When it Comes to Water, California Needs to Think Big Again
When it Comes to Water, California Needs to Think Big Again
For most of the previous century, Californians successfully designed and built big water infrastructure. In sixty years, from 1910 through 1970, we built the most impressive system of interbasin transfers in the world. The Los Angeles Aqueduct, Hetch Hetchy Aqueduct, Colorado River Aqueduct, Delta Mendota Canal, Friant-Kern Canal, and California Aqueduct. Altogether these conveyances are...
By Edward Ring
Can Oil Industry Lawsuits Compel Rational Energy Policy?
Can Oil Industry Lawsuits Compel Rational Energy Policy?
When asked in a recent interview why California has the highest gasoline prices in the nation, Jodie Muller, the President of the Western States Petroleum Association, began by stating the following: “You can’t point a finger at one particular person, because, unfortunately, it is decades of policies layered on top of one another. You have local air...
By Edward Ring
California’s Climate Overreach
California’s Climate Overreach
Even if the most dire climate scenarios are accurate, and humanity must transition away from fossil fuel, it can’t happen overnight. The rational approach is to first develop alternative sources of energy without precipitously destroying the industries that reliably produce oil and natural gas. Once alternatives are available at a competitive price and in sufficient...
By Edward Ring
California’s Self-Destructive War on Oil
California’s Self-Destructive War on Oil
California’s state legislature may succeed in destroying its own oil industry, but it won’t change anything in the world. It will only export jobs and raise the cost-of-living here at home. Here’s a reality check. According to the Statistical Review of World Energy, in 2024, oil, natural gas, and coal contributed 87 percent of the world’s...
By Edward Ring
The Abundance Alliance
The Abundance Alliance
Abundance, and its political twin, affordability, are now bipartisan mantras, but cannot be realized if the only permissible avenues are via urban infill, renewable energy, and water rationing. California is uniquely positioned to do much more. Breakthrough technologies and big projects, both pioneered here, could unite a powerful coalition of farmers, energy companies, high tech...
By Edward Ring
Can California Thrive on Renewable Electricity?
Can California Thrive on Renewable Electricity?
California’s state government has set an official goal of “net zero” by 2045. That’s less than 19 years from now. Already in pursuit of that goal, the state has managed to have the highest priced gasoline and the highest priced electricity in the entire continental United States. Condemning its residents to a poverty inducing bleeding...
By Edward Ring
How Much CO2 Do Oil Tankers Emit En-Route to California?
How Much CO2 Do Oil Tankers Emit En-Route to California?
With war in the Middle East disrupting shipments of crude oil, we have another reason to question policies that are driving our in-state oil industry into terminal decline. To briefly recap, Californians consumed 484 million barrels of oil in 2025, with in-state production only providing 111 million barrels. The rest was imported. It doesn’t have to...
By Edward Ring
Floating Offshore Wind – A Financial and Environmental Catastrophe
Floating Offshore Wind – A Financial and Environmental Catastrophe
Earlier this year, the California Coastal Commission released a report titled “Statewide Strategy for the Coexistence of California Fishing Communities and Offshore Wind Energy.” In addition to providing a “guiding framework” to protect California’s fishing communities, it “presents a roadmap for proposed offshore wind projects to become consistent with California’s relevant Coastal Act policies that recognize...
By Edward Ring
Federal Options for Large Scale Seawater Desalination
Federal Options for Large Scale Seawater Desalination
The Carlsbad desalination plant is reportedly operating at half-capacity, basically because it’s less expensive to import water from the Colorado River. That is likely to change, as Arizona’s Department of Water Resources is negotiating with the San Diego County Water Authority to purchase some of the water they get from the Colorado River. The funds from Arizona will...
By Edward Ring
The Economics of Managing Mono Lake
The Economics of Managing Mono Lake
Along with the California Condor, one of our state’s most magnificent environmental success stories of the 20th century is how Mono Lake was saved. In the early 1980s, after decades of unsustainable water withdrawals from the Owens River into the Los Angeles Aqueduct, the lake had declined in elevation to 6,372 feet. The decline was...
By Edward Ring
The Many Benefits of Dredging the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
The Many Benefits of Dredging the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
The salmon decline in the delta has been attributed to the impact of water withdrawals into the California Aqueduct and the Delta Mendota Canal. But something else happened at the same time as the pumps began operating; dredging in most channels in the delta virtually ceased. For the last 50 years, especially in the south...
By Edward Ring
Why Data Centers Will Create Electricity Abundance
Why Data Centers Will Create Electricity Abundance
There is concern that the energy requirements of data centers will consume so much electricity that demand will overwhelm supply. While this is certainly a possible outcome, the actual impact may have the opposite effect. For starters, while the total consumption of electricity by data centers is significant and growing, credible estimates point to manageable...
By Edward Ring