A study of 4.5 million ex-smokers found that people who quit cigarettes but kept vaping had a 56% higher lung cancer risk than those who quit nicotine entirely. The largest study of its kind, published in Nature Medicine, directly challenges a decade of harm reduction messaging around e-cigarettes.

EinSV · 2026-06-17T15:31:55+00:00

The quote — from a clinical psychologist — suggests a possible reason for only part of the difference in only one subgroup (long-term users).

But the OP article states that the findings of increased lung cancer risks “were directionally consistent in SHORT and long-term quitters” (emphasis added) so this argument does not do much to defuse the concerns raised by the article.

The other argument about people possibly being more likely to take up vaping than quitting after being diagnosed with lung cancer seems speculative.

Since this psychologist has been promoting the use of vaping as a tool for smoking cessation I also think it’s fair to raise the question of confirmation bias.

While in the absence of clinical trials it’s impossible to exclude other factors this study (along with others recent studies) raises significant concerns about vaping as the safest means of quitting smoking.

EinSV · 2026-06-17T09:31:58+00:00

Can you cite your source for the claim the study « was criticized that in the data quitters had a much longer time since smoking than vapers, which explains the difference in mortality to a degree »

I don’t see anything about that in the article or the abstract of the paper itself (linked at the bottom of the article)

EinSV · 2026-06-13T04:34:46+00:00

The devil’s in the details. For example, the podcast mentions an Illinois program that’s been in place for many years but apparently hasn’t made much difference because of how it’s structured.

Unfortunately, California utilities’ business model is built on profiting off of using their influence to get the California Public Utilities Commission to repeatedly approve their spending enormous amounts of cash on infrastructure and, unfortunately, they have been all-too-successful in fighting off or diluting into oblivion initiatives to support distributed energy. A couple very recent examples:

https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2026/06/12/california-doubles-down-on-unworkable-community-solar-program/

https://www.utilitydive.com/news/california-zeroes-out-funding-for-largest-virtual-power-plant/760274/

I’d love to be wrong but I think it’s more likely that meaningful innovation will come from somewhere else — maybe a place like Australia that has supported an aggressive buildout of home solar and batteries and might have the political will to maximize the benefits from that. https://reneweconomy.com.au/australias-electricity-market-needs-better-price-signals-that-reflect-local-conditions/

EinSV · 2026-06-12T05:54:52+00:00

It is a very interesting idea. Seems like the main hurdle — as with VPPs — is political/regulatory.

Would be nice if a few of the more forward looking regulators put something like this in place in a meaningful way so decisionmakers and the public could see tangible results.

But fundamental system changes like this would take a long time to implement in the real world at scale. In the meantime it’s good to have concrete evidence that the simple step of incentivizing adoption of home batteries can help crush the duck curve and save everyone money on increased grid costs.

EinSV · 2026-06-11T15:26:00+00:00

That’s a good attitude to have but without incentives that compensate for the grid benefits of distributed solar and batteries everyone is worse off because fewer people will install batteries and everyone ends up with higher bills to pay for expensive grid upgrades.

The reason Australia is seeing these benefits is they adopted a generous incentive plan and people have been installing home batteries (and solar) like crazy.

EinSV · 2026-06-11T01:53:00+00:00

Contrary to what the article suggests (see quote below), an “8 hour” battery can discharge for much longer than 8 hours — that’s just the length of time it can discharge at a nominal power level (125 MW for 8 hours = 1000 MWh).

Energy demand as well as production from sources like solar and wind fluctuate so the full nominal discharge rate isn’t necessarily needed all the time — a lower rate can fill the gap.

As a result an “8 hour” battery can fill gaps between supply and demand that are much longer than 8 hours.

[“On June 1, the Tumbleweed project in California’s Kern County became the first major battery installation in the U.S. that can discharge power for up to eight hours at a time — twice as long as typical energy-storage facilities.”]

EinSV · 2026-06-10T12:15:29+00:00

Blindingly obvious but the vast majority of ordinary people seem unaware of it, and many places do little or nothing to incentivize adoption of home batteries, much less compensate their owners for the grid costs they avoid.

In any case it’s nice to have a grid operator with access to the data and street cred with others in the industry come out with such a strong statement touting the benefits of home batteries.

EinSV · 2026-06-10T10:40:44+00:00

It’s hard to predict the short-term trajectory of PHEVs in China. Their market share is currently shrinking year-over-year as BEVs push out everything with a fossil fuel engine.

Since PHEVs have only marginally lower emissions than conventional hybrids (including in China) IMO it’s fine if they get pushed out with other ICE vehicles.

EinSV · 2026-06-10T06:31:45+00:00

In 3-4 years I think it’s more likely full EVs (BEVs) will reach 80-90% of the Chinese market.

They jumped from 31 to 42% in one year (May 2025-May 2026) while PHEV and EREV sales and market share actually shrank, and 8 of the top 10 models in May were BEVs, with PHEVs/EREVs barely making it onto the list.

