Indra Overland
@indraoverland.bsky.social
Research Professor at NUPI | energy transition | ASEAN | FSU | squash player | foodie |
My long-time Germany / nuclear take is simply that they should be free to phase out nuclear whenever they like but coal and gas should've been first, and getting the order wrong has meant a very significant amount of harm from prolonged fossil fuel use ember-energy.org/data/electri...
Beyond lithium: how sodium-ion batteries could change the world. Batteries based on sodium ions are entering mass production. Batteries based on sodium promise to be cheaper, safer and much more environmentally friendly than lithium-ion cells. www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Beyond lithium: how sodium-ion batteries could change the world
Batteries based on sodium ions are entering mass production. Some researchers say they could ultimately be a cheaper, safer alternative to lithium in electric cars and other energy applications.
nature.com
🧵1/5 @aljazeera.com interview with me about Ukrainian strikes on Russian energy. The impacts are growing rapidly now:
2025 impact factors are out & GEP had a fantastic year! #2 out of 173 in International Relations 🎉 🎉 🎉 #11 out of 332 in Political Science #48 out of 202 in Environmental Studies
I know this has been pointed out many times by many people but I just want to reiterate: Anthropic is basically using Kurt Vonnegut's drawing of an asshole as the Claude logo
Think of CO₂ removal like a time machine. How far back does planting 100 million trees take us? One mature tree takes up ~25 kg of CO₂/year, so 100 million trees will take up 2.5 MtCO₂. That's a time machine that takes us back ~33 minutes in a year. Nature will not save us from fossil fuel CO₂.
DeLorean Time Travel: Back To The Future
Alt: DeLorean Time Travel: Back To The Future
static.klipy.com
Electricity ratepayers feel pain from *bills*, not prices. If my price goes up 10% but my energy use goes down 20% (from insulation or a more efficient air conditioner, say), then *my bill goes down 12%*. Energy efficiency is weirdly absent from discourse on electricity affordability.
Good China Books Review article on the growing genre of migrant workers' literature. About one-third of China's working population, and nearly two-thirds of migrant workers, work in the gig economy. chinabooksreview.com/2026/05/21/w...
China’s Workers’ Literature Revival | China Books Review
Once a socialist genre beloved of Mao, laborers’ or “battler” literature has seen a revival in the era of the gig economy. Two new books in translation illustrate the mass appeal.
chinabooksreview.com
Chinese researchers have created a bamboo-based plastic as strong as petroleum-based plastics, which can fully biodegrade in soil in just 2 months phys.org/news/2025-10...
Bamboo-based plastic can be made to biodegrade quickly, but still holds up in tough conditions
A new method to produce strong, biodegradable plastic from bamboo is reported in Nature Communications this week. The bioplastic resembles oil-based plastics in strength, shapability, and thermal stab...
phys.org
Almost 100% of new cars sold in Norway last year were electric. Not just because of oil wealth. Because of carbon taxes, EV incentives, and thirty years of consistent policy. New newsletter: Norway: The World's Most Instructive Energy Paradox janrosenow.substack.com/p/norway-the...
Norway: The World’s Most Instructive Energy Paradox
The electrification playbook the world needs - and its inconvenient footnote
janrosenow.substack.com
Germany's electricity mix, 2000 vs 2025: Renewables: 6% → 62% Fossil fuels: 62% → 36% Nuclear: 30% → 0% Nuclear's exit was filled by renewables, not coal or gas. Want more of this content and more detail and links to sources? Subscribe to my new Substack: substack.com/@janrosenow
Of all the made-up intentionally-hollow tactical-false-promise greenwashing technologies out there, space solar I think is the one that just makes me the angriest. Not even sure why, maybe because it should be the most obviously nonsensical but is treated as completely reasonable
Meta pushes into orbit powered electricity as it chases nonstop clean energy
Meta partners with Overview Energy to turn space into a constant power source for data centers and future AI infrastructure
techradar.com
I've been touting the inevitable win of electric trucks over combustion and hydrogen trucks for over 10 years now. Glad to see it's finally happening. www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/bus...
