I read an extract from a JP Morgan report. It stated global warming was a business opportunity for air conditioning and refrigeration companies (amongst others).
No matter how much we screw up our atmosphere, someone will make money out of the misery it causes.
I was working in Terrys chocolate factory that year it was hot
A bit later I trained as a heating and plumbing engineer and spent years before retiring trying to persuade people to go for solar thermal water heater it was like banging my head against a brick wall
Now I’m retired they all want heat pumps and solar panels so I feel there’s some hope for my grandchildren.
That was a great article- thanks. I’m reading it’s not the end of the world by Hannah Ritchie which is very good, shows where there are grounds for hope and tries to suggest what we can do - if we’re quick. Still love to see the oil bosses in the dock though - that has brightened up my morning 😁
A small point. It wasn't legislation that prompted the change to measuring road fuel in Litres. The right to continue using Gallons and Miles was one of the many, many carveouts we'd negotiated.
The fuel pups of the time were nearly all mechanical and the unit price would only go up to 1.99. As soon as you exceeded £1.99 per Gallon, you would have to replace all the pumps! Or, you could simply use a smaller unit. Recalibrating for Litres was trivial, since the pumps were set that way in other markets.
I agree, I was being a little bit relaxed in my explanation. The critical point is, and this came from someone who had spent his life in British motor manufacturing, he explained there was a conscious effort on behalf of the car makers and the fuel industry not to change the way fuel efficiency was measured, ie litres per 100 km as in all other European countries. Hence buy in litres, calculate efficiency in gallons. It’s very clever.
I arrived at RAF Upper Heyford in June of 1976 and saw the lack of rain you talk about. Everything seemed normal to me as I had just come from a base in New Mexico in the USA where it was hot and almost never rained, but I saw the problems that happened that summer. Hopefully we will see improvements in how man takes care of planet earth in our lifetime but it is not looking promising.
I think in some instances electric is just displacimg the polution from road to power station. And then there's the hideous ecological consequences of the batteries, disposi g of them mostly. But there are places where electric vehicles are great (bikes, towns).and gas for the big stuff, be it lpg or hydrodgen, which a couple of big bus builders are working on. Those are tenable and coming soon I hope. 1976 ... I remember my mum being amazed it was 86 Fahrenheit in her greenhouse ... the downs went yellow for the first time ... now they go yellow regularly... yeh. We need to do something.
It still astounds me that’s this argument continues to be spread around.
Number one. The hideous ecological consequences of extracting, refining and burning gasoline/petrol or diesel remains exactly as polluting as it always has. An oil refinery consumes the same amount of electricity ass a mid sized city, plus huge amounts of cobalt, some of which dug up by slave children in the DRC. No one who fills their tank ever considers this.
Number two. It is not possible to make that process ‘clean’ or sustainable. It’s early 20th century technology and 70-75% of the energy contained in a gallon of liquid fuel is wasted in a combustion engine.
Number three, In 2010, in the UK, 40% of our electricity was generated by burning imported coal. Today it is zero. Renewables, wind, solar, hydro produce just over 59% of all the electricity we use, 12% is nuclear, 18% inter-connector from France (nuclear) and the last piddling fraction is from imported methane (natural) gas.
So our electricity is massively, embarrassingly cleaner than it was 16 years ago.
We have control over how we generate electricity, we have no control over the way petroleum products are produced, and using them means, in most countries, vast amounts of wealth being sent to regimes we do not support.
Number four, the most important. The ridiculous claim that batteries are or will be ‘disposed of’ is utter nonsense, keenly fostered by the fossil fuel industry.
All savvy investors and engineers know that the really big growth industry in the next 10 years is battery recycling. Please do check https://www.redwoodmaterials.com/ and watch them ‘dispose’ of batteries. Finally, number five, hydrogen will never be used in transport, yes, I know people are trying but they will fail, there are already 12,000 battery electric long haul 45 ton trucks operating in Germany. The companies running them are saving many millions of dollars a year from NOT buying diesel.
