The story of Jeremiah Thoronka, the rising star of clean-energy tech hailed as a saviour by green elites, is a cautionary tale about the dangerous optimism and ignorance of Western green elites. As Ralph Schoellhammer explains in Spiked, the inconvenient truth is that our societies still heavily rely on fossil fuels, and the consequences of abandoning them would be dire. Here’s an excerpt:
In 2021, Jeremiah Thoronka was making a name for himself in clean-energy technology. The then 21-year-old Durham University masters student had invented a device that uses kinetic energy from traffic and pedestrians to generate electricity. It certainly sounded groundbreaking. In a pilot project in Thoronka’s native Sierra Leone, two devices had apparently provided free electricity to 150 households and 15 schools.
Thoronka’s work clearly impressed awards panel judges. In 2021, he picked up the Commonwealth Youth Award and the Global Student Prize, which was presented to him by film star Hugh Jackman at a virtual ceremony, broadcast from the UNESCO headquarters in Paris. Thoronka was the man of the moment. There was a profile by the BBC, an invitation to give TED talks and, in May 2022, an audience with the Pope. He was celebrated as a green-tech innovator, someone setting a clean-energy example for the world to follow.
The accolades have continued to flow. Last month, at the Green Tech Festival in Berlin, he won the Youngster Green Award for 2023. It was this that prompted German journalists to ask if it might all be a little too good to be true. They contacted the organisers of the Youngster Green Award and Greentech Festival to find out a bit more about Thoronka’s pilot project. After all, it sounded incredible. But the organisers said that wouldn’t be possible because the pilot had since been dismantled. They asked if the device was being used anywhere else, and were told that it wasn’t. One journalist even asked if there were any videos, blueprints or other documentation of this unprecedented breakthrough. Again, nothing was forthcoming. In fact, no one could tell journalists much about the device or the pilot project at all.
It seems the Youngster Green Award and Greentech festival organisers, and potentially others, have been willing to take Thoronka’s achievement entirely at face value. Perhaps the pilot was a success; perhaps it wasn’t. That no one really knows – or cares to know – is telling.
Clearly, Western green elites want to believe in the success of Thoronka’s device. As journalist Alexander Wendt concluded, perhaps Thoronka’s genius lies not in the field of piezoelectricity – the conversion of kinetic energy into electricity – but in ‘psycho-engineering’. He is telling the West’s green establishment what it wants to hear. It wants to believe it’s possible to meet Africa’s growing energy needs without fossil fuels or nuclear power. And so this kinetic-energy device is catering to their environmentalist fantasies.
The tale of Thoronka’s device captures well the wishful thinking that dominates the worldview of Western green elites. They are determined to believe that there are quick and easy routes to decarbonising the economy. That it’s possible to meet people’s energy needs today without using fossil fuels or nuclear power. That the transition to clean, green energy is just around the corner, and the only thing standing in its way are the evil fossil-fuel companies.
This is a dangerous, infantile outlook. And it’s not just confined to the likes of groups like Just Stop Oil. It is the outlook of a large part of our political and media elites, too. They talk up the transition to clean energy and set grandstanding Net Zero targets. And they encourage the demonisation and cessation of fossil-fuel use. But all their green schemes will come at a huge human cost.
The truth is that our societies are still massively dependent on fossil fuels. For all the talk of the advances made in renewable energy, the proportion of our electricity production reliant on fossil fuels has barely changed over the past 40 years. In that time, only nuclear power has declined as a source of electricity.
None of this is to say that an energy transition is impossible. A target of Net Zero by 2050 could well be met. But the rapid abandonment of fossil fuels that this demands would inflict misery and hardship on billions of people.
Of course, Western elites will claim that the energy transition is absolutely necessary if we’re to avert catastrophe from climate change. King Charles and London mayor Sadiq Khan even unveiled a ‘National Climate Clock’ last month, just to show how little time we supposedly have left to stave off the apocalypse.
