{"id":441442,"date":"2026-04-26T06:27:38","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T13:27:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=441442"},"modified":"2026-04-26T06:27:40","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T13:27:40","slug":"why-the-uk-and-eu-keep-doubling-down-on-net-zero-dogma-in-the-face-of-spiralling-economic-dysfunction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=441442","title":{"rendered":"Why the UK and EU Keep Doubling Down on Net Zero Dogma in the Face of Spiralling Economic Dysfunction"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The UK and EU’s insistence on aggressive Net Zero policies\u2014targeting near-total decarbonization by 2050\u2014persists amid mounting evidence of high costs, energy vulnerability, and industrial strain. The ongoing Strait of Hormuz disruptions (stemming from the 2026 US-Iran\/Israel conflict) have triggered another major energy price shock, with oil surging toward or above $100\/barrel and European gas prices spiking sharply. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This echoes the 2022 Russia-Ukraine fallout but highlights a deeper policy failure: deliberate reduction in reliance on reliable, dispatchable energy sources has left these economies exposed to global fossil fuel volatility without adequate backups.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

_____________________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tilak\u00b4s Substack<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Tilak Doshi<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Hormuz Blockade and the Triumph of Economic Illiteracy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Monday, GB News<\/em> ran a story<\/a> on UK Energy Secretary Ed Miliband\u2019s vow to \u201cdouble down\u201d on the government\u2019s environmental agenda, whilst accusing opponents of the move to net zero of \u201cmaking up nonsense and lies\u201d. In a \u201cstrongly worded statement\u201d, Miliband warned that abandoning the net zero agenda would not only risk \u201cclimate breakdown\u201d but would also \u201cforfeit the clean energy jobs of the future\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The hangman\u2019s noose concentrates the human mind wonderfully, Dr Samuel Johnson once observed. But this evidently does not apply to the government bureaucracies ensconced in Westminster or Brussels. The oil price shock triggered by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz \u2014 \u201cthe world\u2019s worst energy crisis in history exceeding the combined shocks of both the 1970s oil prices shocks and the Ukraine war\u201d according to the IEA chief Fatih Birol<\/a> — has led the environmental justice warriors among the ruling elite to yet more muddled thinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Econ 101 Anyone?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead of applying basic economic principles \u2014 comparative advantage in international trade, portfolio diversification to manage risks, and marginal costs in commodity pricing \u2014 Europe\u2019s elites have doubled down on their net-zero dogma. The theme is now familiar: the two great energy shocks of the past 5 years — from the 2022 Ukraine war to today\u2019s Hormuz crisis — prompts not a return to economic rationality but a frenzied acceleration of the very policies that created the vulnerability in the first place. Economic illiteracy, it seems, is an incurable condition; those afflicted are immune to intervention by reality or logic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Start with the fundamentals. International trade operates on David Ricardo\u2019s principle of comparative advantage: nations specialise in what they produce relatively efficiently and trade for the rest of their import needs. In the case of international trade in fossil fuels (as in other natural resources), nations produce what natural endowments they are blessed with. It is an absolute advantage as it were, they exist or they don\u2019t exist: gold and diamonds, copper and other valuable minerals and fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

National sovereignty over these resources, however, means little if the state cannot exploit these resources. It might lack the technological means of mining and refining these resources itself. In most cases, the state dealt with multinational companies specialized in exploiting natural resources. These multinational businesses earned risk-adjusted rates of return by helping export the country\u2019s resources to international markets. In return, governments received taxes and royalties for allowing such exports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In world economic history, they have been few cases of governments refusing to exploit the nation\u2019s resources, directly or via private enterprise, to benefit their citizens (and themselves), from the sale of such resources. In the case of the UK and the EU, the higher imperative is to avoid an imminent \u201cclimate breakdown\u201d (in Ed Miliband\u2019s words) that supposedly will ensue if fossil fuels are extracted. In