Let’s have some predictions because it’s clear that the energy transition, as planned, is not happening. I’d like to say I give it another five years but since I’m wary of my own confirmation bias, I’ll add another two for a neat 2030. Your turn.
I personally think that it will implode before that. - BP with Beyond Petrolium is back to just BP - Shell and Total are increasing oil and gas E&P efforts - Nuclear and Nat gas are in fashion (more so than in the past) more coal being used than before, and the number one issue: Energy Security.
Great question. These things tend to happen faster than we can imagine. The foundation for the transition is already showing cracks, and it lurched way off the tracks last year as demand for all fossil fuels expanded dramatically. So much depends on the U.S. election in 2024 and those in Europe in the coming few years. A Ron DeSantis in the presidency could turn things around very quickly.
We had Germany announcing a fleet of new CCGTs yesterday. Jennifer Granholm saying US will need fossil fuels for years to come. Five years sounds about right to me.
Early in my career I caught the tail-end of a research project that was celebrating its successful conclusion. Two years later when clearing out an archive I found the slide deck (plastic overheads... this was 30+ yrs ago :-) ) which had the 10 objectives of the project listed. Nine of them had been totally missed - and airbrushed out of history to achieve a successful conclusion. My guess is we will see the narrative changing such that the transition is a success no matter what the end game looks like. Too much money and political status invested in not admitting a failure. I'm just looking forward to the creative nonsense that we will see to justify this.
My try for starters: Coal gets labeled as "Green" because the particulate matter it emits is shown to help "global dimming" and has a net cooling effect... Happy days.
Agree, the narrative will certainly "evolve" so the transition can be passed off as a success. That suggestion about coal might not be very far-fetched at all.
concur. was thinking a goalpost shift where coal and oil is reduced a little, they go to gas which is lower emissions, more nuclear and declare victory.
It all depends on the economy. If a recession hits it is always be the economy that takes preference over the environment. Also, I don’t think the narrative will collapse suddenly across the world. Some countries and governments will hang on a little longer.
So my guess is that it will start to loose credibility in 2024 and be done by 2026.
Renewables will and must continue to be installed but reason will take over the narrative of what must be done, what can be done and what will be done.
The "elites" (however one wishes to define them -- political, academic, NGOs, foundations, think tanks, international organizations, and media) across the western world are committed to the net-zero transition come h*ll or high water for reasons that have little to do with the environment. Logic would dictate that this movement should have collapsed (at least) two years ago. But this isn't based on logic. It might collapse under its own weight and internal contradictions, but not before there is much suffering amongst the western population. That suffering might very well cause civil unrest and a system crash.
My heart wishes for 2025, but my gut tells me more like '26-27 via osmosis, or possibly whenever China goes on the offensive and starts tumbling turbines into the sea via jets and missiles.
I'm with you Irina. I would say 5 years but just to be conservative but let's go with 2030, the new decade. Assuming the global economy kicks into full gear again after the upcoming slow down, fossil fuel demand will rise accordingly, and emissions likely with it, so the decision will have to made either to stymy the recovery with more renewable mandates, raising the cost of energy for everyone, or let the benefits of higher economic growth run free. Needless to say, the latter will always win out with voters...
I think 2030 will be, as Winston Churchill said, "the end of the beginning." At that point, with energy costs shutting down industry in the U.S. as it is in Europe, and more people experiencing blackouts regularly, opposing net-zero will no longer be taboo. There will be, however, powerful people who will go to their graves never admitting they're wrong. They will continue to have some clout past 2030 to maintain energy transition policies, if not pass new ones. It's east to make a bad law. Very hard to repeal one.
Regaining the freedom to question the dominant narrative would be a great start. I'll take it. Pleasure to have you here, by the way, I'm a big fan of your work.
I think we are well on the way towards implosion (hopefully not just wishful thinking!) There are very big cracks at the seams. I'm NOT waiting for politicians to save us (never happen) - I think it will be the banking and insurance industries that will bring them down - those are the money makers and they are starting to unravel. When the money laundering or "greenwashing" slows up or begins to be regulated and credits are only worth the paper they are printed on, then it will take a dive. Then it will be back to the real things like - oh yes - product that works - oil and gas, hopefully nuclear! As for the milking of tax credits - when we are all taxed out of existence where will they go for their funding? Supply chains - China, unraveling will slow it somewhat, but if they have it to sell it will eventually get here one road or another! (Road & Bridge). I'm going for 3-5 years, giving it a bit of a spread, it's happening faster than we can see on the surface. Great question - thanks for keeping us all on our toes Irina!
You know, this is where I get stuck when I think about our governments' plans. You can't make life impossible for people and expect them to be accept it, nobody is that stupid. Or are they, I wonder.
I think we're agreed the drivers behind the transition are BS. Okay, so why deny people energy, if it's readily available. Maybe the last caveat is the clue?
