Britain’s curtailment cost jumps as grid struggles to cope with power
Matt Oliver Industry Editor, Daily Telegraph

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British bill payers have spent an “absurd” £1bn to temporarily switch off wind turbines so far this year as the grid struggles to cope

Review

Professor Sir Dieter Helm’s essay, The Fracturing of the Net Zero Consensus (October 2024), offers a critical perspective on the challenges and shortcomings of current net-zero strategies, particularly in the UK. He argues that the existing policies oversimplify the complexities of decarbonization and underestimate the associated costs, leading to a fragile consensus that risks eroding public trust. Key issues include renewables’ intermittency, infrastructure inadequacy, and unrealistic timelines for transitioning to a low-carbon economy.

Helm highlights that, while crucial, renewables like wind and solar are insufficient to replace the UK’s heavy reliance on fossil fuels without substantial backup systems, often powered by fossil fuels themselves. The push for rapid transitions, such as electrifying transport and heating, adds to infrastructure costs, which have been downplayed in public discourse. He also criticizes the environmental costs of technologies like electric vehicles and heat pumps, pointing out their dependence on resource-intensive supply chains.

Helm also warns that neglecting transitional fossil fuel strategies and long-term energy storage solutions risks significantly undermining energy security as demand rises in a digitalized economy. His critique suggests that a more realistic, phased approach, accounting for energy security and economic impacts, is necessary to sustain public and political support for net zero.

While Helm’s insights are compelling, some might argue his critique downplays the urgency of immediate climate action and the potential for innovation to address these challenges. Nonetheless, his call for greater cost transparency and a balanced approach between decarbonization and energy security is highly relevant.

For further details, you can read the full essay here: The Fracturing of the Net Zero Consensus​

Dieter Helm is a Professor of Economic Policy at the University of Oxford and Fellow in Economics at New College, Oxford

He provides extensive expert advice to UK and European governments, regulators and companies across three key areas: Energy & Climate; Regulation, Utilities & Infrastructure; and Natural Capital & the Environment.

(Written with the help of ChatGPT)

If we want to prepare for potential shocks and disruptions, we must envision a future shaped by sudden, severe reductions in critical resources.

What if tomorrow’s 50% cut to the UK’s electricity, petrol, and diesel fuel supplies coincides with an abrupt financial crash that renders formal lending systems obsolete?

How would society adapt when conventional systems falter and people are forced to rely solely on one another for support and survival?

This thought experiment, though grim, allows us to think creatively about resilience and preparedness in a world where traditional infrastructures can no longer be relied upon.

Visualising such a future helps illuminate the deep interdependencies between energy, finance, and social structures. It urges us to consider unanswered questions:

How would communities provide for their most vulnerable members?

Could local networks step into the vacuum left by institutional failures?

By exploring these scenarios, we can identify which strategies, skills, and resources might make the difference between societal fracture and newfound solidarity.

Planning for a future marked by drastic cuts is not merely about survival; it is about ensuring that communities are adaptable and resilient. It compels us to look beyond the reliance on centralised systems and develop local responses prioritising mutual aid, resource sharing, and decentralised innovation. This type of foresight can inform how policies are shaped and how communities organise themselves today to mitigate the harshest impacts of a potential crisis tomorrow.

Imagine the UK in Crisis – Energy Shortages and Financial Collapse

Imagine that in 2025 the UK faces an unprecedented crisis: a sudden 50% reduction in electricity supply and petrol and diesel fuel availability, compounded by a concurrent financial crash that disrupts formal borrowing.

Without pre-planning or government support, this crisis reshapes the nation’s economic, social, and demographic landscape.

Immediate Economic and Energy Impacts

The combined energy shortage and financial crash would severely constrain the formal economy. Government and institutional actors, unable to borrow or fund large-scale projects, would see their capacity to support the population significantly reduced.

As centralised solutions falter, the response will shift to localised, community-driven initiatives. Informal borrowing between individuals and small community groups will become the primary means of funding adaptation efforts, spurring the growth of local networks and cooperative systems.

Adaptation Through Localism

With traditional financial systems paralysed, communities would adapt through grassroots resource-sharing and local solutions. Informal peer-to-peer lending, barter, and trade would become common. For example, individuals with technical expertise might trade labour for food, while households pool resources to establish shared solar panels or energy storage systems. This adaptation would intensify localism, where communities become more self-reliant, relying on mutual aid to meet basic needs.

Social and Demographic Shifts

The crisis would bring significant changes to the UK’s population dynamics:

1. Life Expectancy: Life expectancy would decline due to several factors:
   • Healthcare Challenges: A strained NHS with limited access to electricity would lead to delays in treatments and a decrease in the quality of medical care, increasing mortality rates.
   • Food and Nutrition: Disrupted supply chains and higher prices would cause food insecurity, leading to malnutrition and related health issues.
   • Harsh Living Conditions: Reduced heating in winter and cooling in summer would increase deaths among vulnerable populations.
2. Birth Rate: Economic uncertainty typically leads to lower fertility rates. Couples would delay or decide against having children due to affordability concerns. This could result in a significant drop in birth rates—potentially a 20–40% decrease from current levels—leading to long-term demographic shifts such as an ageing population and fewer young people entering the workforce.
3. Population Decline: Over 5–10 years, the cumulative effect of increased mortality, decreased birth rates, and emigration could lead to a population decline of 3–8%, translating to approximately 2–5 million fewer people. This decline would be driven by:
   • Higher Mortality: Increased deaths due to poor health conditions and exposure.
   • Net Emigration: Emigration of skilled individuals seeking stability abroad, while reduced immigration would slow population growth.

Economic Behaviour and Resource Management

With no formal lending, individuals would turn to informal networks for financial support and resource sharing. Local cooperatives could emerge to pool funds or resources, enabling small-scale renewable energy projects, tool-sharing libraries, and communal food production. Alternative currencies or trade tokens might facilitate exchanges within communities where traditional cash is scarce.

Social Stratification and Inequality

Economic hardship would exacerbate existing inequalities. Households with more savings or assets would fare better, being able to invest in off-grid energy solutions or secure better living conditions. Poorer households might rely on labour exchange or community aid, creating uneven levels of resilience across regions.