Miliband\u2019s view, buying oil and gas from Norway\u2019s offshore oil fields, directly adjacent to the UK\u2019s own jurisdictions in the North Sea, is preferable to Britain having its own vibrant oil and gas sector. Evidently, he does not make too much of the fact that exports add<\/em> to the gross domestic product while imports subtract<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most countries in the world, not blessed with energy reserves within their territories, have to make do with exporting goods and services they can offer competitively in world markets to be able to afford imported energy fuels and other goods and services needed for their economies to function. Resource poor does not mean economy poor, to which the examples of Singapore, Hongkong and even China as a whole attest. It should be noted that while China has ample coal resources, it is among the world\u2019s largest importers of fossil fuels including coal, oil and natural gas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For net energy-importing countries, the basic principle of portfolio diversification is well understood (\u201cdon\u2019t put all your eggs in one basket\u201d). Winston Churchill understood this perfectly when, as First Lord of the Admiralty before the First World War, he insisted that Britain\u2019s Royal Navy switch from coal to oil<\/a> for its advantages in speed, efficiency and manoeuvrability. In the switch to an oil-powered naval fleet, Churchill recognized that diversity of supply was the only true form of energy security, instinctively recognizing the principle of optimal portfolio diversification. After buying a 51% share in the Anglo-Persian Oil Company for the British state, he declared<\/a> that \u201c[s]afety and certainty in oil lie in variety and variety alone.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

EU and UK policymakers blame dependence on imported oil and gas as the cause of their vulnerability to the energy crisis. Without such dependence, they implicitly claim, the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 or the closure of the Strait of Hormuz since February 28th<\/sup> would not have mattered so much. And their solution? One would have thought that the most obvious one to suggest itself, at least for a start, would be to removing the multiple existing barriers to domestic exploitation of such energy resources \u2013 such as the EU-imposed ban on fracking and constraints on offshore drilling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet there is no mention of creating a hospitable fiscal and regulatory environment for private sector development of domestic shale, North Sea oil and gas, or Balkan resources. The rhetoric persists, and the UK and EU\u2019s response has been to double down: more electrification (the EU targets 50% by 2040<\/a>), more wind and solar, more hand-wringing about \u201cenergy sovereignty\u201d while refusing to exploit domestic shale or North Sea resources on anything like Norway\u2019s scale. This is despite the unmitigated disaster of Germany\u2019s Energiewende<\/em> leading to economic suicide and deindustrialisation<\/a> on a grand scale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

EU Climate Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra warned<\/a> that that there is \u201cno workaround\u201d for high energy prices in the wake of the Iran war: \u201cThe only way forward is more electrification, more nuclear, more solar, more wind, more battery capacity, more interconnectors in the EU and all of it with much more speed\u201d. The inclusion of nuclear in Mr. Hoekstra\u2019s list is, of course, after both German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and EC President Ursula Von Der Leyen belatedly (by 15 years) expressed regret over Angela Merkel\u2019s decision to shut down Germany\u2019s nuclear plants after the Fukushima incident in Japan, calling it a \u201chuge strategic mistake<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The words<\/a> of UK\u2019s own fiery climate warrior Ed Miliband are no less feisty: \u201cIn response to recent events, our action must now be faster, deeper and more wide-ranging. That is why we will double down not back down on our mission for clean energy\u2026Unlike the twin fossil fuel shocks of the 1970s, there is now a compelling alternative in the form of clean energy. An alternative that cannot be disrupted by foreign wars because it comes from our own wind, sun and nuclear resources.