Lots of good comments here. I think the "transition" will morph into other, more sensible forms over the years as world energy developments continue to inflict pain on people. At some point, even the Gretas will get less press as people tire of the endless yowling. That all said - a transition of sorts will continue - we don't have infinite oil and gas.
Yes I have a nice graph in my Energy Transitions presentations showing energy sources for the United States from 1700 to 2010. Very clear that nothing has gone away, we've just continued to add more sources while consuming more and more of the old ones too
Perhaps we don't have infinite oil and gas, but known resources have more than tripled in the just the past 20 years, and with the advent of unconventional oil and gas we have learned that huge amounts of oil and gas exist where we thought none could be recovered only ten years ago. Those recovery rates continue to improve, and since we used to leave 70% of everything in the ground, we have known resources more than double what we have used in the past 150 years. With added technological energy efficiency and some supplementation from renewables, we can probably use oil and gas for centuries until we no longer need it. We didn't get to the moon without diesel in our rockets, so it will be oil and gas that gets us to the next phase of our planetary existence. I predict that at one point we are going to realize that many oil basins are still making oil and gas, still in the oil and gas window and cooking away, and that the earth does produce, and can continue to produce a quantity of new oil and gas that is roughly equal to our consumption rate. I say this as a geoscientist who has spent a long career studying this.
My take is that the collapse will accelerate shortly after the war in Ukraine ends. The current Russian regime will be overturned and the replacement government left with an economy in shambles and a dire need to generate revenue. Ukraine will be in a similar position regarding revenue generation albeit with better access to foreign investment. While Russia will initially be burdened with the international sanctions for its aggression against Ukraine, those will eventually end. Both Russia and Ukraine will be eagerly tapping their natural resources and flooding international markets with new O&G production thereby driving down prices. Although European energy buyers have greatly throttled back purchases from Russia, Russia can focus on the insatiable demand for low priced oil and gas from developing countries. The resulting realigned international energy market operating in a low O&G commodity price environment will undercut investment in intermittent renewables globally for years to come.
Something I have been asking for years: Is a transition necessary? I say, no. The whole global warming, climate change narrative is a lie, built upon lies. As you know, unless you want to own up to the truth, you need to keep lying and I do believe at this point, like any pathological liar, they believe their lies are true. My belief and I will stand by this forevermore, is that God created everything, including fossil fuels. And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good - Genesis 1:31
I just showed up here and don't know my way around. Is this a place where the belief that climate change / global warming is commonly held to be a lie? 'Cause if it is, I'm clearly in the wrong building.
If the answer to your question has not become clear from reading this post, I'm not sure I can help you make it clearer but I'll try. The climate changes constantly and also in cycles. It is also changing right now and human activity has a big part in it. The belief, however, that it is human activity in fossil fuel extraction ALONE that is responsible for climatic changes and that the only way to ensure long-term survival of the species is to reduce the amount of one trace element in the air is, while not necessarily a lie, a dangerous delusion.
It's pretty clear to me that anthropogenic climate disruption is not exclusively caused by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, but is also caused by a complex pattern of disruption of the complex functions of forests and other ecosystems, which has resulted in major global disruption of the water cycle as described and explained in this article and video: https://rword.substack.com/p/how-the-environmental-movement-can . However, I'm not in complete agreement with Charles Eisenstein's view concerning the proportional role water cycle and biotic systems disruption in causing climate disruption as compared with forcings from greenhouse gases. I strongly suspect greenhouse gases play a more significant role than Charles suspects.
Regardless of that matter of proportions, clearly most of the changes to the climate we're witnessing these days are anthropogenic. And these are obviously rather dramatic and disturbing changes -- e.g. changes to ocean currents now being so rapid that in the very near term we can expect much more major global changes in rainfall patterns (which will likely result in a global food crisis due to disruptions of agriculture -- and also the death of many forests).
Anyway, clearly I am a strong believer in
(a) anthropogenic climate disruption
(b) CO2 and other greenhouse gases are among the principal causes of this
(c) It's dangerous and disruptive
(d) changes in human behavior could make the risks less catastrophic than they would otherwise be
I think where I and many of the folks who show up here are in agreement is in the notion that rapidly building out a gargantuan amount of "renewable energy" infrastructure to replace current energy levels with these as a replacement of fossil fuels is neither accurate nor wise. But probably my reasons for doubting in this scheme are different from you and most of your readers.
I should also add that the rate and intensity of climate change now occurring is entirely faster and more intense than at any time in the history of our species has existed (300,000 years). And there have been only a very few times in the history of Earth that the rate and extent of such change has occurred before. These earlier extinction events were caused by giant asteroids colliding with Earth, or with massive increases in volcanic activity.
Here's what ChatGPT said concerning the current rate of climate change.