Multigenerational households would become more common as families consolidate resources, adding stress and fostering intergenerational support. Community-driven projects would provide some relief, but gaps in resilience would remain, deepening social stratification.

Public Health Implications

The deterioration of public health would be a serious concern:

• Resurgence of Preventable Diseases: Poor living conditions and limited healthcare access could lead to a return of diseases once controlled, such as respiratory illnesses.
• Mental Health Strain: Chronic stress and uncertainty would exacerbate mental health issues, further impacting physical well-being.

Pathways for Recovery and Stabilisation

Some communities would demonstrate remarkable adaptability, leveraging local knowledge and shared resources to create micro-scale renewable energy and food production systems. Informal problem-solving could lead to the rise of cooperative energy networks and self-sustaining projects. However, recovery would be uneven, and areas with weaker social cohesion might face prolonged hardship.

A Fragmented Future

This scenario outlines a challenging future where local adaptation becomes vital to survival amid reduced state intervention and formal financial collapse. The UK population would experience significant demographic shifts, with reduced life expectancy and birth rates driving population decline. While innovative local solutions could emerge to mitigate some impacts, deepening inequality and public health challenges would create long-term consequences that reshape the nation for decades to come.

Comparing the Future Scenario with the UK in the 1920s and 1930s

The scenario of severe energy and financial disruptions in 2025 evokes striking parallels with the economic hardships faced by the UK during the 1920s and 1930s.

Following World War I, the UK grappled with debt, a struggling industrial sector, and significant social unrest.

By the 1930s, the Great Depression had swept across the globe, bringing economic stagnation, widespread unemployment, and a profound impact on society’s fabric. However, the future scenario envisioned here layers additional complexities that make it unique: energy shortages and a collapse of formal lending systems.

In the 1920s and 1930s, economic decline was marked by deflation, high unemployment rates, and social discontent, particularly in industrial areas heavily reliant on coal, steel, and textiles.

Communities adapted by tightening family structures and relying on informal support networks, reminiscent of the localised responses projected in a future crisis where state intervention is limited. However, the 2025 scenario would amplify these challenges through severe energy shortages that would not only hamper industrial output but disrupt modern life at its core, affecting everything from healthcare and food distribution to communication.

Moreover, while the economic downturn of the 1930s saw the government eventually stepping in with relief programs and policy interventions—such as public works projects to alleviate unemployment—the imagined future situation posits a collapse so deep that the formal government response may be insufficient or nonexistent.

Instead, resilience would come from grassroots community action, echoing but intensifying the interdependence seen in the 1930s. Just as the Great Depression fostered a shift toward localised self-reliance and informal economies, this future would demand a radical expansion of these strategies to include energy production, food security, and peer-to-peer financial networks.

In both eras, hardship could bring ingenuity. The 1930s saw a revival of local crafts, cooperative efforts, and an appreciation for frugality and resourcefulness.

The future scenario projects these adaptive behaviours evolving further—compelled by economic need and the imperative of surviving in a low-energy, resource-constrained world. Yet, unlike the 1930s, where WW2 created a recovery with growth and expansion, the future may lead to a more permanent shift toward a decentralised, local-focused way of life driven by necessity rather than choice.

As the UK government prepares its upcoming budget with a focus on economic growth, energy expert Art Berman’s recent blog post, “This is How Oil Ends,” raises critical questions about the long-term viability of growth-oriented economic policies. Berman’s insights on the decline of the oil industry suggest that the traditional growth model may be increasingly out of step with the realities of a rapidly changing energy landscape.

Berman, a respected petroleum geologist, argues that the global oil industry is facing an irreversible decline driven by structural shifts such as reduced demand, increased efficiency, and the rise of alternative energy sources. He points out that, as profitability wanes, investment in new oil exploration and production is slowing down. This trend is not a temporary downturn but a fundamental change in the energy market, with significant implications for economies dependent on traditional energy sources.

For the UK, which has seen fluctuating North Sea oil revenues and faces ambitious decarbonization targets, Berman’s analysis highlights a looming contradiction: a budget designed around economic growth may be at odds with the realities of a constrained energy future. The traditional link between energy consumption and economic expansion suggests that if oil demand is set to decline—along with energy derived from fossil fuels more broadly—then the UK’s growth-based budget strategy may become increasingly difficult to sustain.

The UK’s budgetary approach often relies on boosting consumption, infrastructure development, and industrial output to stimulate growth. However, if Berman is correct, the era of cheap, abundant oil is ending, which means rising costs for energy-intensive projects and potentially diminishing returns on investments in conventional sectors. With global oil markets on a trajectory of shrinking supply and potentially higher prices, pursuing growth through increased energy use may clash with the need to curb fossil fuel consumption for climate goals.

Moreover, Berman’s analysis, supported by Nate Hagens’ commentary on systemic energy shifts, suggests that an economic transition away from growth may be not only desirable but necessary. The UK government may need to consider alternative approaches that prioritize resilience, energy efficiency, and sustainable development over traditional measures of growth. A budget strategy focused on well-being, reduced consumption, and local economic stability could help the country navigate the challenges of an energy-constrained future.

As the Chancellor prepares to unveil the budget, the implications of Berman’s work are clear: economic strategies rooted in assumptions of perpetual growth may need to be reassessed in light of a shrinking energy base. The transition from an industrial system reliant on oil to a more diversified, sustainable energy economy may require rethinking how economic success is defined, moving beyond GDP growth towards metrics that account for social and environmental well-being.

If the UK is to align its fiscal policies with the realities of the coming energy transformation, it may need to consider reforms that reduce dependency on fossil fuels while ensuring a just transition for workers and communities impacted by the decline of traditional industries. Berman’s analysis should serve as a wake-up call, prompting policymakers to rethink how to budget for a future in which energy, not growth, becomes the defining constraint.

Energy expert Art Berman’s latest blog post, “This is How Oil Ends,” provides a sobering analysis of the future of the oil industry, arguing that the end of oil as we know it is not a matter of if, but when. Berman, a renowned petroleum geologist, discusses the multiple factors converging to signal the decline of the oil industry, from peak demand to the rise of renewable energy and evolving economic realities.

