"Words Can’t Reshape Physical Reality" – A Blunt Conversation with Energy Writer Irina Slav

Irina Slav

I can't recall when I first discovered the Bulgarian freelance energy journalist Irina Slav, but from the start I was captured, not simply by her years of experience writing about oil, gas, mining and geopolitics, but also by her wit and her courage to put it all out there regarding the realities of our current energy issues. Her writing is never dry, and routinely downright fun; a contrarian grounded in facts that force you to confront what is really going on. 

In short, she seems to enjoy telling truths many seem unable to see because they've been swept away in a fifty year flood of media mischief and misinformation. 

 

So without further adieu, I am pleased to introduce you to Irina Slav.

 

EN: I admire your courage and the "let the chips fall where they may" attitude you write with. How long have you been writing and how did you "find your voice" as a writer?

IS: If we’re talking professional writing, that started about 15 years ago, but I’d been writing fiction since my teens. I think that helped train my writing “muscles” for any topic, fictional or factual.

As for finding my voice, that happened gradually, as I gained experience and realized there was no point in being polite and worrying about what people would think. I honestly no longer care about offending anyone with hard facts. They are there, whether anyone likes them or not.

EN: Have you always written about energy issues? What was your background and what drew you to write about this important topic?

IS: My academic background is in English literature and linguistics. My professional life began with translations, while I was still at university. After graduating, I spent a couple of years at a daily newspaper where I mostly translated articles but once got so excited about the topic of peak oil (yes, I believed it was coming) that I volunteered to produce my very own feature article. I think we still have the paper edition with that article.

After I left the paper (because the owner, who was a politician, asked me if I wanted to run for the European Parliament as a party candidate and I said “Hell, no”) I started work at a news agency where I was assigned coverage of Russia’s and Central Asia’s energy and mining industries. I discovered oil and gas are a fascinating topic and started reading up on it, on extraction, pipelines, refineries, the lot.

Following my decision to go freelance I had a major stroke of luck when an editor for Oilprice contacted me and offered me a daily engagement. The rest, excuse the cliché, is history. I still find oil and gas production fascinating and hugely underappreciated as the most essential industry for modern civilization. This doesn’t mean I love Big Oil or some such nonsense but I do have a deep appreciation for the people who extract hydrocarbons from the ground.

EN: You’ve spent nearly two decades covering Russian and Central Asian oil and gas before broadening out to global energy markets. Looking back, what’s the biggest misconception you’ve seen policymakers or investors hold about energy security—and how has the last few years of conflict and market chaos either validated or upended that view?

IS: The most destructive, delayed-action, misconception was the belief that globalizing supply chains would work swimmingly and it’s perfectly okay to outsource all the heavy industries to Asia to focus on the “post-industrial” economy. We’ve all seen how well that’s worked.

More generally, the assumption that words can shape physical reality has wrought havoc in the West, whether it’s about energy or geopolitics. We are now reaping what the reality shapers sowed.

EN: In your writing, you’ve highlighted “stranded transition assets” and grid integration failures for renewables, even as banks like Barclays now acknowledge the risks. Do you see the current energy crunch—driven by geopolitics, AI demand, and defense needs—as the moment when the renewables-heavy transition narrative finally cracks, or is the political momentum still too strong to reverse course?

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IS: The narrative has been cracking for a while now but the net-zero fan lobby is still very strong and loud, especially in political circles. I think the momentum is too strong for politicians to admit they were wrong about it. The current energy crisis is not helping – it just made wind and solar make sense because they are – and how I hate the word – “homegrown”. They aren’t really but nobody cares about that. I fear we’ll have to witness an actual collapse before we come to our collective senses.

EN: You’ve been blunt about EU policies like the ETS, the 2035 ICE car ban (and its green steel workaround), and methane rule “flexibilities.” From your perspective in Bulgaria, what’s the single biggest disconnect between Brussels’ decarbonization targets and the day-to-day reality of energy supply and industrial competitiveness in Europe?

IS: The biggest disconnect is in priorities. Brussels keeps harping on about “clean” energy while everyone else wants mostly cheap and reliable energy.

EN: Your recent posts have touched on blackouts, demand destruction, negative electricity prices, and the quiet return of gas-fired power in places like Spain. What practical lessons from these real-world failures do you think the energy industry and governments still refuse to learn—especially when it comes to baseload power versus intermittent sources?

IS: What governments appear incapable of comprehending is the fact that it is not okay to have a grid dominated by intermittents. Having some is fine, no problem with rooftop solar and some bigger installations in factory yards but having solar and wind make up a substantial, let alone, larger than half, portion of the energy mix is a bit risky.

EN: You’ve written about parallel realities in energy—one physical and one fabricated by analysts and financiers. With oil prices swinging on tweets, record U.S. exports, and surging Chinese “clean energy component” shipments to Europe,  do you see the biggest risks (or opportunities) in the next 12–24 months for both traditional hydrocarbons and the so-called transition technologies?

IS: I think it’s pretty clear by now that hydrocarbons will be in short supply in the coming months. Just how long these shortages will last depends on when the war in the Middle East ends and the outlook doesn’t seem very good right now. So, the risk is shortage, which, I guess, would be an opportunity for those who can source oil and gas and sell them to energy-thirsty countries.

As for transition technologies, the fans will double and triple down, claiming they are safer than oil and gas imports. The problem is those technologies are also largely imported and they will become more expensive, too – energy inflation touches everything. So I think there will be some more rude awakening in the “clean energy” space. 

EN: After covering this beat for 15–20 years and living through events like the recent Bulgarian blackout, what’s one piece of advice you’d give to younger journalists, investors, or even ordinary citizens trying to cut through the noise on energy and geopolitics—especially when official narratives keep colliding with physics and economics?

