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The 59th Street electric powerhouse, New York City, 1904.

The Utility of Utilities

Climate activists are no fans of electric utilities. But the alternatives that they often prefer will not deliver infrastructural change at the scale we need.
by Matt Huber, Fred Stafford via Damage on April 1, 2024
Oil rigs just south of town extract crude for Chevron at sunrise in Taft, California, on July 22, 2008.

How Private Oil Companies Took Over U.S. Energy Security

And why it’s time to take it back.
by Gregory Brew via Foreign Policy on May 16, 2022
Farmers harvest wheat near the village of Tbilisskaya, Russia, July 21, 2021. That nation’s farmers produce nearly a fifth of world wheat exports.

How High Energy Prices Emboldened Putin

Rupert Russell’s new book shows how the financialization of commodity prices worsens volatility and destabilizes geopolitics. It couldn’t be more timely.
by Tim Sahay via The American Prospect on March 22, 2022
Artistic photo of factory pollution

Endless Combustion

Three new books examine how the rise of coal, oil, and gas have permanently remade our world.
by Bill McKibben via The Nation on February 6, 2019
Coal power plant.
partner

It’s Time to Ditch Coal, Not Clean It

In the 19th century, Americans abandoned one source of dirty energy. Can they do it again?
by Raymond Malewitz via Made By History on July 26, 2017
Photograph of cars bumper to bumper on a highway, USA (year unknown, likely during 1970s energy crisis)

How Congress Planned To Solve The 1970s Energy Crisis

Representative Mo Udall's ambitious strategy to wean the United States off fossil fuels by the year 2000.
by Morris K. Udall via The New Republic on June 16, 1973
‘Fifty Shades of White’ by Jaune Quick-To-See Smith.

Remembering the Future

Climate change, colonization, and the Navajo Nation.
by Hazel V. Carby via London Review of Books on March 27, 2024
Post card depicting coal miners in PA

When Did Americans Start Using Fossil Fuel?

The nineteenth-century establishment of mid-Atlantic coal mines and canals gave America its first taste of abundant fossil fuel energy.
by Livia Gershon, Christopher F. Jones via JSTOR Daily on October 11, 2023
President Obama wipes the sweat from his forehead at a press conference.

We Now Know the Full Extent of Obama’s Disastrous Apathy Toward the Climate Crisis

Obama’s official oral history contains new evidence of his indifference and foot-dragging on the most important issue of our time.
by Nathan J. Robinson via Current Affairs on June 5, 2023
Illustration of a coal stove with the roof of a house, as if the whole house is a furnace.

When Coal First Arrived, Americans Said 'No Thanks'

Back in the 19th century, coal was the nation's newfangled fuel source—and it faced the same resistance as wind and solar today.
by Clive Thompson via Smithsonian on July 5, 2022
A line of cars waiting their turn at a filling station in Portland, Oregon, 1973.

The Price of Oil

The history of control and decontrol in the oil market.
by Gregory Brew via Phenomenal World on May 25, 2022
BP is trying to divest its share of the Russian state-owned company Rosneft.
partner

Western Oil Companies Ditching Russia is a New Twist on a Familiar Pattern

For more than a century, Western oil companies have cycled into and out of Russia.
by Michael De Groot via Made By History on March 7, 2022
Horses standing next to a car.

What Extremely Muscular Horses Teach Us About Climate Change

You can’t understand the history of American energy use without them. A new visual history puts them in context.
by Robinson Meyer via The Atlantic on December 8, 2020
Person in factory holding a large sack

Minneapolis and the Rise of Nutrition Capitalism

The intertwining of white flour, nutrition science, and profit.
by Michael J. Lansing via The Metropole on October 20, 2020
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez speaks to an audience in front of a Green New Deal sign.
partner

The Federal Government Subsidized the Carbon Economy. Now it Should Subsidize a Greener One.