Berman challenges the conventional wisdom that oil will always remain a cornerstone of global energy supply. He points to significant shifts in technology, policy, and consumer behavior that are reshaping the landscape. He argues that the conventional oil industry, long accustomed to growth and dominance, faces irreversible changes as electric vehicles, efficiency measures, and changing societal priorities reduce demand.

Adding to the discussion, Nate Hagens, a prominent thinker in energy and systems science, commented that Berman’s analysis is crucial for understanding the broader context of energy descent. Hagens emphasizes that the decline of oil is not just about the availability of resources but reflects a deeper, systemic shift in how societies approach growth, energy consumption, and sustainability. His insights underscore the idea that the energy transition is about more than just swapping out fossil fuels for renewables—it’s about rethinking how energy and economics are intertwined.

The article delves into the economic drivers behind the transition, highlighting that as the industry grapples with reduced profitability, investment in new oil exploration and production is faltering. According to Berman, this is not merely a temporary slump but a fundamental shift that will reshape energy markets in the years to come.

The post concludes with a call to recognize the scale of this transition, urging policymakers, investors, and the public to prepare for a future where oil plays a much smaller role in energy supply. Berman’s insights, along with Hagens’ commentary, challenge readers to consider the implications of an inevitable energy transformation and the need to adapt to a rapidly changing world.

Read the full article on Art Berman’s blog: This is How Oil Ends.

By Richard Heinberg
With his permission

Download printable PDF version

Humanity’s transition from relying overwhelmingly on fossil fuels to instead using alternative low-carbon energy sources is sometimes said to be unstoppable and exponential. A boosterish attitude on the part of many renewable energy advocates is understandable: overcoming people’s climate despair and sowing confidence could help muster the needed groundswell of motivation to end our collective fossil fuel dependency. But occasionally a reality check is in order.

The reality is that energy transitions are a big deal, and they typically take centuries to unfold. Historically, they’ve been transformative for societies—whether we’re speaking of humanity’s taming of fire hundreds of thousands of years ago, the agricultural revolution 10,000 years ago, or our adoption of fossil fuels starting roughly 200 years ago. Given (1) the current size of the human population (there are eight times as many of us alive today as there were in 1820, when the fossil fuel energy transition was getting underway), (2) the vast scale of the global economy, and (3) the unprecedented speed with which the transition will have to be made in order to avert catastrophic climate change, a rapid renewable energy transition is easily the most ambitious enterprise our species has ever undertaken.

As we’ll see, the evidence shows that the transition is still in its earliest stages, and at the current rate, it will fail to avert a climate catastrophe in which an unimaginable number of people will either die or be forced to migrate, with most ecosystems transformed beyond recognition.

We’ll unpack the reasons why the transition is currently such an uphill slog. Then, crucially, we’ll explore what a real energy transition would look like, and how to make it happen.

Why This Is (So Far) Not a Real Transition

Despite trillions of dollars having been spent on renewable energy infrastructure, carbon emissions are still increasing, not decreasing, and the share of world energy coming from fossil fuels is only slightly less today than it was 20 years ago. In 2024, the world is using more oil, coal, and natural gas than it did in 2023.

While the U.S. and many European nations have seen a declining share of their electricity production coming from coal, the continuing global growth in fossil fuel usage and CO₂ emissions overshadows any cause for celebration.

Why is the rapid deployment of renewable energy not resulting in declining fossil fuel usage? The main culprit is economic growth, which consumes more energy and materials. So far, the amount of annual growth in the world’s energy usage has exceeded the amount of energy added each year from new solar panels and wind turbines. Fossil fuels have supplied the difference.

So, for the time being at least, we are not experiencing a real energy transition. All that humanity is doing is adding energy from renewable sources to the growing amount of energy it derives from fossil fuels. The much-touted energy transition could, if somewhat cynically, be described as just an aspirational grail.

How long would it take for humanity to fully replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources, accounting for both the current growth trajectory of solar and wind power, and also the continued expansion of the global economy at the recent rate of 3 percent per year? Economic models suggest the world could obtain most of its electricity from renewables by 2060 (though many nations are not on a path to reach even this modest marker). However, electricity represents only about 20 percent of the world’s final energy usage; transitioning the other 80 percent of energy usage would take longer—likely many decades.

However, to avert catastrophic climate change, the global scientific community says we need to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050—i.e., in just 25 years. Since it seems physically impossible to get all of our energy from renewables that soon while still growing the economy at recent rates, the IPCC (the international agency tasked with studying climate change and its possible remedies) assumes that humanity will somehow adopt carbon capture and sequestration technologies at scale—including technologies that have been shown not to work—even though there is no existing way of paying for this vast industrial build-out. This wishful thinking on the part of the IPCC is surely proof that the energy transition is not happening at sufficient speed.

Why isn’t it? One reason is that governments, businesses, and an awful lot of regular folks are clinging to an unrealistic goal for the transition. Another reason is that there is insufficient tactical and strategic global management of the overall effort. We’ll address these problems separately, and in the process uncover what it would take to nurture a true energy transition.

The Core of the Transition is Using Less Energy

At the heart of most discussions about the energy transition lie two enormous assumptions: that the transition will leave us with a global industrial economy similar to today’s in terms of its scale and services, and that this future renewable-energy economy will continue to grow, as the fossil-fueled economy has done in recent decades. But both of these assumptions are unrealistic. They flow from a largely unstated goal: we want the energy transition to be completely painless, with no sacrifice of profit or convenience. That goal is understandable, since it would presumably be easier to enlist the public, governments, and businesses in an enormous new task if no cost is incurred (though the history of overwhelming societal effort and sacrifice during wartime might lead us to question that presumption).

But the energy transition will undoubtedly entail costs. Aside from tens of trillions of dollars in required monetary investment, the energy transition will itself require energy—lots of it. It will take energy to build solar panels, wind turbines, heat pumps, electric vehicles, electric farm machinery, zero-carbon aircraft, batteries, and the rest of the vast panoply of devices that would be required to operate an electrified global industrial economy at current scale.

