Thread by @emilygrubert

~THERE WILL BE BLOOD~ Netflix watchalong begins in 30 minutes -- push play and join us at the Historians at the Movies theater, run by the capable @HerbertHistory ! Hashtag: #HATM

Kicking us off: this is a movie about oil (and much more). Here are some oil facts:

DYK: Oil still provides more of the world's commercial* primary energy resources than any other fuel.

*Commercial meaning: I'm not counting the fact that the sun grows plants, heats our homes, lights our days, etc. unless it's turned into a saleable product first

First* oil well: Drake's Well, Titusville, PA, 1859

*in the sense that Americans claim it was the first one drilled with the express intent of producing oil commercially

(There are a lot of asterisks about oil facts (tm) )

Oil is still pretty unevenly geographically distributed, and there's still a lot of (American) cultural romanticism about it:

sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

Thrilled to be joining #HATM as this week's guest host! Looking forward to the chatter. :D

Who am I? I'm a civil/env engineering prof at Georgia Tech who studies energy! Born in Bakersfield; 4th gen oil family; grandparents emigrated (basically) to Oil City PA, then got out.

Drinking tonight: a flaming oil-looking Boulevardier in honor of TWBB

#HATM

Also fitting (we didn't plan this): oil and gas are different, but one of the US' erstwhile biggest gas producers, and a huge participant in the shale eruption, filed for bankruptcy today. Lotta milkshakes got drank.

cnbc.com/2020/06/28/che…

For excellent scholarship on boom-bust cycles and impacts of modern US oil (and gas): give these folks a follow. #HATM

@AnneNJunod
@kksmith312
@JacquetJeffrey
@resilientplaces
@Bills_Walsh

Another fun fact for our 3 minute warning: the US used to burn oil for electricity. We almost entirely stopped in response to the oil crisis in the 1970s -- Power Plant and Industrial Fuel Use Act said every new plant had to run coal -- but it's most of our transpo. #HATM

You can see the impact (bunches of coal plants! no more oil & new gas plants during the 1978-1987 period of the law!) here: emilygrubert.org/wp-content/upl…

#HATM