Energy prices are climbing around the world amid extreme weather, rising demand and supply constraints.

• China and India have electricity crises, a dozen power companies in the U.K. have gone belly-up, and Brits all over the country are facing massive gas lines, Axios business editor Kate Marino writes.

Key stat: Prices for both oil and natural gas have roughly doubled over the last year, and gasoline at U.S. pumps is up by about 50% on average.

The big picture: Higher energy costs slow economic recovery. Every dollar that goes to electric and heating bills is a dollar that isn't spent on holiday shopping or going out to eat.

• Prices may go up further this winter. Bank of America analysts estimate Brent crude oil could hit $100 per barrel — a price not seen since 2014.

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The Chinese military has flown a record 145 fighter planes into Taiwan's air defense identification zone (ADIZ) during the past four days, escalating Beijing's campaign of intimidation toward the self-governing island, Axios' Zachary Basu writes.

• Why it matters: China's growing aggression toward Taiwan is raising fears of a catastrophic war.

The People's Republic of China commemorated its 72nd annual National Day on Oct. 1 by sending 38 warplanes through Taiwan's ADIZ. That record stood until the following day — when it sent 39 more.

• State media hailed the incursions as a form of "military parade." The State Department condemned the flurry as "provocative," and reiterated the United States' "rock-solid" commitment to Taiwan.

Undeterred, China sent another 52 jets into the ADIZ yesterday. Taiwan's foreign minister told Australian television that the island is preparing for war, and urged Australia to increase security cooperation.

• Chinese state media responded by asking whether Australia was "willing to accompany Taiwan separatist regime to become cannon fodder."

The big picture: During a speech earlier this year, President Xi Jinping of China pledged "complete reunification" with Taiwan.

• These aren't idle threats: China has crushed democracy in Hong Kong and fortified its military presence in the disputed South China Sea.
• The U.S. has strengthened ties with Taiwan over the last several years and sold the island billions in weapons, infuriating China.

What to watch: Few experts see a Chinese invasion of Taiwan as imminent. But the chances of a devastating miscalculation grow each time a Chinese fighter jet enters Taiwan's ADIZ, says Timothy Heath, senior international defense researcher at the RAND Corporation.

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COVID is causing most U.S. teachers to update their classroom style, Joann Muller writes from a Khan Academy poll.

• More than two-thirds of the 1,000 teachers surveyed by YouGov for Khan Academy — a nonprofit that offers online education — said they intend to keep new tools picked up during the pandemic.

Key findings:

• 58% said they're more confident trying out new ideas to engage students.
• 56% are more confident about collaborating with their colleagues.
• 52% are more confident in communicating with families.
• 50% are more confident using technology to engage students.

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Oil floats in the Pacific Ocean yesterday after an oil spill off Huntington Beach, Calif.

• 🔎 The Coast Guard is investigating whether a large commercial ship set anchor in the wrong location, dragging an oil pipeline as much as 150 feet and causing the massive spill, the L.A. Times reports.

Facebook controversies are hurting its stock, even as its ad business continues to grow, Axios Media Trends author Sara Fischer writes.

• Facebook's stock is down roughly 15% since it hit an all-time high on Sept. 7. This is the biggest dip since Facebook declined at the onset of the pandemic, and the third-worst negative streak in its history.

What's happening: Facebook stock took a hit yesterday following a whistleblower's "60 Minutes" interview, and amid a major outage that shut down Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp apps globally for hours.

What we're watching: Facebook's business has for years withstood controversy and scrutiny, in large part thanks to the millions of small businesses that are hooked on cheap Facebook ads.

• Facebook rivals, free from the regulatory attention beating down on the tech giant, could be free to innovate faster.
• TikTok last week hit 1 billion users worldwide. Snapchat posted higher user and revenue growth last quarter. Facebook's main app continues to show signs of stagnant user growth.

🛑 Latest on the outage ... Facebook says in a blog post: "Our engineering teams have learned that configuration changes on the backbone routers that coordinate network traffic between our data centers caused issues that interrupted this communication."

• "This disruption to network traffic had a cascading effect on the way our data centers communicate, bringing our services to a halt."

Sign up here for Sara Fischer's weekly Axios Media Trends, out later today.

"More apartments sold in Manhattan in the third quarter than at any other time in the last 32 years," the N.Y. Times' Stefanos Chen reports (subscription).

• "The fire sale is long-since over,” Gregory Heym, chief economist at Brown Harris Stevens, told The Times.

Why it matters: It's a new sign New York real estate "is set for a faster-than-expected recovery."

Private space flights are disclosing less to the public than missions by NASA did, Axios Space author Miriam Kramer writes.

• Why it matters: SpaceX and Blue Origin are trying to woo customers. That hinges on people having a clear picture of the risks.

What's happening: The public didn't have much access to SpaceX's Inspiration4 crew and their experiences during their orbit last month.

• Much of this was logistical, mission commander Jared Isaacman tells Axios. Because it was purely commercial, Inspiration4 couldn't use the full network of technology used for government missions.

🎧 Just dropped: Miriam catches up with the Inspiration4 team in the season finale of Axios' "How it Happened: The Next Astronauts" podcast.

Major League Baseball drew 45.3 million regular-season fans this year as stadiums gradually added capacity — down from 68.5 million in 2019, the last season before the pandemic, AP reports.

• The Dodgers led the major leagues in home attendance at 2.8 million. They didn't start selling full capacity until mid-June.
• Atlanta was second at 2.3 million, followed by San Diego at 2.2 million, Texas and St. Louis at 2.1 million, and Houston at 2.07 million.

The Yankees drew 1.96 million, Boston 1.7 million and the Mets 1.5 million in Steven Cohen's first season as owner.

• Miami was last at 640,000.

Only Texas began the season allowing 100% capacity. Seattle was last, on July 2.

• The MLB season averaged 18,901 fans for 2,397 dates.