In the early stages of the transition, most of that energy for building new low-carbon infrastructure will have to come from fossil fuels, since those fuels still supply over 80 percent of world energy (bootstrapping the transition—using only renewable energy to build transition-related machinery—would take far too long). So, the transition itself, especially if undertaken quickly, will entail a large pulse of carbon emissions. Teams of scientists have been seeking to estimate the size of that pulse; one group suggests that transition-related emissions will be substantial, ranging from 70 to 395 billion metric tons of CO₂ “with a cross-scenario average of 195 GtCO₂”—the equivalent of more than five years’ worth of global CO₂ emissions at current rates. The only ways to minimize these transition-related emissions would be, first, to aim to build a substantially smaller global energy system than the one we are trying to replace; and second, to significantly reduce energy usage for non-transition-related purposes—including transportation and manufacturing, cornerstones of our current economy—during the transition.

In addition to energy, the transition will require materials. While our current fossil-fuel energy regime extracts billions of tons of coal, oil, and gas, plus much smaller amounts of iron, bauxite, and other ores for making drills, pipelines, pumps, and other related equipment, the construction of renewable energy infrastructure at commensurate scale would require far larger quantities of non-fuel raw materials—including copper, iron, aluminum, lithium, iridium, gallium, sand, and rare earth elements.

While some estimates suggest that global reserves of these elements are sufficient for the initial build-out of renewable-energy infrastructure at scale, there are still two big challenges. First: obtaining these materials will require greatly expanding extractive industries along with their supply chains. These industries are inherently polluting, and they inevitably degrade land. For example, to produce one ton of copper ore, over 125 tons of rock and soil must be displaced. The rock-to-metal ratio is even worse for some other ores. Mining operations often take place on Indigenous peoples’ lands and the tailings from those operations often pollute rivers and streams. Non-human species and communities in the global South are already traumatized by land degradation and toxification; greatly expanding resource extraction—including deep-sea mining—would only deepen and multiply the wounds.

The second materials challenge: renewable energy infrastructure will have to be replaced periodically—every 25 to 50 years. Even if Earth’s minerals are sufficient for the first full-scale build-out of panels, turbines, and batteries, will limited mineral abundance permit continual replacements? Transition advocates say that we can avoid depleting the planet’s ores by recycling minerals and metals after constructing the first iteration of solar-and-wind technology. However, recycling is never complete, with some materials degraded in the process. One analysis suggests recycling would only buy a couple of centuries’ worth of time before depletion would bring an end to the regime of replaceable renewable-energy machines—and that’s assuming a widespread, coordinated implementation of recycling on an unprecedented scale. Again, the only real long-term solution is to aim for a much smaller global energy system.

The transition of society from fossil fuel dependency to reliance on low-carbon energy sources will be impossible to achieve without also reducing overall energy usage substantially and maintaining this lower rate of energy usage indefinitely. This transition isn’t just about building lots of solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries. It is about organizing society differently so that is uses much less energy and gets whatever energy it uses from sources that can be sustained over the long run.

How We Could Actually Do It, In Seven Concurrent Steps

Step one: Cap global fossil fuel extraction through global treaty, and annually lower the cap. We will not reduce carbon emissions until we reduce fossil fuel usage—it’s just that simple. Rather than trying to do this by adding renewable energy (which so far hasn’t resulted in a lessening of emissions), it makes far more sense simply to limit fossil fuel extraction. I wrote up the basics of a treaty along these lines several years ago in my book, The Oil Depletion Protocol.

Step two: Manage energy demand fairly. Reducing fossil fuel extraction presents a problem. Where will we get the energy required for transition purposes? Realistically, it can only be obtained by repurposing energy we’re currently using for non-transition purposes. That means most people, especially in highly industrialized countries, would have to use significantly less energy, both directly and also indirectly (in terms of energy embedded in products, and in services provided by society, such as road building). To accomplish this with the minimum of societal stress will require a social means of managing energy demand.

The fairest and most direct way to manage energy demand is via quota rationing. Tradable Energy Quotas (TEQs) is a system designed two decades ago by British economist David Fleming; it rewards energy savers and gently punishes energy guzzlers while ensuring that everyone gets energy they actually need. Every adult would be given an equal free entitlement of TEQs units each week. If you use less than your entitlement of units, you can sell your surplus. If you need more, you can buy them. All trading takes place at a single national price, which will rise and fall in line with demand.

Step three: Manage the public’s material expectations. Persuading people to accept using less energy will be hard, if everyone still wants to use more. Therefore, it will be necessary to manage the public’s expectations. This may sound technocratic and scary, but in fact society has already been managing the public’s expectations for over a century via advertising—which constantly delivers messages encouraging everyone to consume as much as they can. Now we need different messages to set different expectations.

What’s our objective in life? Is it to have as much stuff as possible, or to be happy and secure? Our current economic system assumes the former, and we have instituted an economic goal (constant growth) and an indicator (gross domestic product, or GDP) to help us achieve that goal. But ever-more people using ever-more stuff and energy leads to increased rates of depletion, pollution, and degradation, thereby imperiling the survival of humanity and the rest of the biosphere. In addition, the goal of happiness and security is more in line with cultural traditions and human psychology. If happiness and security are to be our goals, we should adopt indicators that help us achieve them. Instead of GDP, which simply measures the amount of money changing hands in a country annually, we should measure societal success by monitoring human well-being. The tiny country of Bhutan has been doing this for decades with its Gross National Happiness (GNH) indicator, which it has offered as a model for the rest of the world.

Step four: Aim for population decline. If population is always growing while available energy is capped, that means ever-less energy will be available per capita. Even if societies ditch GDP and adopt GNH, the prospect of continually declining energy availability will present adaptive challenges. How can energy scarcity impacts be minimized? The obvious solution: welcome population decline and plan accordingly.

Global population will start to decline sometime during this century. Fertility rates are falling worldwide, and China, Japan, Germany, and many other nations are already seeing population shrinkage. Rather than viewing this as a problem, we should see it as an opportunity. With fewer people, energy decline will be less of a burden on a per capita basis. There are also side benefits: a smaller population puts less pressure on wild nature, and often results in rising wages. We should stop pushing a pro-natalist agenda; ensure that women have the educational opportunities, social standing, security, and access to birth control to make their own childbearing choices; incentivize small families, and aim for the long-term goal of a stable global population closer to the number of people who were alive at the start of the fossil-fuel revolution (even though voluntary population shrinkage will be too slow to help us much in reaching immediate emissions reduction targets).