Me: "How does the rate of climate change occurring now compare with other times of rapid climate change in Earth history?"
ChatBot:
"The rate of climate change occurring now is significantly faster than many past episodes of rapid climate change in Earth's history. While climate change has occurred naturally throughout Earth's history, the current rate of change is primarily driven by human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels, deforestation, and other industrial processes.
One past episode of rapid climate change occurred approximately 56 million years ago during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), where the Earth's temperature rose by around 5°C over a period of several thousand years. This event was likely triggered by the release of large amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere from volcanic activity. While this event was rapid in geological terms, the current rate of change is happening much faster, with the Earth's temperature expected to rise by 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels as early as 2030.
Another notable episode of climate change occurred around 12,000 years ago during the Younger Dryas period, where the Earth's temperature cooled by around 3-5°C in just a few decades. This event was likely triggered by the sudden influx of freshwater into the North Atlantic, which disrupted ocean currents and led to widespread cooling. While this event was also rapid in geological terms, the current rate of change is happening much faster and in the opposite direction, with the Earth's temperature rising rapidly due to human activities.
Overall, while there have been past episodes of rapid climate change in Earth's history, the current rate of change is happening much faster and is primarily driven by human activities. This highlights the urgent need for action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the impacts of climate change."
Perhaps, then, you also understand that it is almost certain (I say 'almost' because it's a controversial topic) that a rapid "energy transition" of the kind which is the mainstream / popular narrative, would actually result in a sharp increase in CO2 emissions?
This is because 84% of the technological energy we consume worldwide at present is fossil energy, and it is this very fossil energy which would be used to mine the metals and minerals, smelt the metals, ship this around the world, manufacture the devices and infrastructure, ship these around the world, etc. -- all for "green" energy production.
Richard Heinberg (energy expert at Post Carbon Institute) has said a "rapid energy transition" of the sort which is in being sold as our "climate solution" would result in a "pulse" of increased GHG emissions. A sharp increase. (I've called this "the Heinberg Pulse". Which term you can "google". But I'm dropping this as the name for it due to Richard's explicitly gentle request that we don't make this be about persons, but about ideas.) I only mention the "Heinberg Pulse" because it's a means of locating my writings on the topic through an internet search -- in quotes -- "Heinberg Pulse".
So we're on the same team here. I want us not to create a pulse of increased emissions in the name of "green energy". That would be madness!
But I also want to phase out fossil energy as much as possible! Not by replacement of current energy levels with 'renewables', but through using a lot less energy and materials. We can't possibly keep industrial civilization as we know it going ... even if there were not a climate emergency (and there is). That's because EROI will continue to decline on liquid fossil fuels and natural gas to the point that we simply cannot afford to run an industrial economy of the kind the world presently has.
The good news is that we can create a very high quality of life material culture anyway! My job is to show people how and why this is so. But it's a lot of hard work which far too few people are working on. Perhaps you'd like to help?
Indeed, I do understand. I am also all for the smart and efficient use of energy and all resources rather than their waste, which is unsustainable in the most literal sense of the word. I do my bit, small as it is, here and in my everyday life, and I teach my child to be responsible with resources. It's what we can all do.
There's danger in declaring "victory" over the oil and gas naysayers as though things would go back to where they were pre COVID if only E&P could drill like crazy again. Drilling up our best locations and basically giving away the energy is a short term high but would leave the US in a world of hurt in terms of energy security sooner rather than later. Shale isn't infinite and prices will have to go up to support the extra costs of monitoring, methane scavenging and remediating old wells. Are renewables the only answer? Of course not, but we can't assume that we don't need an answer to replacing hydrocarbons in some markets sooner rather than later either.
Nothing ever goes back to the way it was and that's not necessarily a bad thing. We would need to come up with a better plan, however, a mad rush is not the way to ensure long-term energy security.
But they're not a replacement and aren't accretive. We don't have an answer to replacing HC, which leaves the only course of action being radical societal remodelling. Maybe like what's been happening over the last three years....
Untrue. We do have an excellent answer to "replacing HC"....
Don't replace them. Synthesize them. The US Navy demonstrated a method of extracting the dissolved CO2 from seawater and combining it with cracked H2 to make synthetic jet fuel. The process is energy intensive, but aircraft carriers have lots of energy to spare.
It has been estimated that applying this technique using land based nuclear generators would result in synthetic gasoline at about $4 - $5 per gallon. Expensive, but not ruinously so.
There's enough Uranium to last until the Sun goes out. The CO2 dissolved in seawater (or any saline reservoir) comes from the atmosphere, so the system is carbon neutral.
HC fuel is burned and CO2 enters the atmosphere. Some of that CO2 dissolves into seawater (higher solubility than the atmosphere has). The US Navy synthetic HC (SHC) system extracts the CO2 from seawater, uses it to make HC fuel and the fuel is burned, completing the cycle.
