Michael Bradshaw, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick
Gazprom’s decision to hike the price of the gas it sells to Ukraine came as no surprise as it was flagged more than a month ago. At that time the company’s website showed the Russian prime minister, Dmitry…
Hell and high water: a German anti-piracy ship returns from an African tour.
Ingo Wagner/EPA
The Crimea crisis has focused our attention on the vexed question of Europe’s energy supplies. To a great extent Europe depends on Russia for its oil and gas, which gives Vladimir Putin disproportionate…
Trust between Vladimir Putin and Gerhard Schröder helped lubricate the Nord Stream deal.
EPA Pool/Yuri Kadobnov
Much of the discussion on the current Ukraine crisis concerns European energy security and dependence on Russian gas. The different reactions of EU member states to the Ukraine crisis highlight an underlying…
Australia only keeps an estimated 23 days’ worth of fuel in the country.
Bidgee/Wikimedia Commons
It might sound unlikely, but Australia’s fuel gauge is worryingly low. We’re one of the world’s top energy exporters, but our stocks of liquid fuels – such as the oil on which almost the whole transport…
With floods sweeping the country, energy policy has slipped down the agenda since Labour’s attention-grabbing price freeze policy announcement. And this of course is unfortunate, as energy policy is central…
Brisbane’s annual City of Lights show, which is sponsored by an oil and gas company.
Flickr/Wei Lun Koh (some rights reserved)
From flicking on a light to travelling around town, our lives are utterly dependent on energy. That’s why it’s so surprising that Australia has been so bad at thinking about our country’s future energy…
Would you buy a used energy market from these people?
PA
The impending third reading of the Energy Bill in the UK’s House of Lords marks the final stage of a long and intensive review process for legislation designed to overhaul the UK’s energy market. The question…
The future Hinkley Point C nuclear power station (centre), with older reactors.
EDF
There has long been talk of the need for a “nuclear renaissance”, and now it seems underway. The deal has been struck that would see the first new British nuclear power station in a generation. But is…
New South Wales needs to consider all the options to avoid a gas crisis.
Flickr/mikeyp2000
The NSW Energy Security Summit being held in Sydney this week looks like turning into a debate on the relative economic and environmental credentials of coal seam gas, while at the same time exposing a…
New South Wales relies heavily on gas, but gets nearly all its supply from elsewhere.
Warren Rohner
New South Wales is the only major state in Australia that does not have energy security. Its reliance on Victorian and Queensland gas, paired with the vital role gas plays in its homes and industries…
The Champagne Pool at Wai-O-Tapu, New Zealand: hot water for free.
Rebecca Naden/PA
Geothermal energy is derived from heat produced by the decay of radioactive elements within the Earth’s molten core, where temperatures reach 6000°C around 6000km below the ground. This heat naturally…
Blackouts remind us what life was like before cheap, readily available electricity - but it’s time to think about the true price of our power.
Candle in the dark image from www.shutterstock.com/Ronen
No lights, no power, no internet - and no easy solutions. Fumbling around in a middle of a blackout, hoping to find a torch or some spare batteries, I was struck by just how utterly dependent most of us…
Low-income households in Australia are increasingly at risk of “energy poverty”, a University of Sydney study has found…
Australia’s energy security will fall again after Caltex’s decision to shut its Sydney plant at Kurnell (pictured), but the Federal Government is yet to have a coherent stance on domestic refining capacity.
AAP/Mick Tsikas
Last week, Caltex decided to close its Kurnell refinery in Sydney. This closure follows a recent decision by Shell to close its refinery at Clyde in Sydney and it will leave the city without any oil refineries…
State of dependency: Australia imports the majority of its oil for the first time since 1970.
Flickr/Sr. Samolo
For all the talk about Australia’s resource and energy riches and the country’s economy riding the waves of a resource boom, one facet of the country’s energy situation has largely been under the radar…
Plentiful carbon-based fuel and falling world energy prices are a mixed blessing.
Adrian Bradshaw/AAP
Since the middle of the last decade, well before the worldwide run-up in fuel prices during 2008, it has been widely believed that we are entering a new era of scarcity in carbon-based fuels such as oil…
Serious, interconnected risks are closing in on the globalised community, from climate change to anarchy. Are we heeding the warnings?
AAP/EPA/Daniel Deme
In that world of peripheral vision, essential for business, social and political leaders, it is surprising that the World Economic Forum’s report, Global Risks 2012 has not received greater publicity or…
Driving away from fossil fuels: fields of rapeseed which is used in biofuels, many of which are under development in Australia and abroad.
Flickr/roger g1
In 300 BC, the Syrian city of Antioch had public street lighting fuelled by olive oil. At the 1900 Paris World Fair, German inventor Rudolph Diesel demonstrated his engine powered by peanut oil. Biofuels…
Barrow Island off Western Australia may hold the key to our energy future.
AAP/Bill Hatto
AUSTRALIA IN THE ASIAN CENTURY – A series examining Australia’s role in the rapidly transforming Asian region. Delivered in partnership with the Australian government. Here, Dr Tina Hunter looks at the…
Facing the music: Australia is losing its capacity to refine oil.
AAP/Andrew Brownbill
The looming closure of three Australian refineries will affect the security of liquid fuel supplies in Australia. This is particularly so if the government and the oil industry do not devise a joint strategy…