Step five: Target technological research and development to the transition. Today the main test of any new technology is simply its profitability. However, the transition will require new technologies to meet an entirely different set of criteria, including low-energy operation and minimization of exotic and toxic materials. Fortunately, there is already a subculture of engineers developing low-energy and intermediate technologies that could help run a right-sized circular economy.

Step six: Institute technological triage. Many of our existing technologies don’t meet these new criteria. So, during the transition, we will be letting go of familiar but ultimately destructive and unsustainable machines.

Some energy-guzzling machines—such as gasoline-powered leaf blowers—will be easy to say goodbye to. Commercial aircraft will be harder. Artificial intelligence is an energy guzzler we managed to live without until very recently; perhaps it’s best if we bid it a quick farewell. Cruise ships? Easy: downsize them, replace their engines with sails, and expect to take just one grand voyage during your lifetime. Weapons industries offer plenty of examples of machines we could live without. Of course, giving up some of our labor-saving devices will require us to learn useful skills—which could end up providing us with more exercise. For guidance along these lines, consult the rich literature of technology criticism.

Step seven: Help nature absorb excess carbon. The IPCC is right: if we’re to avert catastrophic climate change we need to capture carbon from the air and sequester it for a long time. But not with machines. Nature already removes and stores enormous amounts of carbon; we just need to help it do more (rather than reducing its carbon-capturing capabilities, which is what humanity is doing now). Reform agriculture to build soil rather than destroy it. Restore ecosystems, including grasslands, wetlands, forests, and coral reefs.

Implementing these seven steps will change everything. The result will be a world that’s less crowded, one where nature is recovering rather than retreating, and one in which people are healthier (because they’re not soaked in pollution) and happier.

Granted, this seven-step program appears politically unachievable today. But that’s largely because humanity hasn’t yet fully faced the failure of our current path of prioritizing immediate profits and comfort above long-term survival—and the consequences of that failure. Given better knowledge of where we’re currently headed, and the alternatives, what is politically impossible today could quickly become inevitable.

Social philosopher Roman Krznaric writes that profound social transformations are often tied to wars, natural disasters, or revolutions. But crisis alone is not positively transformative. There must also be ideas available for different ways to organize society, and social movements energized by those ideas. We have a crisis and (as we have just seen) some good ideas for how to do things differently. Now we need a movement.

Building a movement takes political and social organizing skills, time, and hard work. Even if you don’t have the skills for organizing, you can help the cause by learning what a real energy transition requires and then educating the people you know; by advocating for degrowth or related policies; and by reducing your own energy and materials consumption. Calculate your ecological footprint and shrink it over time, using goals and strategies, and tell your family and friends what you are doing and why.

Even with a new social movement advocating for a real energy transition, there is no guarantee that civilization will emerge from this century of unraveling in a recognizable form. But we all need to understand: this is a fight for survival in which cooperation and sacrifice are required, just as in total war. Until we feel that level of shared urgency, there will be no real energy transition, and little prospect for a desirable human future.

by ChatGPT

The vision of a future powered entirely by renewable energy is often depicted as a world free from the environmental and economic shackles of fossil fuels. Solar panels glistening in the sun, wind turbines gracefully turning on the horizon, and hydroelectric dams silently generating power from flowing rivers create a compelling image of sustainability. However, this vision may not be as straightforward as it seems. The lifecycle of renewable energy infrastructure, from production to disposal, reveals a paradoxical dependence on fossil fuels that could challenge the very essence of a renewable future.

The Lifecycle of Renewables: An Inconvenient Dependency

Renewable energy technologies, while operationally clean, require significant inputs of fossil fuels during their lifecycle. Manufacturing solar panels, wind turbines, and battery storage systems involves energy-intensive processes that currently rely heavily on fossil fuels. For instance, the production of photovoltaic cells necessitates the use of high-purity silicon, which is extracted and processed using electricity and heat predominantly generated from coal and natural gas. Similarly, the construction of wind turbines involves the smelting of steel and the fabrication of composite materials, both of which are energy-intensive and fossil-fuel-dependent processes.

Moreover, the transportation and installation of renewable energy infrastructure require diesel-powered machinery and vehicles. Even the maintenance of these systems, often located in remote areas, relies on the availability of fossil fuels. Thus, the current deployment of renewable energy systems is intricately tied to the availability of dense fossil fuels.

The End of the Line: Disposing and Replacing Renewables

As renewable energy systems reach the end of their operational lifespan, typically 20-30 years for solar panels and wind turbines, the challenge of disposal and replacement looms large. Recycling and safely disposing of the materials used in renewables require sophisticated technologies and significant energy inputs. For example, decommissioning a wind turbine involves dismantling its massive blades, towers, and foundations, a process that is both labor- and energy-intensive.

If society continues to rely on fossil fuels to manage this end-of-life phase, the sustainability of renewables comes into question. The energy required to recycle or dispose of old infrastructure and manufacture new replacements could perpetuate a cycle of fossil fuel dependence. Without substantial advancements in renewable-powered industrial processes, the notion of a completely fossil-fuel-free renewable energy future remains elusive.

The Path Forward: Breaking the Fossil Fuel Cycle

To truly realize a sustainable renewable energy future, a radical transformation of the current energy paradigm is necessary. This involves not only increasing the efficiency and deployment of renewable energy systems but also revolutionizing the way these systems are produced, maintained, and recycled.

One potential pathway is the development and scaling of renewable-powered manufacturing. Innovations in solar-powered silicon refining, hydrogen-based steel production, and electric transportation could significantly reduce the fossil fuel footprint of renewable energy infrastructure. Additionally, advances in recycling technologies could enable the recovery and reuse of materials from old renewables with minimal energy input.

Furthermore, investing in research and development of alternative materials that require less energy to produce and have longer lifespans could mitigate the dependency on fossil fuels. For example, organic photovoltaic cells and biodegradable materials for turbine blades are areas of ongoing research with promising potential.