In truth, Western politicians themselves don’t really take their own doom-mongering that seriously. They know that talk of ending fossil fuels appeals to parts of the electorate. Plus it looks good on the global stage. It’s something to posture over at the annual COP junket. But they also know that most people would be unwilling to bear the consequences of an actual end to fossil fuels.
U.S. President Joe Biden, for example, is well aware that gasoline prices have a direct impact on his re-election prospects. This is why he has shown no hesitation in draining America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve to keep prices down.
The same bad faith is at work among European politicians, too. They hype up the ‘climate emergency’ and posture over Net Zero targets. But when push comes to shove, they relent. Germany, for example, likes to present itself as a leader of the global energy transition. Yet as soon as the energy crisis started to bite last year, the German government brought coal power plants back online to power the electricity grid. And it did so by burning lignite, the dirtiest type of coal.
Then there’s Norway, the fifth-richest country in the world, which is blessed with abundant natural resources and hydropower. It has become the poster child for the introduction of electric vehicles, and we’re told it is showing the world how to manage the energy transition. But is it really? Domestic oil consumption in Norway today is about as high as it was in 1985. Despite the hype, Norway’s energy transition is going much slower than the headlines let on. Norwegians themselves know which side their Smørrebrød is buttered. Indeed, Oslo has just approved $18 billion in funding to help develop another 19 oil and gas fields.
Western governments’ green hypocrisy is revealing. They posture endlessly about Net Zero and indulge in fantasies about the energy transition. Yet they can’t escape the fact that fossil fuels are integral to their societies’ wellbeing.
Worth reading in full.
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Aren’t Budweiser sponsoring this geezer as well.
Sort of ironic, fake beer for a fake women.
Geezer, Yes!
Not bowing to the thought police.
Nor am I.
Kid Rock perhaps says it for us?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZ19c16nZOQ
Plus I think Candace Owens nails it…!
Apparently they lost $800 million of market cap value as their shares nose-dived.
Nike. Me no likey.
Really like what Jessica Rose has to say on what the definition of a woman is and the whole trans ideology thing coming at us from all angles;
”I want to now transiently examine the ‘transgender movement’ (‘activists’) and the way in which, well, the movement (not to be confused with individuals) is pretty much being shoved in our faces and down our throats at every turn lately – and not just on social media. This ‘movement’ is appearing in public settings and even more disturbing to me, in strange and inappropriate settings that are aimed at children. I am seeing a lot of irrational violence associated with these so-called activists, as well.
These ‘movements’, among many things, are tricks – imposed propaganda-style – to try to convince you that we’re all separate, different and in a big stupid constant fight. We’re not. Don’t fall for it. War gamers are devious. And their pawns are clueless. See them for what they are. Many of the victims of these tricks are the young. They need good role models and good guidance. Away from predators. It’s always been like this. Be a good role model.
Ultimately my philosophy is this, do what you want, but don’t shove it in my face and tell me I have to like it or even put up with it. Especially if you’re preying on children. I have fought bullshit my entire life and I am not stopping now. I am woman. Hear me roar. And as much as many people would like to pretend that there are no lines to cross: THERE ARE.
So what is a woman? I am a woman: an adult female human being carrying two X chromosomes.”
https://jessicar.substack.com/p/i-can-define-what-a-woman-is
At a school recently, someone gave a talk about freedom of speech and gave as an example of freedom of speech the freedom from coercion to call people by chosen pronouns. In other words, freedom of speech entailed not being forced to use a pronoun just because someone demanded it.
The reaction afterwards:, on the whole, the boys thought it.made.perfext sense and the girls were appalled and thought the speaker was a transphobe.
There is something that those who want to make this an assault on women are missing and that is that this ideology is most appealing now to teenaged girls.
Until that is paid attention to, understood why and addressed the problem is just going to get worse.
