Iran War and the Energy Crisis

I pumped gas today for $4.49 a gallon at my local gas station. Before the war with Iran and the subsequent closing of the Strait of Hormuz, I bought gas for $2.67 per gallon, a dramatic difference in two months’ time. It is hard to imagine that nobody thought of the global energy crisis and the price escalation of everything that would ensue shortly after the attack on Iran on February 28, 2026.

The Strait of Hormuz is bordered by Iran and Oman who have international control over their territorial waters. Approximately 20 percent of the world’s oil and LNG passes through Hormuz.

The Strait of Hormuz is legally an international waterway, but Iran has taken control of it, regulating access, directing shipping routes, and imposing tolls to friendly nations who are allowed passage.

The rest of the ships experience shipping delays, the threat of explosions from anti-ship mines, missiles, and drones, and increased insurance, resulting in soaring global energy prices.

Iran restricted access in the international waters of the Strait of Hormuz for U.S., Israeli, and their allied ships. China, India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Russia, and Iraq have negotiated safe passage on routes near Larak Island.

It does not matter that the U.S. has a large navy, its large ships are vulnerable to more than 100,000 Iranian drones.

The burning of fossil fuels, petroleum (38%), natural gas (36%), and coal (9%) provided 83 percent of U.S. energy production in 2023. According to statistics, net electricity generation in 2025 amounted to around 4,430 terawatt hours. Natural gas was the most common fuel for electricity generation. Combined with coal burning, fossil fuels accounted for 76 percent of all power generation in the U.S. U.S. fossil fuel consumption 2025| Statista

Despite billions of dollars invested in and, at times wasted on various green enterprises that eventually went bankrupt, it was painfully evident that renewable energy never provided enough energy for the needs of such a large economy like the U.S.

In addition to the price of gasoline going up significantly, the price of electricity spiked, making everything produced or serviced much more expensive. “Cheap energy is the key to civilization.”

Calls for more fossil fuel energy production are coming from many of the former proponents of global warming who claimed previously that the “evil” fossil fuels were destroying the planet and thus had to be replaced at all costs with renewable energy, solar and wind.

Why the sudden change? Why the calls for massive expansion of exploration and burning fossil fuels, oil, gas, and coal? What changed? Isn’t CO2 destroying the planet anymore? What happened to the much-touted climate change industry? Did it die as quickly as it started? Is CO2 spewed from burning fossil fuels no longer a threat to the planet?

Enter AI and data centers that need a lot of water and electricity. Influencers, the media, and the moneyed class are trumpeting AI as the future of humanity. Nobody is quite clear about the thousands of jobs it will create. Could those jobs be like green jobs that never materialized with green energy?

The problem with AI is that, to perform well, it needs data centers, thousands of them and then some. It also needs water and land.

Which brings us to the latest fight against data centers in Utah where the proposed Stratos Project in Box Elder County, financed by Shark Tank star Kevin O’Leary, would cover 40,000 acres in Hansel valley, 2.5 times the size of Manhattan, using 9 gigawatts of power, more than double Utah’s current electricity use. The project is overseen by Utah’s Military Installation Development Authority (MIDA). The project is framed as an economic and national security necessity. Tax revenue and thousands of jobs are being promised. Commissioners OK controversial data center proposal for Box Elder County in northern Utah - East Idaho News

Tucker Carlson interviewed O’Leary recently and asked him poignant questions about AI and its huge need for data centers, electricity, and water.

O’Leary’s argument for more data centers was that “if we don’t do it, the Chinese will,” and we will be vulnerable in an asymmetric future war.

Liberty Utilities, which served 49,000 Lake Tahoe residents on the California side, told customers that they must secure a new primary power source by May 2027 because “NV Energy will end its long-standing wholesale electricity supply agreement.” Why would that happen? Because electricity demand from large-scale data centers has skyrocketed. Liberty Utilities generates 25% of its power from its solar facilities in Nevada, and 75% from NV Energy. Nearly 50K Lake Tahoe Residents Have to Find New Power Source - Energy  News Beat

Political pundits opine that the sudden increase in data centers, which require a lot of electricity and water, is the race for AI. Nobody wants U.S. to be behind China. But China already has less data centers than U.S. and has total control over its population with the social score. The oft-repeated question is, what exactly is AI producing?

What would happen to humans and their work if they were suddenly replaced by AI robots? Would that be healthy? Would AI robots become sentient beings and become our judges, jailers, and executioners? Could AI trigger a war and other disasters by malfunctioning or on purpose?

Russia’s Veto Saved the Fossil Fuels for Now

In the 1980s, the environmentalists believed that using paper grocery bags harms the environment by excessive deforestation, so they moved in the direction of replacing the paper grocery bags with plastic ones. It made sense, plastic bags made from petroleum by-products were certainly cheaper and more plentiful.

Fast forward to 2021, environmentalist governments in counties like Fairfax, Virginia, moved to replace the plastic bags with paper bags by charging a tax of 5 cents per plastic bag previously given free (included in the price because nothing is free). Furthermore, a fine of $500 will be levied on anyone who dares to leave grass and other yard clippings on curbside in plastic bags other than heavy paper bags.