IS: The one advice I would give is “Check if two plus two makes four. If the news says it doesn’t, then the news is false.” It’s a simple thing to do but not easy. A lot of people would rather stick with the false news for comfort, even if they end up paying dearly for that comfort down the line. Those who are not satisfied with “the noise” ask questions. They also buy generators for backup.

Check out her Substack, Irina Slav on energy 

When The Trucks Shut Down

High fuel costs are putting the hurt on a lot of industries right now. But no where is the pinch more intense than for truckers, both independent operators and fleets.

These are tough times for truckers. If you know someone who drives a rig, you've probably already learned what it costs to fill 'er up these days. $800 - $1000 is typical. Problem is, the truckers deliver goods for businesses that may schedule payments for thirty, sixty or even ninety days out. An active trucker may accumulate 10-15,000 dollars of expenses for fuel alone in a month, and that kind of out-of-pocket risk for owner operators is serious money.

We take our truckers for granted, no question about it. How often when fueling your car do you note that a trucker brought the fuel to that gas station? When you buy food at the grocery store, how many times have you thanked the truckers for bringing the food from wherever it was grown, packaged, delivered? But right now, due to high fuel costs, independent truckers and in a lot of pain. And at some point many will leave their trucks in the driveway.

The current transport systems that have worked for the whole of our various lives are in jeopardy. Truckers play a significant role in our society, and most of us are not aware of how much they're suffering at the moment.

I grew up in Maple Heights, Ohio, till I was twelve. One of the memorable television commercials I remember from my childhood was a Lawson's spot which showed a truck zipping along the highway with the tune, "Roll On Big O... Get that milk up to Lawson's in forty hours." I'm not sure where it was coming from, but the idea was that the milk was being transported fast and fresh. I used to go to Lawson's with my dad when he picked up milk, and always associated it with that Lawson’s jingle (among other things.)

There are truck strikes in Europe right now. Fuel prices are killing the transporters and in several countries -- Spain, France, Portugal – trucks are being parked in front of toll booths to give a visual show of what’s coming. The unions from Italy, England and other E.U. nations are meeting now to discuss more coordinated actions designed to effectively send a message.
At this moment I know no self-sufficient individuals personally. That is, people who grow their food, make their own goods, take care of all their personal business with no dependence on others. We’re not an agricultural society any more. We are dependent on grocery stores and when the store shelves are bare, how will people react? At some point something’s gonna give.

On another note, purportedly we have enough oil reserves within our borders to be utterly independent of foreign oil. It's a mystery to my why our leaders have allowed the country to come to its knees like this...

High fuel costs are going to impact us in ways we did not expect. Today’s blog is a warning signal. And a reminder to thank a trucker today.

The Gas Can Incident

It’s Monday, my last day with my Mom and family in Emmaus, PA. I decide to run to the store to pick up a gas can because the two that she has both have issues (which we learned when my brother had run out of gas and needed a bit to get to the gas station.) The one does not have a cap so that if someone tipped it there would be a spill with potentially serious consequences, not the least of which might be a fire that destroys… well let’s not go there. The second gas can has no spout at all, so there is no way to pour the gasoline into a car engine.

Alas, I drove to Wal-Mart, parked and walked to the furthest corner of the supersized super store. Indeed there were red plastic gas cans, but upon inspection they were definitely changed from my own gas can. They had a spout that seemed too short to be effective, and also a springloaded method of holding the cap on while dispensing gas. But for some reason it seemed too complicated for me to understand. The instructions did not make sense to me and I asked for assistance getting an explanation. The customer service rep essentially said, “I’m not sure how it works, but this is all we sell now.”

I left the Wal-Mart seeking an auto parts store, hoping for a more suitable gas can for Mom. A few blocks down the road I stopped at the gas station to ask directions to nearest auto parts store so I could buy a gas can. “We sell gas cans,” the friendly woman behind the counter said while pointing to the lower shelf behind me.

I placed the gas can on the counter and looked at the dispensing tube. Like the Wal-Mart dispensing unit it was likewise complicated, but even more complicated than the Wal-Mart version. It had a double spring plus some kind of means of “locking” the spout before it would release gas. After reading the instructions I finally asked the two women there for help. The one said several times that her husband could explain it. I didn’t realize that he was there on the premises, so when she fetched him I thought I was making progress.

Unfortunately, despite the good intentions, he could not get the spout to lock properly, which meant you could not get the gasoline to come out. All the while I am wondering how to explain this to my mom or brothers. After thanking them, I went back to my original query… how to find an auto parts store.

From here I drove to Wenz Hardware where they had a shelf of gas cans in a range of sizes. I purchased a two gallon plastic can which appealed to me because it appeared less complicated… but after filling it, the lid leaked. While reading instructions, I also notice the label which read, NOT FOR USE FOR VEHICLES THAT GO ON THE ROADS. When I asked the gas station attendant where I could dispose of the gasoline, she said that was not possible. I did not think it wise to put the gas container in the trunk, which would spill and smell up my mother’s car. Nor could I risk putting it on the seat and holding it upright, which would likely also dribble a bit of gas smell into the car. So, I offered the free container of gas, filled, to the first guy in a truck who came along, believing he would not care about a little spilled gas. Sure enough, he took it.

I drove back to Wenz, and discovered that ALL of the gas cans had that message. What’s a car owner to do?

I’m not sure if this is a problem that Pennsylvania environmentalists have created or whether it is a national matter, but it does seem we’re going a bit far with government meddling. My guess is that the worst is yet to come.