I think you make a very good point. Perhaps the girls’ interest and support is linked to a reaction to the girly girl porn style which was offered to little girls until quite recently (all clothes pink and purple, glitter and stars for toys) and a return to a sort of tom boy option that many of us leaned towards when we were growing up (think Famous Five – George was one type of girl and Ann another). If you want to hide your sexuality at school and not be the object of boys unwanted attention then perhaps now young girls choose to hide behind the trans idea.
Watching France 24 recently when abroad I was very intrigued to see that in a piece about Drag in France they also interviewed a Drag King – woman with painted on black moustache – who made the point that this is just/still the patriarchy in a new version which women are not allowed to object to because it is “unfair”. A very valid observation.
That’s a very fair point. I agree over sexualisation of women and young girls in particular is very corrosive.
I would just point out that much of the pressure on women comes from other women. At least that is what I’ve heard many say.
The advertising and entertainment industry doesn’t help at all obviously. It’s a bad cocktail.
Not surprising. Wimmin have been forcing down our throats their World view of their eternal fight against the Patriarchy, toxic masculinity, I’m a Ms not a Miss, women and men are equal – but not in sport apparently – women should have access to men’s spaces, but woman should have spaces reserved just for them.
It’s natural that the little, maids would identify with fellow victims.
“Movement” used to refer to bowels.
And the product.
Just read this … excellent and beautifully written … thanks for the pointer.
This is really a come to Jesus moment for feminism.
After decades of flirting with the notion that the differences in behaviour and outcomes between men and women are not biological but socially constructed, the idea has gone half a step further and spawned an ideology in which gender is a social construct. Men can chose to be women at any time and vice versa. Why not, they’re basically the same, right?
Feminism has spun out of control and we now have a new ideology, even more hateful, destructive and insane.
How to get the cat back in the bag.
I’m pretty sure that more feminist self victimisation is not the answer. Men, especially young boys being bludgeoned with this ideology in schools, are equally being assaulted by this madness.
Sorry, are we reading the same thing? Sharon Davies, who I suspect considers herself to be a feminist and standing in defence of the integrity of actual women…..is the one asking people to boycott Nike…
Dylan Mulvaney is a man..the President and CEO of Nike is a man …the eight most senior executives behind him are men.
Dylan Mulvaney also advertises Bud Light…. The president and CEO of Anheuser Busch is a man….there are 15 executives in the ‘Leadership Team’…14 of them are men….….…..
…….and femenists have a problem?
As usual I don’t recognise any women I know as the type of ‘feminists’ you always describe…..Where the hell do you meet these women?
So men bad, woman good? Gotcha.
Ebygum was simply stating the facts about who is making decisions in those companies. Your response seems to say more about where you are coming from than anything else.
Point …missed..whoosh!!
Yes and I’ve given examples of women driving this too.
It’s complex.
Large corporations are adopting climate nonsense and the whole woke agenda for very devious reasons. They are forming a coalition with their biggest traditional enemy, the far left, who would normally be after them for being capitalists, but because then left is now all about climate change and wokism, they’ve become allies.
So companies can continue to make enormous profits and expand their power with the support of the left, as.long as they play the woke game.
Some feminists like Sturgeon or those crazy Kansas women law makers are pro-trans agenda. Others, like Rowling, are against.
And that is basically like Sunni vs Shia or Catholics vs Protestants. The trans agenda is basically the radicalisation of the feminist agenda.
That’s how I see it. And that would explain how teenage girls are so for trans rights, why teachers unions are for trans rights, why the teaching profession as a whole, so dominated by women, is allowing its.proliferation in schools and how radical feminists like Sturgeon are for it too.
The problem of trans ideology needs to be understood properly, not superficially, from news headlines.
I don’t consider Sturgeon to be a feminist of any sort … she’s an awful person, in every way, and just clearly following the nutty agenda..you seem to think all women are feminists, particularly the bad ones. They aren’t….
it’s just a label you smear most women with…as in your other post you think women are to blame for the notion that “the differences in behaviour and outcomes between men and women are not biological but socially constructed”…good one, except which women are these, as I don’t know any that would agree with that sentence?