I'm not saying keep fossil fuels. We all agree they are grim. But surely electric cars as they are manufactured right now are the least grim of two options rather than the answer. They are too big for our roads and the range is poor (I used to have to drive a 300 mile round trip every Wednesday and there wasn't an electric car with the range). It was difficult to add half an hour to the journey when delays could add two on their own. They have to be improved in range and also in weight. There has to be an alternative, long term, to something that will double the tonnage of the vehicles on our roads (electric cars as they are currently made are too heavy for a lot of our parking infrastructure) and the batteries contain many minerals which are not produced ethically and which, with tbe best will in the world, are not always disposed of the way they are supposed to be. Have a look at this. It's is a bit of a shocking read ... https://europeancorrespondent.com/en/s/audio?d=2026-06-19&%26
So electric, yes, but different from and better than current batch of massive piddly ranged vehicles. We need cars to be smaller and lighter not bigger and bigger and heavier and heavier. That brings a whole new raft of perils of its own. I cant find the article now but just the other day I was reading how the ever expanding size of cars will start to cause accidents. If I find the link I'll come back and post it.
Please forgive me if I am a little impatient about some of your casually held assumptions because I’ve heard them all so many times before.
I want to stat with the fact that for a while, all electric cars ran on traditional lithium ion batteries that contained cobalt and nickel.
People were rightly critical of these metals due to the terrible ways some of thieve mineral are extracted.
Now, the majority of new electric cars come with LFP, Lithium Ferrous Phosphate batteries that contain NO cobalt or nickel and are 98% recyclable at the end of life which is now 20 to 25 years.
I mentioned that oil refining uses cobalt to remove sulphur from diesel and petrol and you did not respond. Not one glimmer of recognition that the most cruel and contentious metal is used to refine fossil fuel.
Um, ‘Electric cars are so heavy they are damaging parking infrastructure.’ You really need to check your sources, not just read a tacky headline in a far right news blog.
The top 9 heaviest cars allowed on UK roads are ALL petrol or diesel. Massive fat, ugly SUVs. The 10th heaviest is the Tesla Model X, no longer in production. Battery technology has moved on, not only lasting much longer than the cars, but smaller and lighter and 5X more energy dense.
And the now truly embarrassing ‘range’ argument, only ever made by men who have never driven an EV.
You are a human being, you have this thing called a bladder. You sit in a car driving for 10 hours like so many very dull men tell me, you are going to be very very regretful when you have a bladder infection which turns into sepsis.
How do I know this? Because I have suffered from exactly that problem.
A human being has to stop driving every 3 to 4 hours for at least half an hour, for you. Your health, your safety and the safety of others for pities sake.
Truck drivers are not allowed to drive to 8 or ten hours, it’s literally against the law, so range is a rubbish excuse.
I can tell you are really uncomfortable about the idea of a battery, that’s fine, please keep driving a gasoline/diesel car until hydrogen becomes a plausible alternative. It never will, your will drive fuel burning cars until you pass from this world, which is EXACTLY what the fossil fuel industry want you to do, so congrats for supporting them.
If that's true about the batteries. Good. Because they jolly well need to do something. Has that got anywhere near modern electric cars though? Because looking at them, they're still all massive. They are all, clearly designed around the same 18" high platform of batteries with the cabin sitting on top.
I didn't answer your reply about refining because I'd agreed with you that fossil fuels are not the answer and that we have to ditch them. But you were too busy making assumptions about what I think, rather than reading what I had actually written.
Indeed, in both my replies what I was trying to say was that electric cars now are as flawed as petrol in many respects and have to be an interim answer if produced they way they are currently. I still think some kind of hydrodgen use would be better in the long run because it causes zero emmissions and zero power useage.
I am reasonably aware of the law on drivers hours. I used to work for a coach company. The 150 miles was 2 and a quarter hours to 2 and a half if the roads were clear but usually 4 back, two of those stood still or crawling. The usual driver's shift was 8 hours. 2 hrs 15 mins and then 15 mins rest at the first safe place to stop (scheduled in), another 2 hrs 15 and then a longer break after which you could do another 4 hours with the break back. Pretty much what I did ... if and when it worked. But I did need to get there in time to have a couple of hours before going back. I had to be home by 7 and life didn't allow for me to take more than a day out each week.
Rather like your sepsis story, there is a very deep emotional trigger in that one for me. Nearly 3 years after it all ended I still teeter on the brink of burnout most of the time.
I think we'll have to agree to disagree. You keep driving your hovvercraft sized electric car along our tiny British roads. I'll use my bike and the train for everything I can.
Oh well, at least we agree on two things. Petrol cars are not the answer and SUVs are shit. Don't get me started on those enormous ford transit bus sized munter trucks.
I love reading your substack but I'll remember not to comment in future. Sorry to have upset you. Namaste. MTM
You haven’t upset me in the least. I might be a bit snippy at times, but as you suggested to me, don’t take it personally. I certainly don’t, it’s an honest and open discussion where we might disagree but not by much.