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBreaking the Link\u201d between Gas and Electric Power Prices<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many a professor has spent precious class periods teaching Econ 101 students the concept of marginal cost, a true test of pedagogy. It would seem than many don\u2019t get it, with or without the benefit of economics professors teaching introductory economics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nowhere is this clearer than in UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves\u2019s latest pronouncements<\/a>. Last week, on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund \/ World Bank meetings in Washington, Reeves declared she was considering \u201cquite a big change\u201d to weaken the link between natural gas and electricity prices. This was nothing new \u2014 such a proposal was first floated by the previous Conservative government Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng in 2022 who said<\/a> in words that could have been lifted from the mouth of Ed Miliband:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cThe government is also working with electricity generators to reform the outdated market structure where gas sets the price for all electricity \u2013 instead, the government will move to a system where electricity prices better reflect the UK\u2019s home-grown, cheaper and low-carbon energy sources, which will bring down consumer bills.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Reeves plans to raise the windfall tax (the electricity generator levy) on low-carbon generators \u2014 nuclear, biomass, and pre-2017 renewables \u2014 to shield household bills in the short term while \u201cconsulting on long-term wholesale market reforms\u201d. Older renewables obligation projects would be shifted onto newer set-price contracts, guaranteeing fixed prices to consumers. The \u201cguaranteed fixed price\u201d is nowhere specified, and it would be surprising if older renewable generators will settle for anything much less than what they were already being paid. The presumption is that gas-fired power generators which typically set the marginal price in the UK\u2019s merit-order wholesale market are the villains driving Britain\u2019s household and industrial power prices \u2014 already the highest in the developed world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Data<\/a> from the IEA and UK sources confirm British households pay around 30\u201340p\/kWh, far above US, Chinese or Norwegian levels. Reeves and Miliband argue that by \u201cbreaking the link\u201d and ensuring electricity prices are set more often by \u201ccheaper\u201d renewables (now 52.5% of UK generation<\/a>), bills will fall \u201cin the long run.\u201d This is Alice-in-Wonderland economics. As Humpty Dumpty told Alice, \u201cWhen I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean \u2014 neither more nor less.\u201d In the topsy-turvy world of net-zero ideologues, \u201ccheaper in the long run\u201d means whatever the DESNZ bureaucrats say it means.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While they wave their arms about the \u201clong run\u201d, they ignore the elementary distinction between unit cost which refers to the low operating cost of wind or solar plants once built, measured at plant level<\/em> and system cost. The latter includes the cost of grid upgrades required to connect remote solar or wind farms to power demand centres in cities, backup gas plants for when there is no sun or wind, curtailment payments for when there is too much sun or wind, CfD subsidies to attract wind and solar investors, grid balancing services, and policy levies needed to integrate intermittent renewables. As I have argued elsewhere, it is time to stop pretending renewables are cheap<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Power PEnergy analysts Kathryn Porter and David Turver among others have repeatedly demonstrated that once \u201cpolicy costs\u201d are added \u2014 CfDs that guarantee above-market prices for 15\u201320 years, grid enhancement charges, backup capacity payments and the rest \u2014 retail bills soar. Gas plants do not cause high prices; net-zero mandates do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Remember the 1970s?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The historical parallel is instructive. The 1970s oil crises led to market-driven responses: diversification of supply, efficiency gains, and substitution in power generation. Key government responses in the OECD were focused on building strategic petroleum reserves with coordination by the IEA. The dominant policy response in the U.S. and other OECD countries was not to restrict or curtail international fossil-fuel trade. On the contrary, the focus was on increasing supply diversity and domestic production. No serious move against fossil-fuel trade occurred much beyond President Carter\u2019s ill-fated attempt at controlling domestic prices at the pump and banning oil exports (when the US was a net oil importer).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, with only about 20% of primary energy used as electricity (the rest for transport, heating, and industrial heat), the EU and UK propose to \u201celectrify everything\u201d while simultaneously chasing fossil fuels out of the grid. The result? Grids operating with dangerously low reserve margins, over-exposed to fickle, weather-dependent renewables and requiring massive state subsidies. The empirical evidence is unambiguous. Countries and states furthest advanced in renewables penetration \u2014 Germany, California, South Australia \u2014 suffer the highest electricity prices. Charts plotting wind-plus-solar share against retail prices across jurisdictions show a clear positive correlation.