And as it’s men..being trans-women, who are making all the fuss, and expecting the rules to be changed for them???
There are as many men involved in this as women, so what are we going to call them..radical misogynists? Every time these stories crop up shall we just blame it on the radical misogynists?…it is after-all about trans women..who are biologically male….not the other way around..
Yes it’s a big subject, yes it’s more complex, but the issue in this report is that trans-men are being ‘favoured’ over actual women…
…trans-women are infiltrating women’s spaces, which means women can’t feel safe in jails, hospitals or any ‘shared space’….trans women are invading women’s sport…Fallon Fox, the MMA fighter, and a trans-woman, has just fractured the skull of a second female opponent…..and while it might be a side show to you, it’s very real to the women involved…
You’ll notice I don’t bring up women or feminism in any other context other than the trans problem. So, no, despite your insistence I am not a misogynist. It’s simply that current trans ideology has its origins in feminism and I’m calling it out, not to have a go at women or any nonsense like that but because I want the problem solved.
Just because you don’t consider Sturgeon a feminist doesn’t mean she isn’t. She thinks she is and says so. Just because you don’t recognise the feminism I describe it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist and it doesn’t mean it doesn’t have enormous influence on the social discourse. It does exist and the influence of more extreme feminist views is clear.
How many people believe in extreme gender ideology, male or female? Few. And yet there you have the results affecting our society very profoundly. With organisation, influence, funding, powerful allies and zeal few people can accomplish a lot.
I’ll repeat, having to make this point over and over again is like trying to get the idea of “safe and effective” out of the mind of someone who thinks modern medicine is one of humanity’s greatest achievements and that our medical establishment would never do that to us.
I have never said you are misogynist..just asking why women you think are guilty have a name and the men don’t?
I don’t agree that trans ideology comes from the original genuine feminism that I know and believe in. So we won’t ever agree on that…and I would say, as it seems to be your ‘safe and effective’ mantra..you have the problem, not me.
The expansion of trans rights has gone more in hand with state and institutional regulation of speech and behaviour….not just in relation to women and men but calling Welsh people Taff, or people of colour certain names, or calling gay people ‘poofs’ etc…not having hot-cross buns…because?…..celebrating Eid, but not St George’s day…etc…etc…this has been going on for years, and this is sadly an extension of it in my opinion…
…..and even though the trans lobby are small, people in positions of power…(just as many of them men) in the media, academia, law, the medical profession, police, Government both local and National have gathered around the ‘cause’….and now try to legislate the behaviours of all of us, rather than that tiny minority…
The why is something I don’t know….
I don’t know if you have read Lindsay and Pluckrose’s analysis of feminism, gender studies, queer theory with marxist and postmodern influences, in their ‘Cynical Theories‘? They trace the evolution of marxist feminism modified with queer theory and postmodern Derridean analysis of language to deconstruct the meanings of “man and “woman” whereby a dominant view within marxist feminism had it that “man” and “woman” were to be regarded as “constructions or representations – achieved through discourse, performance and repetition – rather than real entities”(P141).
The shift away from sex to gender was documented in Candace West and Don H Zimmerman’s 1987 paper Doing Gender in which they have a shift away from sex and towards gender, they “explicitly reject biology as a source of differences in male and female behaviours, preferences or traits”(P147)
This change was documented in a 2006 essay by Judith Lorber and followed up by further accounts of gender studies coming out of that by Judith Pilcher and Imelda Whelan ‘Key Concepts in Gender Studies’ 2017.(P144).
The page numbers refer to Lindsay and Pluckrose’s book.
Needless to say, coming out of STEM, I find this wild theorising coupled with reification utterly fascinating – and frightening.
Lindsay and Pluckrose also look at liberal feminism also diverting into intersectional or diversity feminism concerned with identity.
