Electricity, nuclear and renewables

Electrification in the US, Britain and Germany, 1880 to 1930, as a technical system.

A short primer on energy: its forms, units and role in nature and economies.

Each shift from wood to coal to oil took 50 to 70 years; new ones will be slow too.

History told through energy, from muscle and fire to coal, oil and electricity.

The physical basics of modern life: energy, food, materials and globalisation.

The economic criteria for setting regulated utility rates.

Artisanal cobalt mining in Congo and its place in the battery supply chain.

Six materials the world runs on, sand, salt, iron, copper, oil and lithium, traced.

The man who invented the regulated-return utility bargain, and the holding company that killed him.

The current war: Edison against Westinghouse and Tesla.

A sceptic's conversion to nuclear power, and how public fear of it formed.

Uranium: its mining, its boom towns and the geopolitics of its supply.

How utility business models must change once regulated growth ends.

Nuclear accidents, what went wrong in each, and what each taught about the atom.

How minor metals are mined, traded and hoarded.

The global race to build a better lithium-ion battery for electric cars.

Why the regulated grid's economics are breaking.

The Sweden-and-France case that nuclear is the fastest decarbonisation path.

Michael Skelly's bid to build a power line across America for wind power.

The rare metals behind green tech and devices, and China's hold on their supply.

The demand side: what full electrification of homes and vehicles requires.

Lithium, cobalt and nickel supply chains behind the EV build-out.

Why energy demand never falls, why 'waste' helps, and why quality power is scarce.

How people will get energy two centuries from now, once fossil carbon is gone.

Rare metals such as tantalum and rhodium, and why phones and weapons need them.

The century-long race among automakers to build the car of the future.

Institutional history of interconnection and who controls it.

Deregulated wholesale markets and reliability risk.

The history and technology of the Integral Fast Reactor built at Argonne, 1984-94.