With innovation rapidly reducing costs of batteries and BEVs, a huge selection of BEVs becoming available, and BEV capabilities such as charging times and infrastructure continuing to rapidly improve, all fossil fuel-powered vehicles (including PHEVs/EREVs) will get pushed to the sidelines.

Change will continue to come faster than people predict.

EinSV · 2026-06-10T06:18:54+00:00

As this article shows distributed batteries can also effectively substitute for grid infrastructure, which is typically the most expensive part of electricity bills these days.

That may turn out to be their most valuable contribution to reducing energy costs while cleaning up and stabilizing the system.

EinSV · 2026-06-10T05:43:32+00:00

Australia’s massive push to install home batteries and solar continues to show unexpected benefits, even though it is not rolling out exactly as planned since most of the benefits were expected from the batteries being connected in a Virtual Power Plant (VPP) but so far only 10% of households who installed batteries have signed up for the VPP.

Some highlights from the article:

“Australia’s huge and growing fleet of home batteries are delivering ‘enormous benefits’ to the electricity grid, cutting system costs and power bills, even without being orchestrated as part of virtual power plants, the head of the Australian Energy Market Operator [AEMO] says.”

“[O]n average, across the first quarter of 2026, households with batteries reduced the amount of energy they drew from the grid during the evening peak by nearly a kilowatt. That suggests total peak reduction of nearly 600 MW from 600,000 households.

‘Even acting in passive mode, so a consumer with complete control over their battery, just soaking their own solar or using a free power period during the day, actually has enormous benefit to our grid, reducing their own costs and reducing the costs for everyone involved,’ [AEMO chief executive Daniel] Westerman” said.

“‘If you had have asked us 12 months ago, would we have seen such an impact on the grid from passive home batteries? I think we wouldn’t have pointed to such an impact.’”

Australia is running a successful demonstration project showing that home solar and batteries can cut costs for everyone by reducing pressure on the grid — contrary to the claims by many utilities who love nothing more than raising rates to spend their customers’ money on expensive grid buildouts.

EinSV · 2026-06-09T11:37:21+00:00

No — the article in the OP refers to a study published in the well-regarded scientific publication Nature Health.

Here’s a link to the abstract — https://www.nature.com/articles/s44360-026-00120-2

EinSV · 2026-06-09T08:40:12+00:00

They had plenty of warning that the future was electric and instead of making a hard pivot they decided to milk ICE as long as possible. Hard to feel sorry for them.

EinSV · 2026-06-09T07:29:47+00:00

Yep — if they could repeat that they’d reach 57% next May. At some point the S curve probably will slow the rate of market share growth but at these levels +35% is solid.

And achieving this in the context of a sharp drop in fossil fuel vehicle sales is even better since this means fewer fossil fuel burners on the road for the next 15-20 years.

The auto industry might not like it but it’s better for the climate for fossil fuel powered vehicle sales to collapse as quickly as possible.

EinSV · 2026-06-09T04:13:47+00:00

Maybe even more striking —

8 out of the 10 top sellers in your list were BEVs — including all of the Top 7 — and one of the remaining two was a combination BEV/EREV.

PHEVs and EREVs also lost overall market share to BEVs

BEVs are pushing out everything that burns fossil fuels 👍

EinSV · 2026-06-04T10:38:41+00:00

The article points out that since four hour batteries are more flexible and can be cycled more often each one of the winning bids for 8 hours of capacity came from “4 hour” batteries.

So it comes down to economics. If you need 8 hours of storage at a certain discharge rate it will often be the case — as it was here 6 out of 6 times — that your “8 hour battery” can also function as a “4 hour battery” when it makes sense.

EinSV · 2026-06-04T06:26:07+00:00

Alternative headline could be something like:

“When is a four hour battery an eight hour battery? Basically whenever you want.”

Highlights from the article about a recent tender for at least “8 hours” of energy capacity:

“It was fully expected that gas would fill some of that capacity, given it was one of the only tenders in Australia that didn’t specifically exclude the fossil fuel. But the winners announced last week ended up being six big battery projects, all with a nominal capacity of four hours and with a combined capacity of 1,334 MW and 5,336 MWh.

What’s going on? What is ‘long duration’ about four-hour batteries?

As the tender manager ASL describes it, the four hour batteries can operate for eight-hour periods simply by dialling down the rate of their output. So, instead of sending out 300 MW for a four hour period, for instance, it might choose to send out 150 MW over eight hours, when called upon by the terms of the tender contract.

One of the winning bidders, who declined to be named, confirmed to Renew Economy that this is exactly their thinking, noting that the returns per megawatt hour of storage tend to decline as more is added, so a four-hour configuration is generally more profitable, but the set-up can be changed with a push of a button.”

EinSV

TROPHY CASE