I am interested to know why you clearly take feminism so personally.
I don’t take it personally. I think the trans problem is being completely misrepresented and misunderstood.
Some women are trying to male this about them, a new form of misogyny. But it isn’t. The men in women’s loos and women’s sports is a sideshow. The real problem and danger is in schools. Driven by women, and taken up mostly by men.
If you aren’t involved in schools in some way you probably aren’t seeing it. But it’s a dangerous problem.
And it is linked to feminism. Its a kind of spin off from it. It appeals to many ultra.feminists and to teenage girls.
I always thought the point of support bras was for support.
I am looking forward to seeing Nike’s advert for jock straps.
It’s just nonsense, but so very few seem brave enough to say so.
My lady is fairly busty and a sports bra holds everything still while she’s active. I’m told they’re quite heavy and without one exercise would be painful for her.
Dylan’s plainly a boy, with (a pathetic attention-seeking complex and…) nothing whatsoever that requires the support of a sports bra. No matter what the activity nothing will bounce and nobody will know if the garment works or not.
I doubt he’s likely to get the snip, I hear that not many do – that requires true commitment and bravery. But if he does, then he can also model the jock strap for Nike and demonstrate it’s ability to hold a load of absolute bllx
Maybe we need to set up a truss fund.
Old news. Anyone with a moral compass will have been boycotting Nike since they started paying professional knee taking and perpetually whingeing victim Colin Kapernick to promote their sweat shop output.
Wasn’t Nike a goddess?
Yes..the Goddess of victory…I saw her beautiful statue in Warsaw once….
but you know, myth, history, stories…it can all be re-written can’t it?
People like an easy lie rather than the hard truth these days….
This makes perfect sense for the fashion industry, I don’t know why they didn’t think of using trans models to replace women sooner instead of forcing women to starve themselves to be a boyish shape. I always assumed the fashion houses needed women to be emaciated because they weren’t talented enough to design clothes to fit female curves. Nike has proved you don’t have to worry any more.
Is a boycott really necessary? Seems like Nike are sh*tting in their own nest.
One could easily form the opinion that Nike does not know or care about the difference between sexes. As a sports ware brand (I almost write in error “manufacturer”) one would have thought they knew the difference.
What next, Buck Angel being sponsored to advertise jock straps?
Another entity added to me ‘boycott’ list – from Paypal to Walkers crisps, to Penquin Books, the list just keeps expanding. Helping me save.
Matt Walsh is making the point that the mass boycotting you refer to is ineffective. Better to ‘flash’ target woke companies one by one, starting with Anheuser Busch. A list of their products … https://twitter.com/Travistritt/status/1643773257206693888
Thank you Nike for telling the female population that a man without breasts who tells you he is a woman is so much better at being a woman than the real thing.
In order to prove that you as a company actually believe in this “its what you say you are rather than what biology says” When can we expect to see a white person dressed as a black man rather like the minstrel show from the 70’s used in one of your ads for sports gear? After all if a man can profess to be a woman and its not allowed to be offensive to real women, surely a white person can put black make up on, claim to be black and it not be considered acceptable for black people to find it offensive.
So go on show us just how serious you are and not just a craven money grabbing go along with anything for the cash company
spot-on Hester…
An excellent suggestion
It is up to each individual ofcourse, but I will never purchase from any company that tries to stuff any ideology down my throat. The woke capitalists will not get any of my money if I can help it. I already asked my wife not to buy any DOVE products because of their TV ads that have black women in business suits staring in utter contempt at the camera. But when you take a look at TV ads these days all they seem to care about is putting as many different races on the screen as they can stuff in there. If a husband is white his wife will be black and vice versa. It seems these days that the woke capitalists pretend that they care about something other than profit and power precisely to gain more of both.
Seems to me that the black and other coloured people in tv ads and programmes are indicative of a slave market emerging to make up the numbers for an ever reducing pool of suitable, willing but unambitious white actors and actresses.
