Power Hour with Alex Epstein

Alex Epstein interviews Adam Anderson, author of a widely-circulated open letter to The North Face when the company refused to sell Anderson’s oilfield services company, Innovex, 400 jackets. They discuss: - How Adam got into the oil and gas industry - Why Adam wrote the letter - How Adam was influenced by The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels - The unexpected volume of feedback Adam has gotten - Why The North Face and other anti-hydrocarbon groups didn’t publicly respond - Why speaking up has less downside than people think - Adam’s plans for the future

On this episode of Power Hour Alex Epstein continues his discussion with physicist Adrian Bejan, of “constructal law” fame, to discuss the central ideas of Bejan’s book Freedom and Evolution. They cover: - Professor Bejan’s broad-ranging conception of freedom, including change and movement. - How freedom of change and movement naturally leads to economies of scale for humans, for other life forms, and for the inanimate. - How freedom of change and movement and naturally leads to hierarchies, for other life forms, and for the inanimate. - How Bejan explains the continued dominance of the Northeast United States in the university world. - Why Bejan expects energy use to keep increasing. - Why Bejan agrees with the moral case for fossil fuels. - The role of bad ideas in restricting freedom and progress

On this week’s Power Hour Alex Epstein interviews Adrian Bejan, a Duke Professor and Benjamin Franklin Medal recipient renowned for identifying “constructal law.” The topic is how physics, specifically thermodynamics, can help us better understand life, including our use of energy, our environmental impact, and the need for freedom. Topics covered include: - How Bejan escaped communism, immigrated to the US, and studied MIT. - How Bejan identified “constructal law.” - The universality of thermodynamics. - Why humans impacting our environment is natural. - Bejan’s predictions of our energy and climate future.

On this week’s Power Hour, Alex Epstein is joined by former Congressman Keith Rothfus, to talk about threats to energy freedom under the new administration--and how to fight back. Alex asks Congressman Rothfus: - What prompted you to run for Congress? - What did you do to promote energy freedom while in Congress? - What are the major attacks on energy freedom you expect from the Biden administration and its Congressional allies? - What advice do you have for pro-energy, pro-freedom elected officials? - Are there opportunities to make a difference by proposing legislation even if it won’t pass (like Democrats with the green new deal)? - What do you think of EnergyTalkingPoints.com--and what can we do to make it better?

In the “Best-Of” episode, originally titled “Greenpeace cofounder Patrick Moore eviscerates climate catastrophism,” Moore does just that by looking at rising CO2 levels from a scientific and pro-human perspective--not the pseudoscientific and anti-human perspective that dominates today. Topics include: - Why Moore left Greenpeace. - The beginnings of the climate catastrophe movement. - Why Moore believes human beings would not only survive but survive better at far higher average temperatures (which would be concentrated toward the poles). - Why Moore believes that contrary to being in a Sixth Extinction, we are actually at an unprecedented time of biodiversity with no end in sight. - Why Moore believes “ocean acidification” claims are totally meritless. - The commonality among opposition to plastics, GMOs, nuclear energy, and fossil fuels. - Moore’s unrefuted theory that human beings actually saved life on Earth from terminal decline in CO2 levels.

On this week’s Power Hour Alex interviews futurist J. Storrs Hall, author of the mind-blowing book Where’s My Flying Car? which gives a brilliant analysis of what has held back many forms of progress, including flying cars, over the last half-century. Topics they cover include: - What is the Great Stagnation? - How did you become interested in analyzing the Great Stagnation? - What is your basic explanation for The Great Stagnation? - How does government funding of research promote stagnation? - How does the “green” philosophy promote stagnation? - What was the trajectory of nuclear energy before government started criminalizing it? - What legal/regulatory reforms are necessary to decriminalize nuclear? - What can we do to liberate human progress from its political and philosophical strangulation?

On this week’s Power Hour, I interview Vijay Jayaraj, an up and coming energy/environment researcher based in India. Vijay has experienced the reality of poverty, including energy poverty, firsthand--as well as India’s rapid rise from poverty using fossil fuels. Some topics we discussed included: - Why Vijay decided to study energy and environmental issues professionally. - Vijay’s experience at the University of East Anglia during the “Climategate” scandal. - What life in the unempowered world is like for women. - What sanitation is like in the unempowered world. - Hunger challenges in the unempowered world. - How international investment revolutionized India. - How coal revolutionized India. - How the less-developed world can tell its energy story. Toward the end of the episode we began what I hope is an ongoing discussion about how the unempowered/less-developed world can tell its energy story and advocate for its right to use more fossil fuels. Vijay mentioned at the end of the episode that he’s available to do research and write papers. If you’d like to reach him his email is konsultvijay@gmail.com.

On this week’s Power Hour, Alex shares some thoughts on the election and then features a “best of” interview with Michael Shellenberger, author of Apocalypse Never. Some highlights: - How Shellenberger went from being a renewables activists to championing nuclear. - Why Shellenberger decided to stand up against climate catastrophism after years of silence. - How modern environmentalism is a religion. - The real motives of most of modern environmentalism. - How environmental journalists misrepresent environmental science.

Recently, Shawn Steffee, an executive board member of Boilermakers 154 in Pennsylvania, was featured on a popular FoxNews segment in which he loudly and proudly advocated for fossil fuels. On this week’s Power Hour Alex Epstein interviews Steffee about the fossil fuel industry in Pennsylvania and what its challenges and opportunities are going forward. They cover: - Why every other form of energy is made using fossil fuels - How Steffee learned about the case for fossil fuels - Why utilities should offer a real renewable energy option, where your power gets cut off when sunshine and wind are inadequate - What happens “behind the scenes” when you turn your lights on - Common-sense problems with using solar in regions with bad winters - Why “smart” people can have so many dumb ideas about energy - The oil and gas industry in Pennsylvania - The coal industry in Pennsylvania - The myth of the perfect climate

Alex Epstein interviews Joakim Book, an up-and-coming economic and environmental commentator.These days Book is writing articles challenging climate catastrophism and explaining the value of abundant energy use.But he used to be a climate activist who thought he was saving the planet from the evil of fossil fuels. Epstein and Book cover: - Book’s time as a climate activist. - Why Book and others never questioned the rightness of opposing fossil fuels. - How economic thinking changed Book’s perspective. - How Book was influenced by The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels. - What lessons we can learn about persuasion from Book’s experience.