February 2024

India’s refining capacity is projected to increase by 56 million tons by 2028, Junior Oil Minister Rameswar Teli said last month, without elaborating. That equates to an overall capacity boost of 22%, or 1.12 million barrels a day.

India recorded a peak electricity demand of 243 gigawatts last year, exceeding the power ministry’s projections of 229 gigawatts and prompting the ministry to push for more coal power. Maximum demand is expected to jump to 366 gigawatts by 2032.

For nuclear power to live up to the current hype it is getting, it needs to fully address its perennial issues and problems, and so far it has not done so.

The US was the supplier of 56% of the total, with some 14% coming from Russia and 10% from Algeria. Notably, around 7% was also originating from Qatar and 4% from Nigeria.

Australia is a sunny country with excellent renewable energy resources. However it is not rolling out clean energy projects rapidly enough to reach the Australian government’s target of 82% renewable electricity by 2030.

In the real world, climate has changed numerous times, often dramatically, sometimes catastrophically, and always naturally. Multiple ice ages and interglacial periods, Roman and Medieval warm periods, a Little Ice Age, major floods, droughts and dust bowls all actually happened – long before fossil fuels.