Well done Nike, for showing us that your sports bras are absolutely crap and not fit for purpose: you’ve had to use a flat chested bloke to advertise them! Great job.
It’s very difficult to argue with the logic of that argument.
Is it just me, but Dylan looks a bit like a brave little toaster, dancing around with a rictus grin, pretending everything is fine, when they are dying inside ?…
..plus he’s a funny looking little gink! LOL!
Fake beer, fake America, crap expensive shyte, made in Indian! Go campaign for sales there! Bunch of f-ing idiots!
Put your cock where your mouth is and get it cut off! Then I might believe you, freak
Not sports bra’s, Breast binding! Why doesn’t…it..bind its head and feet too? and then p*#s off!
Products to abandon!
Nike
Budweiser Family
•Budweiser
•Bud Light
•Budweiser Select
•Budweiser American Ale
•Bud Dry
•Bud Ice
•Bud Ice Light
•Budweiser Brewmaster Reserve
•Bud Light Lime
•Budweiser & Clamato Chelada
•Bud Light & Clamato Chelada
•Bud Extra
– Michelob Family
•Michelob
•Michelob Light
•Michelob Honey Lager
•Michelob AmberBock
•Michelob Golden Draft
•Michelob Golden Draft Light
•Michelob Bavarian Wheat
•Michelob Porter
•Michelob Pale Ale
•Michelob Dunkel Weisse
– Ultra Family
•Michelob Ultra
•Michelob Ultra Amber
•Michelob Ultra Lime Cactus
•Michelob Ultra Pomegranate Raspberry
•Michelob Ultra Tuscan Orange
– Busch Family
•Busch
•Busch Light
•Busch Ice
– The Natural Family
•Natural Light
•Natural Ice
– Specialty Beers
•Bud Extra
•Bare Knuckle Stout
•Anheuser World Lager
•ZiegenBock
•Ascent 54 (Colorado only)
•Redbridge (gluten-free)
•Rolling Rock
•Landshark Lager
•Shock Top
•Skipjack Amber Lager
•Wild Blue
– Seasonal Beers
•Sun Dog (spring)
•Beach Bum Blonde Ale (sum)
•Jack’s Pumpkin Spice Ale (fall)
•Winter’s Bourbon Cask (wntr)
– Non-alcoholic
•O’Doul’s
•O’Doul’s Amber
•Busch NA
•Budweiser NA
•Budweiser NA Green Apple
– Energy Drinks
•180 Blue
•180 Sport Drink
•180 Energy
•180 Red
•180 Blue Low Calorie
•180 Sugar Free
– Specialty Organic Beers
•Stone Mill Pale Ale
•Wild Hop Lager
– Specialty Malt Beverages
•Bacardi Silver
•Peels
•Tequiza
•Tilt
Also Stella Artois
Weak fizzy p*ss each and every one of them. & almost certainly turning boys and men into women and girls due to the hideously unnatural ingredients.
People who drink these products will not live long and happy lives. The manufacturers know it. The whole thing is based on contempt for customers and profiteering. See vaccines.
(
weak fizzy p*ss! 
)
You are so right
️
I’m mad Jack Daniels has joined the ‘in crowd’ as well as I always liked it …luckily I’ve discovered Buffalo Trace….LOL!
There’s always an alternative!!
This is what Ted Nugent and Kid Rock think of the Bud Light et al campaigns. Definitely worth a watch…
https://youtu.be/ipElQEzsWKs
Brilliant…I put the Kid Rock on earlier, but the more the merrier and I like Ted Nugent…’truth, logic and common sense is Kryptonite to our governments, media and big tech’… absolutely….!
Since I don’t and never have bought a Nike product, and in any case likely never would, I find myself unable to boycott them.
How annoying.
There’s an American YouTube channel I occasionally watch where the presenter was commenting on the latest school shooting.
The assassin / terrorist was trans so he suggested that their pronouns should now be “was” and “were”.