Why the Green New Deal fits right in with America’s energy economy.
by Ryan Driskell Tate via Made By History on April 26, 2019

A New Struggle Coming

On the teachers' strike in West Virginia.
by Jedediah Britton-Purdy via n+1 on March 5, 2018
Albert B. Fall swears in as Interior Secretary in 1921.

Reckoning with History: Interior’s Legacy of Bad Behavior

Ryan Zinke isn’t the first Interior secretary to attract controversy.
by Adam M. Sowards via High Country News on January 3, 2018

Oil Barrels Aren't Real Anymore

Once a cask that held crude, the oil barrel is now mostly an economic concept.
by Brian Jacobson via The Atlantic on September 8, 2017

Coal No Longer Fuels America. But the Legacy — and the Myth — Remain.

Coal country still clings to the industry that was long its chief source of revenue and a way of life.
by Karen Heller via Retropolis on July 9, 2017

Letter From a Drowned Canyon

The story of water in the West, climate change, and the birth of modern environmentalism lies at the bottom of Lake Powell.
by Rebecca Solnit via The California Sunday Magazine on March 30, 2017
Yosemite Valley from Artist’s Point

This Land is Their Land: Trump is Selling Out the US’s Beloved Wilderness

During the McCarthy era’s darkest days, public lands came under attack. History now repeats itself – and this may be the last chance to defend what’s ours.
by Nate Schweber via The Guardian on May 18, 2025
Jimmy Carter speaking in front of a row of solar panels.

Energy Is Central to American Politics. That All Started with Jimmy Carter.

We have yet to solve the problems that Carter confronted head-on as president.
by Gautama Mehta via Grist on January 9, 2025
Karen Silkwood.

Whistleblower Karen Silkwood’s Urgent Message for Us

Karen Silkwood death and smear campaign highlights how retaliation against whistleblowers deflects scrutiny from power by targeting the messenger.
by Sarah Milov, Katherine Turk via Jacobin on December 28, 2024
Still from 'Chinatown' showing Jack Nicholson taking photo.

“Chinatown” at 50, or Seeing Oil Through Cinema

On the 50th anniversary of “Chinatown” and the beginning of the end of petromodernity.
by Michael Rubenstein via Los Angeles Review of Books on July 8, 2024
Jimmy Carter at a podium against the backdrop of an American flag.

Is Jimmy Carter Where Environmentalism Went Wrong?

Carter’s austerity was part of a bigger project. It didn’t really have much to do with environmentalism.
by Kate Aronoff via The New Republic on April 18, 2023
The FTX Arena.
partner

FTX’s Downfall Shows the Problems Exposed by Enron Have Only Gotten Worse

Social media makes it even easier to sell the aura of success that was pivotal to both companies.
by Gavin Benke via Made By History on November 15, 2022
Picture of President Joe Biden, left, and President Jimmy Carter, right.

What Historians Think of Joe Biden-Jimmy Carter Comparisons

Historical experts and former Carter advisers fact-check the critics who have compared Joe Biden to Jimmy Carter.
by Olivia B. Waxman via TIME on August 16, 2022
Heavy machinery pushes coal at the Ramaco Resources Stonecoal Alma mine near Wylo, W.Va., on Aug. 8, 2017.
partner

Supreme Court Could Thwart EPA’s Ability to Address Climate Change

No matter the outcome of West Virginia v. EPA, the agency can take action to engage the public and make its data more accessible.
by Leif Fredrickson via Made By History on February 28, 2022
Old-time black and white pictures of Theodore Roosevelt and John Muir with a modern city background

How American Environmentalism Failed

Traditional environmentalism has lacked a meaningful, practical democratic vision, rendering it largely marginal to the day-to-day lives of most Americans.
by William Shutkin via The MIT Press Reader on August 31, 2021
Aerial view of a mining quarry

The Land Was Ours

Trump, Biden, and public lands.
by Nick Bowlin via The Drift on January 27, 2021
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