Conclusion: A Renewable Paradox

The pursuit of a future powered entirely by renewable energy is fraught with complexities that challenge the simplistic narrative of a fossil-fuel-free world. The current dependence of renewable energy infrastructure on fossil fuels for production, transportation, and disposal presents a paradox that must be addressed to achieve true sustainability.

Breaking this cycle requires bold innovation, substantial investment in renewable-powered industrial processes, and a commitment to developing sustainable materials and recycling technologies. Only by confronting and overcoming these challenges can we hope to create a future where renewable energy is truly renewable, independent of the very fossil fuels it seeks to replace.

ChatGPT can be very useful in providing information about something about which  I have a glimmer of knowledge.

I was thinking about the massive role that diesel fuel plays in the economy.

It enables stuff to be moved, large and small, near and far, especially home deliveries to country homes such as where we live.

A WordPress site with hundreds of interesting links.

https://energyskeptic.com/

A theory to explain everything

Copied from NE – nakedemperor.substack.com

May 24, 2023

I’m constantly looking for new theories to explain why the things that are happening in this world are happening. Why are governments pushing for ever greater control? Why did they unnecessarily destroy their economies during Covid? Why do they push a self-destructive Net Zero agenda? Why do they shout about reducing immigration only for it to rocket upwards? These are just a few of the many questions where mainstream answers just don’t make sense.

Simple explanations could include inept politicians who only think in the short term. A lack of critical thinking. Careers too finely balanced to upset the apple cart. Woke ideology not allowing people to be challenged. And risk being blown out of all proportion.

But perhaps there is another explanation. One that convinces politicians to pursue policies that don’t seem to be in the public’s interest.

One such theory that I am about to bastardise is by Dr. Tim Morgan. A reader called ‘Fast Eddy’ first told me about Dr. Morgan and I have slowly been absorbing his work. What follows is my take on Tim’s ideas, so apologies, Tim, if I have trashed your work. To read all of Tim’s work, go to his blog SurplusEnergyEconomics.

For those of you who have interacted with Fast Eddy on Substack, he often links to Dr. Morgan’s 2013 paper called “perfect storm – energy, finance and the end of growth”. This was written whilst he worked as Head of Research at Tullett Prebon, a world-leading intermediary in the wholesale financial and energy markets.

The economy is a surplus energy equation, not a monetary one, and growth in output (and in the global population) since the Industrial Revolution has resulted from the harnessing of ever-greater quantities of energy. But the critical relationship between energy production and the energy cost of extraction is now deteriorating so rapidly that the economy as we have known it for more than two centuries is beginning to unravel.

Since then, Tim has written a number of books including “Life After Growth”. His views have turned him into a controversial figure with newspapers calling him “Dr Gloom” and “Terrifying Tim”.

Dr. Morgan believes that there are two economies running in parallel. One is “the underlying ‘real’ or physical economy of products and services” and the other is a “financial economy of money and credit”. “Money has no intrinsic worth, but commands value only in terms of the material things for which it can be exchanged”. To better understand that concept, imagine yourself stranded on a desert island. No amount of money, whether that be coins, gold or crypto, would have the slightest value because there would be nobody with which to trade it with for food or water.

So, “the financial economy is a proxy for the real economy, just as money and credit are proxies for the products and services for which they can be exchanged”.

In the past these were closely linked with the industrial revolution starting centuries of economic growth. However, Tim argues that the two are becoming more and more detached from each other with real economic growth beginning to shrink. Between 2000 and 2007 world GDP increased by $17 trillion whilst debt increased by $55 trillion meaning each dollar of growth COST $2.20 in new debt. Since then debt has more than doubled meaning each dollar of growth now costs around $3.

If you take out a loan of $25,000 and spend it on brand new shiny things, does that make you more wealthy? No, because you have borrowed it and you still have to pay it back with interest on top.

Between 2001 and 2022, reported world real GDP – a proxy for the financial economy – expanded by 109%, a compound annual rate of growth of just short of 3.6%. Material prosperity, by contrast, grew at an annual rate of just 1.2% between those years, increasing by only 30% between 2001 and 2022.

What does this all mean? Simply, we are going to become poorer. Whilst previous generations ‘expected’ to become more prosperous than their parents, according to Dr. Tim, this will no longer happen.

Quite a lot of you will probably have noticed this already. But as Dr. Morgan points out, it is “perfectly feasible for different people to have different experiences, depending upon which of the two economies – the monetary or the material – determines their circumstances”. If you have worked in the financial sector and are part of the financial economy, you are probably doing ok…for now.

The question is, why are we getting poorer?

Briefly moving away from Dr. Morgan to Czech economist, Tomas Sedlacek can start to answer that question. His book ‘Economics of Good and Evil’ explains the concept of money as energy and the relationship between time and money.

For money is something like energy that can travel through time. And it is a very useful energy, but at the same time very dangerous as well. Wherever you put this energy in a time-space continuum, wherever you plant it, something happens there.

This time-travel of money is possible precisely because of interest. Because money is an abstract construct, it is not bound by matter, space, or even time.

Due to this characteristic, we can energy-strip the future to the benefit of the present. Debt can transfer energy from the future to the present.

To summarise, Sedlacek compares debt to a Saturday night drinking session. Even though you normally go to bed at 9pm, suddenly you are able to stay awake until 3 in the morning. How is this possible? Because you borrowed energy from the future. And then comes Sunday. Your debt must be repaid, you feel terrible, have no energy and you stay in bed all day.

We have had the mother of all parties for the last two hundred years and instead of slowing down at 3am, we carried on partying, but harder and with stronger drugs. It’s now Sunday morning and a hangover like you’ve never experienced before is about to start.

But it gets worse.

Rather than a financial system, the economy should be viewed as an energy one. If you think about it, all goods and services require some form of energy to produce and supply. Money only “commands ‘value’ only in relation to the things for which it can be exchanged – and all of those things rely entirely on energy”.

All economic output is therefore the product of surplus energy. But energy is also required to access and produce the energy in the first place. Whatever remains is surplus energy. Dr. Morgan calls the energy needed to access energy the Energy Cost of Energy (ECoE). So Surplus Energy = Total Energy – ECoE.

ECoE is critical to prosperity. If ECoE goes up then using the equation above, surplus energy goes down meaning economic output goes down.

