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992 and had come to Paris for what was their 21st conference, came to an end with the […]

A Deal over Climate Change

Irwin M Stelzer www.irwinstelzer.com 2/29/16 T he science of climate change may or may not be the certain thing that the president claims it is, but surely certain is the fact that he can push the Constitution only so far before the Supreme Court pushes back. Which is what it has done by granting the […]

Obama’s Climate Change Diversion

Irwin M Stelzer www.irwinstelzer.com 9/5/16 President Obama will tolerate a lot for an opportunity to push his climate-change agenda. At this weekend’s G20 summit meeting of the world’s developed (aka “rich”) nations, which account for 85 percent of the world’s economy, his Chinese hosts really poured on the humiliation. Unlike every other national leader, Obama […]