I mainly want to challenge your rather odd bits of information, an ‘18" high platform of batteries?’ WTF. Where did that come from.
I totally agree about big cars, that’s not an electric car thing, that’s a ridiculous fashion thing.The Renault 5, as an example, small, compact hatchback car. The battery pack is 14 cm (5.5 inches) thick. An 18 inch battery pack would be if the batteries were lead-acid.
I have never driven an electric car with an 18 inch thick battery pack, and I’ve driven about 250 different electric cars.
Other than that, bike, train, walk, bus, all much better than any individual vehicle.
That's good. Yes. The Renault 5, I can completely get on board with. If that's the future of electric cars I'm a lot more interested. I don't know the actual size of the platform with the battery on but looking at most electric cars I see: polestar, jaecoo, lotus, prius, byd, hyandai, vauxhaull ... most electric cars at the moment seem to have an enormous lot of height before anything else happens like windows etc, and rubbish visibility out of the rear for anything under 3ft high near the back of the car ... Where they look smaller and better they seem to have a really short city car range. I do think electric city cars are brilliant. For the few things I need a car to do an electric or lpg van might be better. Or converting my car to run on something else. I still need range though ... I'm looking into the options...
I heard today that Burnham is considering new licences for oil & gas exploration in the North Sea. I imagine that will endear him to the orange balloon and Farage the Frog but he'll lose the vote of this moderate dad!
Another cranky old guy ..my weekend warrior got 9 mpg when premium gas was $ 0.35/gal! Which is comparable to today's costs for running my 22mpg SUV./ I really dislike the paper straws now- must have been a lost art in manufacturing 🤠
Ha ha ha. Cranky old guy here, LOL paper straws, and 22mpg is utterly pathetic, it’s embarrassing. And to have a car you call a ‘weekend warrior’ is a bit childish and sad isn’t it? Anyway, carry on wasting money buying gasoline. :-)
The WW was usually the second car. An old Plymouth made to go fast and loud; only got one speeding ticket with it. Built in HS as first car, so was a learning experience as well 🤠
I read an extract from a JP Morgan report. It stated global warming was a business opportunity for air conditioning and refrigeration companies (amongst others).
No matter how much we screw up our atmosphere, someone will make money out of the misery it causes.
Depressing.
I was working in Terrys chocolate factory that year it was hot
A bit later I trained as a heating and plumbing engineer and spent years before retiring trying to persuade people to go for solar thermal water heater it was like banging my head against a brick wall
Now I’m retired they all want heat pumps and solar panels so I feel there’s some hope for my grandchildren.
That was a great article- thanks. I’m reading it’s not the end of the world by Hannah Ritchie which is very good, shows where there are grounds for hope and tries to suggest what we can do - if we’re quick. Still love to see the oil bosses in the dock though - that has brightened up my morning 😁
We all want to know who the actors were. You tease!
That’s a cue for “buy the book”!
A small point. It wasn't legislation that prompted the change to measuring road fuel in Litres. The right to continue using Gallons and Miles was one of the many, many carveouts we'd negotiated.
The fuel pups of the time were nearly all mechanical and the unit price would only go up to 1.99. As soon as you exceeded £1.99 per Gallon, you would have to replace all the pumps! Or, you could simply use a smaller unit. Recalibrating for Litres was trivial, since the pumps were set that way in other markets.
I agree, I was being a little bit relaxed in my explanation. The critical point is, and this came from someone who had spent his life in British motor manufacturing, he explained there was a conscious effort on behalf of the car makers and the fuel industry not to change the way fuel efficiency was measured, ie litres per 100 km as in all other European countries. Hence buy in litres, calculate efficiency in gallons. It’s very clever.
I arrived at RAF Upper Heyford in June of 1976 and saw the lack of rain you talk about. Everything seemed normal to me as I had just come from a base in New Mexico in the USA where it was hot and almost never rained, but I saw the problems that happened that summer. Hopefully we will see improvements in how man takes care of planet earth in our lifetime but it is not looking promising.
..just got back from JAPAN. 1 pound to 220 yen. Fuel i saw was 177 yen to a liter. 😯
..and probably oil drilling DOES CAUSE EARTHQUAKES! well there you have it. stupid humans!!! 🤐
I think in some instances electric is just displacimg the polution from road to power station. And then there's the hideous ecological consequences of the batteries, disposi g of them mostly. But there are places where electric vehicles are great (bikes, towns).and gas for the big stuff, be it lpg or hydrodgen, which a couple of big bus builders are working on. Those are tenable and coming soon I hope. 1976 ... I remember my mum being amazed it was 86 Fahrenheit in her greenhouse ... the downs went yellow for the first time ... now they go yellow regularly... yeh. We need to do something.
