I have a new column this week on OnlySky. It’s about how the fossil fuel era will end – not with a whimper, but with a bang of exploding refineries.
Despite sanctions, price caps and other attempts to punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, the Western world can’t kick the habit of buying its oil. The dollars and euros are the lifeblood of Vladimir Putin’s genocidal war machine. Now Ukraine is changing the calculus, with fleets of domestic drones and cruise missiles destroying Russian refineries, pipelines and other fossil-fuel infrastructure. And Russia’s military seems helpless to do anything about it.
This is something every politician should be thinking about. Even if you think climate change is a liberal hoax (or are paid by lobbyists to say that you do), there’s also a national security argument for renewables. The Ukraine war has proven that oil and gas infrastructure can’t be protected, especially with drones becoming cheaper and more capable all the time. But a society with solar panels on every roof has no such vulnerable points. What will it take for the world to learn that lesson?
Read the excerpt below, then click through to see the full piece. This column is free to read, but members of OnlySky also get special benefits, like member-only posts and a subscriber newsletter:
For years, Russia served as Europe’s gas station. Despite having few other industries of note, Russia has abundant oil and gas reserves, which it was happy to sell to European nations to cement their economic links.
However, Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine showed Europeans the folly of depending on a belligerent, warmongering dictator for their energy needs. Like any drug dealer, Putin wanted his customers hooked so he’d have leverage over them. At the start of the war, Russia engaged in brazen energy blackmail, threatening to cut off the fuel supply unless the E.U. looked the other way.
But to the Europeans’ credit, they didn’t knuckle under. They slapped Russia with sanctions, sought out alternative sources of fuel, and redoubled their efforts to shift to renewable energy. Putin’s attempt at blackmail fizzled: in the first month of 2025, Russia’s last gas pipeline to Europe was shut off for good.
From time to time the news spits out stories about how well Germany has done in converting to solar energy. It gives me hope, because if cool, damp Germany can thrive on solar power, there’s no reason for sunny Phoenix, Arizona (for example) or Las Vegas to drag its feet.
Lest anyone think the USA is the only place where rightwing nuts object, my formerly-sane-turned-right-wingnut religious Dutch friends recently called me, absolutely furious that Rob Jetten is now their new prime minister. They’re simply besides themselves in rage that Jetten favors green policies. Their church (an American-created megachurch that set up shop in the Netherlands) has been preaching against him.