Fossil fuels have become environmentally and politically such a Democrat hot potato that they have been labeled public enemy number one, including plastics.

What is Fairfax County and other like-minded counties around the nation doing with the 5 cents tax per bag, or 8 cents in other places? Will they fund the bloated Democrat government or their guaranteed basic income schemes? And how is this tax going to solve the manufactured global warming which gave rise to a very lucrative climate change industry and a huge money-maker?

When Amazon and other online retailers run out of places to buy cheap shipping boxes, I wonder which forests are they going to cut down, and can excessive demand for paper and carboard boxes keep up with supply and with tree growth?

The U.N. Security Council moved to vote on December 13, 2021, on a resolution on climate change co-authored by Ireland and Niger, under the guise that adverse climate change can “lead to … social tensions …, exacerbating, prolonging, or contributing to the risk of future conflicts and instability and posing a key risk to global peace, security, and stability.” The concern is that climate change affects more negatively “women, children, ethnic minorities, and the most vulnerable.” Climate Change and Security: Vote on a Resolution*: What's In Blue : Security Council Report

According to the New York Times, “the resolution, which enjoyed wide-ranging support, would have significantly expanded the criteria used by the most powerful U.N. agency to justify intervening in armed conflicts around the world.” Russia Blocks U.N. Move to Treat Climate as Security Threat - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

It is claimed that the U.N. resolution was supported by 100 countries. Twelve of the fifteen Security Council countries signed on, but Russia’s veto blocked its passage. China abstained, and India, with its invited temporary membership status, also declared against the resolution. It is obvious that all three countries have similar interests, the survival of fossil fuels.

The U.S. government has been busy replacing fossil fuels with wind and solar power, doing severe damage to its economy and weakening its position in the world as a superpower. Biden closed the Keystone pipeline on day one and interrupted supply. “Nearly 40% of America’s electricity is produced from natural gas. When gas goes up, so does your electric bill.” Varney on the 'price' of Biden eliminating fossil fuels | Fox Business

The regime stopped giving new drilling permits on federal land and interrupted off-shore drilling. U.S. became again dependent on oil imports.  During President Trump’s administration, America became an oil exporter.

If the U.N. Security Council vote would have been unanimous in favor of the resolution, then members who would fail to take “drastic” measures recommended by “experts” to green their economies immediately, then they would have been considered aggressors against the global governance.

What might have been the expectations to green a country’s economy urgently? To close coal mines, oil derricks, refineries, oil and gas pipelines, and to give up fossil fuels immediately, with huge economic costs and disastrous economic results for that country.

If a country would have refused to comply, then the most intimidating measures against it would have been justifiable, imposing a global dictatorship of the U.N. to save the planet from climate change Armageddon.

So, Russia, China, and India, with one fifth of the world’s land surface and almost half of its population, saved fossil fuels for now. They viewed the manufactured global warming as a political fantasy and the preservation of their economies and of their economic development as most important for their peoples.

The West wants electric cars (they did not do so well recently in one foot of snow stuck for 24 hours on I-95 in Virginia), electric bikes, electric buses, ships, home and business heat and light from solar panels and wind turbines (when the wind blows and the sun shines, otherwise it is cold and dark). China wants coal burning power plants and builds them at high rates. Russia depends on natural gas and pipelines. And India is adding more coal mines.

Biden’s Green New Deal is neither new, nor green, nor a deal, it is a political plan aimed at killing fossil fuels and destroying the American economy that depends on the fossil fuels’ reliability and consistency.

So, the global warming/climate change scheme to enact global governance has been defeated so far. But the grand plan of one world government might still be realized. To achieve it now, the globalists are bringing out the pandemic green passports of Covid vaccination and the social scoring system which is already underway in China and in America.

Restricting movement of the population can be achieved in more ways than just taking away their fossil fuels; the government can cause severe inflation, double gasoline and natural gas prices, make their currency worth less, obstruct the supply chain of necessary goods and food, restrict access to clinics and hospitals, and restrict domestic and international travel. Under draconian Covid-19 lockdown rules, two years after the declared pandemic, Australians cannot travel more than 29 km from home. How Sydney residents can travel more than 5km from home for exercise (msn.com)

Mayor Muriel Bowser of D.C. has already enacted draconian rules that a person must show I.D. and a vaccine card to enter any business in D.C. It is racist to be asked to show I.D. to vote but it is necessary to enter a business.

If you have a green passport, you are not just vaccinated and boostered, but it is proof that you are now a compliant global citizen, and you can be given (by the global government) the privilege to enter buildings, to fly, to travel, to board a ship, to ride a bus, a train, you can use a bank, you can buy or rent a home, you can move from on town to another, and you can attend school. The social scoring system works wonders with population compliance and obedience under the Chinese communist dictatorship.

For now, Russia, China, and India have saved fossil fuels. I am not sure who or what is going to save a weakened America from its Marxist regime in control in Washington. They are busy printing money for trillion-dollar pet social programs and to finance national debt v. GDP which has reached astronomic proportions (127.61% federal and 141.24% total) at the time of this writing. The military is busy hunting down fictional, Democrat-invented systemic racism. U.S. National Debt Clock : Real Time (usdebtclock.org)