It still astounds me that’s this argument continues to be spread around.
Number one. The hideous ecological consequences of extracting, refining and burning gasoline/petrol or diesel remains exactly as polluting as it always has. An oil refinery consumes the same amount of electricity ass a mid sized city, plus huge amounts of cobalt, some of which dug up by slave children in the DRC. No one who fills their tank ever considers this.
Number two. It is not possible to make that process ‘clean’ or sustainable. It’s early 20th century technology and 70-75% of the energy contained in a gallon of liquid fuel is wasted in a combustion engine.
Number three, In 2010, in the UK, 40% of our electricity was generated by burning imported coal. Today it is zero. Renewables, wind, solar, hydro produce just over 59% of all the electricity we use, 12% is nuclear, 18% inter-connector from France (nuclear) and the last piddling fraction is from imported methane (natural) gas.
So our electricity is massively, embarrassingly cleaner than it was 16 years ago.
We have control over how we generate electricity, we have no control over the way petroleum products are produced, and using them means, in most countries, vast amounts of wealth being sent to regimes we do not support.
Number four, the most important. The ridiculous claim that batteries are or will be ‘disposed of’ is utter nonsense, keenly fostered by the fossil fuel industry.
All savvy investors and engineers know that the really big growth industry in the next 10 years is battery recycling. Please do check https://www.redwoodmaterials.com/ and watch them ‘dispose’ of batteries. Finally, number five, hydrogen will never be used in transport, yes, I know people are trying but they will fail, there are already 12,000 battery electric long haul 45 ton trucks operating in Germany. The companies running them are saving many millions of dollars a year from NOT buying diesel.
I'm not saying keep fossil fuels. We all agree they are grim. But surely electric cars as they are manufactured right now are the least grim of two options rather than the answer. They are too big for our roads and the range is poor (I used to have to drive a 300 mile round trip every Wednesday and there wasn't an electric car with the range). It was difficult to add half an hour to the journey when delays could add two on their own. They have to be improved in range and also in weight. There has to be an alternative, long term, to something that will double the tonnage of the vehicles on our roads (electric cars as they are currently made are too heavy for a lot of our parking infrastructure) and the batteries contain many minerals which are not produced ethically and which, with tbe best will in the world, are not always disposed of the way they are supposed to be. Have a look at this. It's is a bit of a shocking read ... https://europeancorrespondent.com/en/s/audio?d=2026-06-19&%26
So electric, yes, but different from and better than current batch of massive piddly ranged vehicles. We need cars to be smaller and lighter not bigger and bigger and heavier and heavier. That brings a whole new raft of perils of its own. I cant find the article now but just the other day I was reading how the ever expanding size of cars will start to cause accidents. If I find the link I'll come back and post it.
Please forgive me if I am a little impatient about some of your casually held assumptions because I’ve heard them all so many times before.
I want to stat with the fact that for a while, all electric cars ran on traditional lithium ion batteries that contained cobalt and nickel.
People were rightly critical of these metals due to the terrible ways some of thieve mineral are extracted.
Now, the majority of new electric cars come with LFP, Lithium Ferrous Phosphate batteries that contain NO cobalt or nickel and are 98% recyclable at the end of life which is now 20 to 25 years.
I mentioned that oil refining uses cobalt to remove sulphur from diesel and petrol and you did not respond. Not one glimmer of recognition that the most cruel and contentious metal is used to refine fossil fuel.
Um, ‘Electric cars are so heavy they are damaging parking infrastructure.’ You really need to check your sources, not just read a tacky headline in a far right news blog.
The top 9 heaviest cars allowed on UK roads are ALL petrol or diesel. Massive fat, ugly SUVs. The 10th heaviest is the Tesla Model X, no longer in production. Battery technology has moved on, not only lasting much longer than the cars, but smaller and lighter and 5X more energy dense.
And the now truly embarrassing ‘range’ argument, only ever made by men who have never driven an EV.
You are a human being, you have this thing called a bladder. You sit in a car driving for 10 hours like so many very dull men tell me, you are going to be very very regretful when you have a bladder infection which turns into sepsis.
How do I know this? Because I have suffered from exactly that problem.
A human being has to stop driving every 3 to 4 hours for at least half an hour, for you. Your health, your safety and the safety of others for pities sake.
Truck drivers are not allowed to drive to 8 or ten hours, it’s literally against the law, so range is a rubbish excuse.
