Matt Ryan

Made it past halfway, then got turned around. Well done everyone! Truly a day of humanity.

A few months ago, I was wondering what "drill baby drill" would look like, seeing as Biden already had fossil fuel production at all time highs, and the global LNG market was heading toward a glut.

Looks like I underestimated the power of fossil capital...

The new US-EU trade deal requires that Europe must buy $250 billion in fossil fuels from America every year. Last year, the EU spent just $70bn on the same. And renewables build-out means Europe will require less, not more, of the planet-killing garbage.

Yeah, this. Anecdotally, I know of graziers who went out the day after this announcement and culled their herds...

While WA gas prices rise for consumers, Waitsia buys domestic gas cheap and sells it for a profit off shore while no-one notices 😡

#Auspol
#FFdeathwatch

www.abc.net.au/news/2025-07...

WA and federal governments allowing Woodside to export large amounts of WA’s domestic gas reserves Reporting today confirms large quantities of Western Australia’s domestic gas reserves are being exported via Woodside’s North West Shelf project, and the federal and Western Australian governments ar...

Reporting today confirms large quantities of Western Australia’s domestic gas reserves are being exported via Woodside’s North West Shelf project, and the federal and Western Australian governments are letting it happen.

The Australia Institute warned of precisely this situation last August.

Virtue Capitalists: The Rise and Fall of the Professional Class in the Anglophone World, 1870–2008 Published in Journal of Australian Studies (Ahead of Print, 2025)

@hannahforsyth.bsky.social's *Virtue Capitalists*, “the sort of book that changes how you see the world”. (Me, quoting @adamtooze.bsky.social, quoting Claire EF Wright). Class, settler-colonialism, global history - it's good!

My review out now in @jas-jozstudies.bsky.social: doi.org/10.1080/1444...

Melinda Cooper starter pack but it's only her. FYI she's one of the most creative, incisive critics of American political economy; well worth a follow for fellow travelers.

@melindacooper.bsky.social

As per @mkblyth.bsky.social, the goal here is to use the power of the state to strand renewable assets in the same way climate people once talked about fossil fuel assets becoming stranded as an inevitability. This is "drown the baby in the bathtub before it becomes a threat" territory.

Here's something absolutely cooked about books in Australia - The Australia Institute It's a big week for Australian culture, with announcement of the shortlist for the Miles Franklin Literary Award, one of the country's top writing prizes.

Here’s something absolutely cooked about books in Australia https://australiainstitute.org.au/post/heres-something-absolutely-cooked-about-books-in-australia/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=heres-something-absolutely-cooked-about-books-in-australia #Auspol

“Private capital will never deliver a just transition away from fossil fuels. The public sector MUST be involved.

“Capital is incapable of a managed transition + there is no profit motive in justice.”

@jmijin.bsky.social on the need for public ownership as a key component of fossil fuel phaseout.

The Truth About Empire: Real Histories of British Colonialism Published in The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History (Ahead of Print, 2025)

Nice review of The Truth About Empire from @drrscully.bsky.social:
‘Use it to inform or to reinforce your knowledge … of the British Empire in all its complexity … a volume of such diversity & lucidity should certainly be hailed as the landmark it is’.

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

"The North West Shelf, according to analysis by The Australia Institute, will be responsible for more emissions than all of Australia’s coal-fired power stations each year."

By far the scariest part of this is that the *rate* at which our planet is warming has increased so quickly.

I mean, the last time I checked a few years ago the consensus was that the planet was heating 0.2C / decade.

Oh look, Env Minister Murray Watt just tripled the area of native habitat that tax-shy gas company Arrow Energy can destroy!

When LNP's Greg Hunt approved this, he imposed "some of the strictest env conditions in Aus history"

Not so strict anymore...1/4
@australiainstitute.org.au

The full implications of Australia's North West Shelf decision On 28 May 2025, Australian Environment Minister Murray Watt made the first step towards what looks set to be a final decision to approve Woodside Energy's North West Shelf LNG plant in Western Austral...

Re: NSW, see climateanalytics.org/publications...

Next time someone tells you their climate policy is "science-aligned", consider this.

Carbon budget for 1.5C is only 130GtCO2.

Woodside's NWS extension to 2070 will result in 3.9Gt.

That ONE project is 3% of the GLOBAL carbon budget, and more than Australia's entire "fair share". Pure madness.

"Cheap labour: gendered jurisdictions and
feminizing capitalism" - loving this article by Claire EF Wright and @hannahforsyth.bsky.social. Now to dig into the whole special issue... www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1...

Gas giants say they can get Asia off coal – and reduce emissions New research suggests replacing coal power with Australian gas could deliver cost-effective emissions reductions in Asia.

Asian LNG trade body pays for report saying Aus gas displaces coal in Asia and analysts say case closed; on the other side is the CSIRO saying no evidence and US Department of Energy work finding gas displaces renewables at twice the rate of coal.

Staff Profile

www.sydney.edu.au/science/abou...

The capitalist state and critical agrarian studies: toward progressive strategy in the imperial core This paper connects the concerns of critical agrarian studies to broader discussions of transformation and capitalism through a socio-ecological – strategic-relational (SESR) reading of the capital...

The agrarian question today, with the state centred.

This is such a powerful article, by one of the best scholars I know. If you haven't heard of Anna Sturman, you have now - you're welcome. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Pakistan redirects 2GW to Bitcoin mining and AI data centers Country aims to use surplus power to kickstart digital infrastructure boom

Pakistan borrowed heavily & over-invested in coal & gas generation capacity, and is now facing a "utility death spiral" as distributed solar & batteries are going gangbusters. Now, it's trying to sell spare thermal capacity to AI & crypto data centres.

www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/paki...

This falls into the same trap as the same issue w/ large-scale wind and solar farms. Being pro or anti [insert technology here] misses the obvious factors around corporate behaviour and benefit sharing.

Be pro-justice and anti-unfairness instead!

platformlondon.org/app/uploads/...

Hotter world will drive more wars, EU climate chief warns Military staff increasingly concerned about rising sea levels, droughts and floods, according to EU commissioner A Nairobi slum after flash floods in April last year. Climate change has 'crystal clear direct and indirect effects on geopolitics, on safety and security, says Woke Hoekstra © Simon Maina/AFP/Getty Imades

I agree more violence is coming. But I hate the racist undertones of how it’s talked about— implying that poor people will be driven to violent outbursts by tropical heat disregulating their emotions.

Global heating is a result of violent capitalist inequalities; that then causes more violence.

Another highlight. Fossil fuel investment in "low emissions technology" remains greenwash:

Some more context to understand the relationship between the ALP and fossil fuel exports - we're leading the world in expanding coal exports! This just in from the @iea.org: www.iea.org/reports/worl...

Check out how crazy profitable Australian gas exports are! 47.8%!!! Amazing what happens when you pay no royaltes, and let other people pay for the climate change you cause...

I've come to realize the book itself is ok actually - it's just that a generation of left-wing thinkers have used it as an excuse for lazy, vibe-driven theorizing (mistaking Polanyi's casual metaphorical expressions for concepts).

- Oil and gas producers point to Russia/Ukraine as the driver behind their massive expansion, but it is also anticompetitive. The thinking seems to go that if the price of gas falls far enough, gas can compete with solar and will lock in gas infrastructure over the long term. This a very risky bet.