The distinguishing feature of the world economy over the last two decades has been the relentless rise in ECoE. This process necessarily undermines prosperity, because it erodes the available quantity of surplus energy. We’re already seeing this happen – Western prosperity growth has gone into reverse, and progress in emerging market (EM) economies is petering out. Global average prosperity has already turned down.

Trend ECoE of fossil fuels has risen exponentially, from 2.6% in 1990 to 4.1% in 2000, 6.7% in 2010 and 9.9% today. Since fossil fuels continue to account for four-fifths of energy supply, the trend in overall world ECoE has followed a similarly exponential path, and has now reached 8.0%, compared with 5.9% in 2010 and 3.9% in 2000.

For fossil fuels alone, trend ECoE is projected to reach 11.8% by 2025, and 13.5% by 2030.

Dr. Morgan goes into detail about why renewables aren’t the answer, nor will they likely be for the foreseeable future. They may stabilise things but even in the unlikely scenario of stabilising ECoE at the current rates, global prosperity will still decline. “British prosperity has been in decline ever since ECoE reached 3.6%, and an ECoE of 5.5% has been enough to push Western prosperity growth into reverse”.

So with the ECoE going up and surplus energy going down, what does Dr. Morgan think the future holds? He outlines three outcomes that he expects to see.

1. A financial shock that will dwarf 2008;
2. Government breaking down in the face of failing prosperity; and
3. The acceleration of economic deterioration.

The financial shock will dwarf 2008 because at the end of the ‘90s ECoEs rose past 4% and Western prosperity petered out. However, this was masked with cheap and easy credit. Ultra-loose monetary policy meant cheap money flew into assets causing rampant asset inflation. This is the everything bubble. All assets have been pumped up with cheap money and all could now pop.

Dr. Morgan anticipates that as well as mass defaults and collapses in asset prices there will be currency crises due to a breakdown in trust.

Governments will break down in the face of failing prosperity because assumptions made by governments will differ from the underlying reality experienced by individuals.

Recent experience in the United Kingdom illustrates this process. Between 2008 and 2018, GDP per capita increased by 4%, implying that the average person had become better off, albeit not by very much. Over the same period, however, most (85%) of the recorded “growth” in the British economy had been the cosmetic effect of credit injection, whilst ECoE had risen markedly. For the average person, then, prosperity has fallen, by £2,220 (9%), to £22,040 last year from £24,260 ten years previously. At the same time, individual indebtedness has risen markedly.

The deterioration of prosperity explains all the recent political shocks such as Brexit, Trump and the Yellow Vests in France.

And finally the deterioration may accelerate due to risk factors including worsening trends in fossil fuel ECoEs, the financial crisis discussed above and a decline in high rates of utilisation of both businesses and public services.

So we’ve identified the problem, seen how growth has ended and discussed the everything bubble but what would politicians do with this same information. Would they ‘fess up to the public that times are about to become hard, risking civil unrest and a further acceleration in the rate of deterioration? Or would they try to manage expectations downwards?

Dr. Morgan calls this the ‘modified consensus’.

The authorities would not, and could not, say that economic growth has ceased, let alone that it has gone into reverse, and neither would any practical purpose be served by doing so. Instead, they would seek to steer expectations towards successively, but gradually, lower levels.

Suddenly a lot of the unanswerable questions above start to have answers. Why are governments pushing for ever greater control? Because they will need it to control citizens as their prosperity declines. Why did they unnecessarily destroy their economies during Covid? Because it allowed them to pump up the financial system one last time whilst tamping down demand. Why do they push a self-destructive Net Zero agenda? Because they are managing expectations downwards. If you decide that you are going to use less energy yourself, you are far less likely to riot than if you are told the energy has run out. Why do they shout about reducing immigration only for it to rocket upwards? Because with a large retired population, the only way to achieve any kind of growth or pay unfunded pension liabilities, is to attract young workers into the country.

Human activity—mostly the burning of fossil fuels—has raised Earth’s atmospheric carbon content by 50 percent, from 280 parts per million (ppm) to 420 ppm. Since the start of the Industrial Revolution, we’ve released approximately 950 billion metric tons of carbon into the air. Every year, humans emit more than 40 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere, as of 2021 measurements. Even if we stop burning fossil fuels now, the amount of CO2 already in the atmosphere will cause Earth’s climate to continue warming for decades, triggering heat waves, droughts, rising sea levels, and extreme weather.

Climate scientists warn that if we want to avert catastrophe, a significant amount of excess atmospheric CO2 must be captured and sequestered. The process is called carbon dioxide removal (CDR), and it has been receiving more attention as nations, states, and industries strive to meet their climate goals. But how should we go about doing it?

There are two broad strategies: biological and mechanical. Nature already absorbs and emits about 100 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide every year through the natural processes in the biosphere—including plant growth—an amount 2.5 times humanity’s annual carbon output. So, according to advocates for biological carbon removal, our best bet is simply to help the planet do a little more of what it is already doing to absorb carbon. We could accomplish this through reforestation, soil-building agricultural practices, and encouraging kelp growth in oceans.

On the other hand, advocates for mechanical carbon removal point to technologies that successfully capture CO2 in the laboratory; if these machines were scaled up, those advocates tell us, we could create an enormous new industry with plenty of jobs while removing atmospheric carbon and reducing climate risk. Scientists are exploring several chemical pathways for direct air capture (DAC) of carbon and ways to sequester CO2 in porous rock formations. Revenue streams come from government subsidies or from the use of captured CO2 in enhanced oil recovery (EOR).

So, which pathway—nature or machines—holds more promise?

In its sixth assessment report, released in March 2023, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations body that regularly assesses the current state of climate science, points out that “biological CDR methods like reforestation, improved forest management, soil carbon sequestration, peatland restoration[,] and coastal blue carbon management can enhance biodiversity and ecosystem functions, employment[,] and local livelihoods.”

On the other hand, notes the IPCC, the implementation of mechanical DAC along with underground sequestration of CO2 “currently faces technological, economic, institutional, ecological-environmental and socio-cultural barriers.” Further, the current global rates of mechanical carbon capture and storage “are far below those in modelled pathways limiting global warming to 1.5°C to 2°C.”