I can tell you are really uncomfortable about the idea of a battery, that’s fine, please keep driving a gasoline/diesel car until hydrogen becomes a plausible alternative. It never will, your will drive fuel burning cars until you pass from this world, which is EXACTLY what the fossil fuel industry want you to do, so congrats for supporting them.
If that's true about the batteries. Good. Because they jolly well need to do something. Has that got anywhere near modern electric cars though? Because looking at them, they're still all massive. They are all, clearly designed around the same 18" high platform of batteries with the cabin sitting on top.
I didn't answer your reply about refining because I'd agreed with you that fossil fuels are not the answer and that we have to ditch them. But you were too busy making assumptions about what I think, rather than reading what I had actually written.
Indeed, in both my replies what I was trying to say was that electric cars now are as flawed as petrol in many respects and have to be an interim answer if produced they way they are currently. I still think some kind of hydrodgen use would be better in the long run because it causes zero emmissions and zero power useage.
I am reasonably aware of the law on drivers hours. I used to work for a coach company. The 150 miles was 2 and a quarter hours to 2 and a half if the roads were clear but usually 4 back, two of those stood still or crawling. The usual driver's shift was 8 hours. 2 hrs 15 mins and then 15 mins rest at the first safe place to stop (scheduled in), another 2 hrs 15 and then a longer break after which you could do another 4 hours with the break back. Pretty much what I did ... if and when it worked. But I did need to get there in time to have a couple of hours before going back. I had to be home by 7 and life didn't allow for me to take more than a day out each week.
Rather like your sepsis story, there is a very deep emotional trigger in that one for me. Nearly 3 years after it all ended I still teeter on the brink of burnout most of the time.
I think we'll have to agree to disagree. You keep driving your hovvercraft sized electric car along our tiny British roads. I'll use my bike and the train for everything I can.
Oh well, at least we agree on two things. Petrol cars are not the answer and SUVs are shit. Don't get me started on those enormous ford transit bus sized munter trucks.
I love reading your substack but I'll remember not to comment in future. Sorry to have upset you. Namaste. MTM
You haven’t upset me in the least. I might be a bit snippy at times, but as you suggested to me, don’t take it personally. I certainly don’t, it’s an honest and open discussion where we might disagree but not by much.
I mainly want to challenge your rather odd bits of information, an ‘18" high platform of batteries?’ WTF. Where did that come from.
I totally agree about big cars, that’s not an electric car thing, that’s a ridiculous fashion thing.The Renault 5, as an example, small, compact hatchback car. The battery pack is 14 cm (5.5 inches) thick. An 18 inch battery pack would be if the batteries were lead-acid.
I have never driven an electric car with an 18 inch thick battery pack, and I’ve driven about 250 different electric cars.
Other than that, bike, train, walk, bus, all much better than any individual vehicle.
That's good. Yes. The Renault 5, I can completely get on board with. If that's the future of electric cars I'm a lot more interested. I don't know the actual size of the platform with the battery on but looking at most electric cars I see: polestar, jaecoo, lotus, prius, byd, hyandai, vauxhaull ... most electric cars at the moment seem to have an enormous lot of height before anything else happens like windows etc, and rubbish visibility out of the rear for anything under 3ft high near the back of the car ... Where they look smaller and better they seem to have a really short city car range. I do think electric city cars are brilliant. For the few things I need a car to do an electric or lpg van might be better. Or converting my car to run on something else. I still need range though ... I'm looking into the options...
PS thanks for the recycling link. Looks very interesting and we need better battery recycling. I'll check that out.
I heard today that Burnham is considering new licences for oil & gas exploration in the North Sea. I imagine that will endear him to the orange balloon and Farage the Frog but he'll lose the vote of this moderate dad!
Another cranky old guy ..my weekend warrior got 9 mpg when premium gas was $ 0.35/gal! Which is comparable to today's costs for running my 22mpg SUV./ I really dislike the paper straws now- must have been a lost art in manufacturing 🤠
Ha ha ha. Cranky old guy here, LOL paper straws, and 22mpg is utterly pathetic, it’s embarrassing. And to have a car you call a ‘weekend warrior’ is a bit childish and sad isn’t it? Anyway, carry on wasting money buying gasoline. :-)
The WW was usually the second car. An old Plymouth made to go fast and loud; only got one speeding ticket with it. Built in HS as first car, so was a learning experience as well 🤠
Brilliant. Just brilliant.
I did not know that oil industry lobbying is why we still measure consumption in mpg.