I originally created this site as a way to contribute to the national dialogue and help educate my community about issues that concerned me. It has since become an essential part of my work as an energy analyst and communicator.

The history

GetRealList began as a series of occasional emails that I distributed to friends in the wake of 9-11, in an attempt to help us figure out what the attack was all about. The list finally outgrew the confines of regular email distribution, so I rebuilt it as the blog you see today, which is now on its third major revision. Most of the early posts were about politics and environmental subjects, but around 2003 I became more and more focused on energy, and peak oil in particular.

In late 2006, I went pro with my writing, and became an editor of a family of financial newsletters, including Energy and Capital, Green Chip Stocks, and Wealth Daily. The articles I wrote for them are all tagged as such in the GetRealList archives. We parted ways in the spring of 2010.

Before GetRealList, I had a brainchild that I built my first Web business around, and that was Better World, an online magazine about environmental and social responsibility.  (Some years later, I sold the domain betterworld.com to Better World Books, an excellent company that recycles millions of books annually and creates libraries where there are none in Africa and elsewhere.)

As with all great endeavors, Better World and GetRealList represent much more than my labors alone; lots of people have contributed substantially of their time and skills to make them happen. They are all incredibly talented, brilliant, generous souls and I’ve been lucky to have so much of their help.

GetRealList today

Can I become a subscriber?

To receive GRL in your email, just submit your email address in the upper left corner of the home page.

You can also send me a personal note.

–Chris Nelder