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Germany\u2019s Energiewende<\/em> has driven deindustrialisation, with firms like BASF, Volkswagen, and Mercedes relocating or cutting capacity<\/a>. South Australia\u2019s much-vaunted renewable experiment has produced volatile prices and repeated calls for more gas backup<\/a>. Yet the ideologues insist renewables are \u201chomegrown\u201d and \u201ccheap in the long run\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the windfall tax tweak reveals the absurdity. Older low-carbon plants, already subsidised under the Renewables Obligation, will now face higher levies so the state can claw back profits and offer \u201cguaranteed prices\u201d to households. This is what one (official) hand giveth, the other taketh away. The first-best policy would have been not to hand out the subsidies in the first place. Adam Bell, former DESNZ strategy head, enthuses<\/a> that removing gas from the market and \u201cholding it in reserve\u201d would represent a \u201ctransfer of value from producer to consumer\u201d not seen for decades. This is socialist class-war rhetoric dressed up as energy policy: fossil-fuel providers are now the class enemy blocking the \u201cenergy transition.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The deeper presumption is even more troubling. Bureaucrats and PPE graduates in government departments and quangos claim the wisdom to pick winning \u201cindustries of the future\u201d \u2014 wind, solar, EVs, batteries \u2014 and subsidise them through the \u201cvalley of death<\/a>\u201d (as they call it in business school) until they mature. History says otherwise. Milton Friedman reminded<\/a> us in a 1977 lecture that the great industries were built by private entrepreneurs \u2014 the so-called robber barons who became barons precisely because they delivered goods and services people wanted. Nor, one might add, did Ford need government subsidies for producing the Model T. In the developing countries, import-substituting industrialisation<\/a> based on the argument that \u201cinfant industries\u201d needed temporary protection led to permanent infants that never grew up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Afflictions of Learned Illiteracy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Freely chosen economic illiteracy, like other ideological afflictions, appears immune to correction by experience. The hangman\u2019s noose may concentrate some minds, but in Westminster and Brussels, the noose is worn as a fashion accessory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until voters demand a return to economic first principles \u2014 open trade, competitive markets, prudent natural resource development policies and pragmatic diversification of energy imports \u2014 the doubling down on dumb energy policies will continue. And Britain and Europe will pay the price in lost prosperity and diminished security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A version of this article was first published in the Daily Sceptic https:\/\/dailysceptic.org\/2026\/04\/24\/why-the-uk-and-eu-keep-doubling-down-on-net-zero-dogma-in-the-face-of-spiralling-economic-dysfunction\/<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr Tilak K. Doshi is the <\/em>Daily Sceptic\u2018s Energy Editor. He is an economist, a member of the CO2<\/sub> Coalition and a former contributor (cancelled) to <\/em>Forbes. Follow him on Substack<\/a> and X<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The UK and EU’s insistence on aggressive Net Zero policies\u2014targeting near-total decarbonization by 2050\u2014persists amid mounting evidence of high costs, energy vulnerability, and industrial strain. 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They are felt in Mumbai,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Energy Transition\"","block_context":{"text":"Energy Transition","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=energy-transition"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-The-Strait-of-Hormuz-Crisis-Shows-the-World-Still-Runs-on-Fossil-Fuels.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-The-Strait-of-Hormuz-Crisis-Shows-the-World-Still-Runs-on-Fossil-Fuels.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-The-Strait-of-Hormuz-Crisis-Shows-the-World-Still-Runs-on-Fossil-Fuels.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-The-Strait-of-Hormuz-Crisis-Shows-the-World-Still-Runs-on-Fossil-Fuels.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":436901,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=436901","url_meta":{"origin":441442,"position":2},"title":"Europe\u2019s Hormuz Armageddon","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"04\/03\/2026","format":false,"excerpt":"European political and intellectual elites have spent the past few decades pushing the risk of imminent Climate Armageddon. Some of us can still picture the young Joschka Fischer, a Leftist of the Greens party who took oath of office as Environment Minister in the German state of Hesse wearing sneakers\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Deindustrialisation\"","block_context":{"text":"Deindustrialisation","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=deindustrialisation"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/0-Europes-Hormuz-Armageddon.