Cheaper, cleaner electric trucks overhaul China’s logistics
While the country's prowess in electric passenger vehicles has long been known globally, electric trucks have only recently gained traction.
freemalaysiatoday.com
BREAKTHROUGH: SaltX Technology and Holcim have produced Portland-quality clinker - the core ingredient in cement - using a fully electrified process. No fossil fuels. The goal is now a pilot plant targeting Europe's first fully electric cement facility by 2028. www.globalcement.com/news/20714-s...
Let me remind everyone that fierce debate exists over the different classes of ebikes allowed in cities.
Natalia Barbour@nataliabarbour.bsky.social · 3mo agoHey Siri, show me madness.
I was reminded this morning of something IBM noted in 1978: "A computer can never be held accountable. Therefore, a computer must never make a management decision."
Corn ethanol serves no purpose and is purely a handout to farmers. It costs more and emits more than normal petroleum. And it takes up half as much land area as all urban and suburban land in the US. If we replaced the land with solar, we'd get 3x as much power as the US uses.
Some reflections on getting rejected: The secret skill of highly successful people? Getting rejected (a lot!) without letting it erode their sense of self-worth. Nobody puts that on their CV. More in my Substack article: janrosenow.substack.com/p/on-rejection
On rejection
Why rejection is the hidden engine of success
janrosenow.substack.com
"Under limited CCS growth rates, deployment... could be reduced by a factor of 7 relative to a scenario that does not consider injectivity or growth rate limits... Delayed mitigation combined with slower-than-expected CCS deployment could result in large &prolonged temperature overshoot"
Rate and growth limits for carbon capture and storage
Rate and growth limits for carbon capture and storage, Fuhrman, Jay, Lane, Joe, McJeon, Haewon, Iyer, Gokul C, Edwards, Morgan R, Thomas, Zachary, Edmonds, James A
iopscience.iop.org
It’s the 250th year of American independence, and the Pope and the King of England are reminding Americans of their revolutionary values, principles, and ideals Somewhere, John Adams is confused as fuck
This seems really bad? I mean, if you want the oil to stay in the ground, the cartel that set production quotas to limit output and keep oil prices high was a good thing. It felt like a possible useful player in a managed energy transition.
Truthout@truthout.org · 3mo agoThe move signals a further break in the UAE’s relations with Saudi Arabia, the de facto leader of OPEC, as well as re-alignment between the UAE and the U.S. as it’s cozied up with the Trump administration.
Potentially hyper-cheap sodium batteries are becoming commercially available and are getting LFP battery specs. This is nuts! This could lead to *incredibly* cheap batteries! electrek.co/2026/04/27/c...
Europe's electricity: 29% fossil fuels in 2024, down from 53% in 2005. Progress. But transport is still 92% fossil. Buildings: 71%. Industry: 61%. And 95% of EU oil and 88% of gas imported. Switching suppliers doesn't fix this. Electrification and efficiency do. More here: rdcu.be/feOjc
This is already demonstrably incorrect. And Wright isn't even dead yet.
Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · 4mo agoEnergy Secretary Chris Wright: "I'm pretty confident coal will lead the world in global electricity production when I die"
Chinese researchers report 700 Wh/kg lithium-metal battery www.pv-magazine.com/2026/04/02/c...
Chinese researchers report 700 Wh/kg lithium-metal battery
A team from Nankai University and the Shanghai Institute of Space Power-Sources has developed a hydrofluorocarbon electrolyte enabling lithium-metal cells to operate at temperatures as low as -70 C.
pv-magazine.com
Cars are parked 20 to 22 hours a day on average, which is plenty of time to recharge an EV using a standard AC outlet leahy.substack.com/p/my-non-fos...
My Non-Fossil Car Experience
Very few EV drivers ever go back
leahy.substack.com
The next tipping point in the energy transition is approaching. Overall, solar has already been cheaper than fossil power for a while, but upfront costs used to be higher. That's no longer the case. Solar is now competitive upfront AND has vastly lower operating costs (no fuel).
We bought an EV years ago and have so far saved over $7000 in avoided gas costs. And our electricity is now free because our solar panels have completely paid for themselves in saved electricity costs. My interest in the price of fossil fuels is purely political.