In a study published in the journal PLOS Climate in February 2023, a team of American scientists analyzed the benefits and downsides of the two pathways in detail. They used three criteria: effectiveness (“[d]oes the process achieve a net removal of CO2 from the atmosphere” once all inputs and outputs are accounted for?), efficiency (“[a]t a climate-relevant scale… [of a billion metric tons of CO2 per year], how much energy and land are required?”), and impacts (“[w]hat are the significant co-benefits or adverse impacts [on nature and society]?”).

The team gathered data and crunched the numbers. The lead author, June Sekera, a carbon researcher and visiting scholar at the New School for Social Research in New York, concluded:

“[B]iological sequestration methods, including restoration of forests, grasslands, and wetlands and regenerative agriculture, are both more effective and more resource efficient in achieving a climate-relevant scale of CO2 removal than are techno-mechanical methods—which use machinery and chemicals to capture CO2. Additionally, the co-impacts of biological methods are largely positive, while those of technical/mechanical methods are negative. Biological methods are also far less expensive.”

In this comparative study, the scores for natural versus mechanical carbon removal methods were not close: Natural methods won in every category—and by a significant margin. The problem with machine-based carbon removal is not just that current technologies are immature (with the hope of getting better with more research and investment), but also that using machines is inherently inefficient, costly, and risky. On the other hand, removing carbon by restoring nature costs less, is more effective at reducing atmospheric carbon, and offers numerous side benefits.

The American study also noted that its findings “that biological methods exhibit superior effectiveness in comparison to DAC are consistent with data reported in the 2022 IPCC study.” It added in plain terms: “According to the IPCC, not only are biological methods of CDR more effective than DAC…, but their effectiveness is projected to increase significantly over time.”

As if to underscore that conclusion, a separate study published in March 2023 in the journal Nature Climate Change concluded that the protection and rewilding of even a small targeted group of wildlife species would help facilitate the capture and storage of enough carbon to keep the global temperature below the tipping point of warming 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

You might expect, therefore, that policymakers would currently be directing all of their support toward natural carbon removal methods. But you’d be wrong. Government policy support in the form of subsidies is being shoveled mostly into mechanical carbon removal.

In the U.S., the primary subsidy for mechanical CDR is the federal 45Q tax credit, introduced in 2008, which offers $10 to $20 per metric ton of CO2 captured and stored. But there are also carbon offset credit programs (including the California Low Carbon Fuel Standard), subsidies for building CO2 pipelines, and subsidies for the production of alternative fuels (including ethanol and hydrogen) that rely on carbon capture technology to be considered “low-carbon.” The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 significantly increased the number of credits in 45Q and broadened eligibility, and included federal subsidies for oil producers who pump CO2 underground to make it easier to extract trapped petroleum—which is by far the most common way of using captured CO2.

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which President Biden signed in November 2021, included billions in federal funding for carbon capture projects. In the Midwest, as a result, there has been a rush to build thousands of miles of CO2 pipelines for carbon sequestration—a frenzy that has set off regulatory chaos and is pitting farmers and Native Americans against biofuel plant operators and venture capitalists. Researchers continue to spend time and money finding new chemical pathways to mechanical CO2 capture—resources that could instead be diverted to biological CO2 removal methods. Even AI is being enlisted in mechanical carbon capture efforts.

There are also subsidies that, in effect, promote nature-based CDR methods, including soil conservation and wetlands restoration programs, but these programs were not initially intended for carbon capture and sequestration, and they are not optimized for that purpose. In November 2022, at the global COP27 climate summit in Cairo, the Biden administration announced the “Nature-Based Solutions Roadmap,” an outline of strategic recommendations to put America on a path to “unlock the full potential of nature-based solutions” to address “climate change, nature loss, and inequity.” The roadmap calls for updating policies, providing funding, training a nature-based solutions workforce, and prioritizing research, innovation, knowledge, and adaptive learning to advance nature-based solutions. However, the roadmap remains, for the most part, in the realm of good intentions.

There’s only so much funding available for climate solutions, and the total amount is woefully inadequate. Only strategic investment will obtain significant results for the dollars spent, and it is now clear which path will get results.

Given the clear superiority of nature-based solutions, why is so much support still going toward mechanical carbon capture? Poor judgments in the past have created funding streams and projects with a momentum of their own. Most of the gold-rush fever surrounding mechanical carbon capture can be attributed simply to the lure of subsidies for building new DAC plants and pipelines.

In a 2018 article published by the Thomson Reuters Foundation, Justin Adams—who at the time was the managing director for global lands at the U.S.-based environmental nonprofit Nature Conservancy—urged the European Union to take the lead on using nature-based solutions in the climate crisis fight. “Many economists and policy advisors ignore the potential of natural climate solutions at our peril,” warned Adams’s article, calling a 2018 report by the European Academies’ Science Advisory Council (EASAC) “short-sighted” for downplaying the potential of nature-based climate solutions.

“Natural climate solutions are in fact the world’s oldest negative emissions technology,” Adams wrote. “By managing carbon dioxide-hungry forests and agricultural lands better, we can remove vast quantities of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and store them in trees and soils.”​​

The science tells us that policymakers and investors have so far been wrong to advocate so strongly for mechanical CDR solutions to the detriment of biological ones. The fate of future generations is at stake, and we cannot afford to waste both time and money on techno-fixes that are ineffective at achieving our climate goals. The clear path forward to addressing the looming catastrophic effects of climate change is to restore nature.

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This article by Richard Heinberg is copied with his agreement from https://richardheinberg.com/museletter-362-capturing-carbon-with-machines-is-a-failure-so-why-are-we-subsidizing-it

The President of the EU Commission has announced that “a growth model based on fossil fuels is obsolete.”

Nate Hagens discusses this in his Great Simplification project.

https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/frankly-original/31-reflections-on-beyond-growth

Von der Leyen was speaking at a European Parliament-hosted event in Brussels entitled “Beyond Growth” whose main theme was how to reconcile economic development with environmental goals.

“A growth model centred on fossil fuels is simply obsolete,” von der Leyen said, adding the goal of the EU’s Green Deal energy transition was to create “a different growth model that is sustainable far into the future”.