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/0-Europes-Hormuz-Armageddon.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/0-Europes-Hormuz-Armageddon.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/0-Europes-Hormuz-Armageddon.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":430227,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=430227","url_meta":{"origin":441442,"position":3},"title":"Energy Crisis Warning: UK Has Just Two Days of Gas While Iran Halts Global Flows","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"03\/09\/2026","format":false,"excerpt":"As of early March 2026, the UK faces heightened energy security concerns with natural gas storage reserves equivalent to roughly 1.5\u20132 days of typical national demand, sparking widespread fears of potential shortages or sharp price spikes if disruptions persist. This situation is exacerbated by the ongoing Iran conflict, which has\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Energy Costs\"","block_context":{"text":"Energy Costs","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=energy-costs"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Energy-Crisis-Warning-UK-Has-Just-Two-Days-of-Gas-While-Iran-Halts-Global-Flows.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Energy-Crisis-Warning-UK-Has-Just-Two-Days-of-Gas-While-Iran-Halts-Global-Flows.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Energy-Crisis-Warning-UK-Has-Just-Two-Days-of-Gas-While-Iran-Halts-Global-Flows.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Energy-Crisis-Warning-UK-Has-Just-Two-Days-of-Gas-While-Iran-Halts-Global-Flows.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":430095,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=430095","url_meta":{"origin":441442,"position":4},"title":"Iran War Shuts Hormuz \u2013 Time to Ditch Miliband’s North Sea Suicide Plan","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"03\/08\/2026","format":false,"excerpt":"The ongoing geopolitical tensions and conflict involving Iran, specifically an Iranian attack on a major liquefied natural gas (LNG) export facility in Qatar, disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz (through which about 20% of global oil passes), and broader Middle East instability, have driven sharp spikes in global oil and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Energy Secretary Ed Miliband\"","block_context":{"text":"Energy Secretary Ed Miliband","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=energy-secretary-ed-miliband"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Iran-War-Shuts-Hormuz-%E2%80%93-Time-to-Ditch-Milibands-North-Sea-Suicide-Plan1.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Iran-War-Shuts-Hormuz-%E2%80%93-Time-to-Ditch-Milibands-North-Sea-Suicide-Plan1.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Iran-War-Shuts-Hormuz-%E2%80%93-Time-to-Ditch-Milibands-North-Sea-Suicide-Plan1.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/0-Iran-War-Shuts-Hormuz-%E2%80%93-Time-to-Ditch-Milibands-North-Sea-Suicide-Plan1.jpg?fit=784%2C1168&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":436115,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=436115","url_meta":{"origin":441442,"position":5},"title":"The Strait of Hormuz\u2019s Bitter Lesson for the European Union","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"04\/01\/2026","format":false,"excerpt":"The crisis in the Strait of Hormuz reveals a truth that many European policymakers have ignored: Humanity remains structurally dependent on oil. This reality, first highlighted during the 1973 oil shortage and reinforced by the 1979 version\u2009\u2013\u2009triggered by Iran\u2009\u2013\u2009continues to be neglected, even openly dismissed, by certain political elites.","rel":"","context":"In \"carbon dioxide (CO\u2082)\"","block_context":{"text":"carbon dioxide (CO\u2082)","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=carbon-dioxide-co%e2%82%82"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Strait-of-Hormuz-Siege.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Strait-of-Hormuz-Siege.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Strait-of-Hormuz-Siege.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Strait-of-Hormuz-Siege.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Strait-of-Hormuz-Siege.jpg?fit=1200%2C675&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/121246920"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=441442"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441442\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":441452,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441442\/revisions\/441452"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/441443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=441442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=441442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=441442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}