Hydraulic fracturing, aka fracking, has revolutionized energy production in the United States and cornered OPEC.  That cartel is currently attempting to restrict oil production and raise prices, but it faces the reality that American frackers can rapidly expand output.  It’s a nightmare if you are a corrupt petro-dictator of any stripe, communist to jihadist. Now the never-ending quest for new technologies has yielded a potentially revolutionary replacement or substitute for fracking: microwaving shale to extract oil and gas.  James Watkins reports in Ozy.com: As strange as it sounds, producers are experimenting with ways to zap previously unextractable oil resources with microwaves, which has the potential to kick-start an even bigger energy revolution than fracking — and appease environmentalists while they’re at it. This is potentially “a whole shift in the paradigm,” says Peter Kearl, co-founder and CTO of Qmast, a...(Read Full Post)