The last severe cold snap that hit the country brought more attention to the energy needs of many states, leading to a “NetZero” utopia.
In addition, it nearly froze Lake Erie to the point of complete ice cover.
Well, there is likely to be even greater appreciation for inexpensive, reliable energy in the wake of the “snow hurricane” (as it is being called by some). Especially after over half-a-million people have lost power during the deep freeze.
The storm snarled travel at airports and on the roads, breaking records in Providence, Rhode Island, and Islip, New York. More than 5,600 flights were canceled, according to FlightAware. Street closures abounded as snow piled up and whiteout conditions made for “potentially life-threatening” travel conditions, the National Weather Service said.Over half a million homes and businesses across the Northeast were without power, according to a USA TODAY outage tracker. The intense snowfall and winds began to ease off across New York and New Jersey by mid-afternoon. But the storm was making a slow exit in New England, not expected to fully clear out of Massachusetts and Maine until late Monday evening.
A shout out to Professor Jacobson and his family, as the highest snow total, so far, is 36.2 inches in Warwick, Rhode Island.
Climate crisis cultists who made natural gas pipelines impossible to construct are going to learn a valuable lesson about supply and demand. Prices for this very efficient fuel source jumped during the last cold snap we had in January.
The contracts for near-term US natural gas futures have skyrocketed more than 70% so far this week, according to FactSet data. That leaves natural gas on track for the biggest weekly increase since 1990 and at the highest price since 2022, according to Bloomberg.The explosive move has been driven by meteorologists warning of one of the most extreme winter storms in years. As much of the country soon enters a deep freeze, people cranking up the heat in their homes could deplete some stockpiles of natural gas.Darrell Fletcher, managing director of commodities at Bannockburn Capital Markets, said he’s only seen a few moves in natural gas futures like this in his 30 years as a trader.
As a delightful bonus, coal use also increased during last month’s deep freeze.
The U.S. electric grid leaned heavily on fossil fuels during Winter Storm Fern, with coal generation in particular jumping 31% for the week ended Sunday, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said Tuesday.Beginning Friday, Fern brought snow, ice and frigid temperatures to a swath of the U.S. from Texas to New England.Coal generation has surged in the second half of January, from a mid-month low of around 70 GWh/day to about 130 GWh/day, according to EIA data. During the week of Fern, gas generation in the Lower 48 also increased 14% from the previous week while generation from solar, wind, and hydropower declined.“Grid operators can call upon the coal fleet to increase electricity generation in extreme weather events and other times when demand surges or output falls from other generation sources, a pattern also evident in severe cold snaps in February 2021 and January 2025,” EIA said.
The Iron Law of Electricity for the win…again.
Interestingly, talk of another Ice Age has resurfaced.
The idea of a mini ice age (a period of significant global or regional cooling) sounds dramatic, but it’s not entirely fringe science. While mainstream climate consensus emphasises ongoing human-driven warming, a minority of researchers have long warned of natural factors that could trigger abrupt or localised cooling.The most prominent claim centres on a grand solar minimum (GSM), where solar activity drops sharply, reducing solar irradiance and potentially leading to cooler conditions. Astrophysicist Valentina Zharkova has been a key voice here. Her model, based on solar magnetic field dynamics, predicts a modern GSM from around 2020–2053, with the deepest cooling in cycles 25–27 (particularly 2030–2040).She argues this could drop average temperatures by up to 1°C globally, echoing Maunder Minimum conditions during the Little Ice Age.
So as the “snow hurricane” buries airports, freezes lakes, and turns highways into luge tracks, all the evidence suggests that when temperatures crash, people do not crave “NetZero utopia,” they crave heat.
Politicians could spin, activists could tweet, and modelers could promise a perfectly balanced climate in 2050, but none of that will coax a single electron through a frozen, darkened transmission line when gas supplies are gone, and solar panels and wind turbines fail to meet energy demands.
What happened in January will happen again with energy pricing. Perhaps people will remember the shock of seeing their energy bills next month when they are choosing which candidate will be making energy policy after the next election.
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