Leave it to the next generation to figure out how to make the most important transition in human history happen. It is, after all, going to be be their problem. Really.
It's happening now and they aren't pest of it James. Everyone here knows that low cost, available energy is a sine qua non for an industrialised society and that renewables aren't that. I think the elephant in the room is, ironically what we're advocating. The problem is it's decliningv
I see the nonsense everywhere - but with the complete takeover of public education by the "environmental mind set/religion and therefore our children"s belief system - we have lost the war - even when faced with massive energy shortages their indoctrination and religious like embrace of "wokeism" does not allow for any actions to force changes - and lets be honest here - with oil and gas selling at prices adjusted for inflation lower than in 2000 who can blame them? and a few trillion free dollars and euro's to give the "green" competitors free capital as well - hope I am wrong but math-science- logic- and critical thinking to solve problems is going extinct - it is all about " how does that make you feel?"
Well, sub-zero temperatures make you feel cold and having to spend 50% of your income on your electricity bill makes you feel sad and angry, so maybe not all is lost. Anger is a great driver of change.
When I debate people on this topic, I bring up the idea that when the United States has gone from 20 Mbpd of oil consumption down to 5 Mbpd, the transition has succeeded. I know there is more to it than that but these are the round numbers I like to use. My math shows that all of the EVs we are going to be build in the next ten years will reduce our oil consumption by about 10%. A start, but much slower than most people think. This is how I try to convince people that whatever the energy transition is or isn't, it is going to be a long slow process. Just because your neighbor drives a Tesla doesn't mean we are done with oil.
It won’t collapse. It will just morph into the new thing and all of the activists will chase the next shiny marble. Unfortunately not before doing a lot of damage to the world first...
I must say, when I talk to normal people who aren’t energy obsessed like I am, they just seem so relaxed about all of this anyway. A lot of them have picked up wrong ideas about wind and solar, but they don’t seem wedded to them. They all still drive automobiles and feed their children, so I think the screeching crazy will subside a bit over time and we will go about slowly reducing switching out technologies once they are shown to be feasible and superior, just like humans always have. And I guess that is the definition of a “transition” anyway...
The majority of people are normal. They have no time for activism because they have lives. But I think a moderate interest in energy is always warranted, if for nothing else, just to spare you the shock at the next electricity price jump.
Yeah, if only more people actually had some idea what energy is it would make things a lot better in the world. Of course you could say that about a lot of things...
I don't think of it as "number of years" as much as milestones. I think things'll start fraying seriously when California hits 25–30% of (actual) electricity generation via wind and solar—that state with third-world power supply (or European price level energy) is a _powder keg_.
There was a time before everyone became aware of the climate crisis, but I can claim that I’ve known how difficult the problem would become since 1980. That was when my friend (and superb energy analyst Dave Peters) forced EIA to insert a warning to congress in the Energy Information Administration’s annual report that global warming was coming, and it could only get worse unless something major was done. As you all know, Congress did nothing then or since.
The context is important. Three-mile island had just happened and the nuclear industry was on its way toward full stasis. The very elaborate and intense Republican policy of Project Independence, released in 1974, which did the right thing for the wrong reasons (turned America into a nuclear power-building nation where electric vehicles would prevail to escape Arab oil control) was abandoned after the auto companies demanded that America assume there would be no future oil-related energy problem and continue with the oil imports. And with the failure to go nuclear for climate reasons, the nation rolled on for 43 years without any policy. The costs of the change were going to be enormous, and no one wanted to pay them. Very understandable but incorrect.
But now lip service is paid to a new solution: we can be saved by wind, solar, renewables, and batteries. I know that isn’t the case and I know why. I am truly shocked by the failure of those making transition policies to understand that adding gigantic increases of new electricity production demand occasioned by ev’s will only raise the fossil fuel content required to produce current electricity. And raise it far beyond where current systems can perform correctly. There is even the danger that in a really bad winter natural gas distribution companies will have to command the share of natural gas that electric utilities think belongs to them. So I am aware that there are lots of real issues that require correct resolution.
I read this as I was listening to the BBC coverage of the Windsor framework and a rehash of all things brexit. With that as context I can see the EU insisting on this energy transition 20 years from now while trying to make that tight clown suit fit objective reality with legalistic contortions.
Three years ago (Mar 2020) I realised Covid was not the threat it was made out to be and challenged my friends with facts and logic... they didn’t agree then and to this day they still refuse to admit they were scammed.
If that’s anything to go by, terms like “Net Zero”, “Climate Change”, “Renewable Energy”, “ESG”, (along with other woke agendas) have been marketed effectively, they are deeply engrained and have so much momentum, the economic pain will need to be immense before this thinking will be reversed, by which time we will have had a total collapse, at least in the West. This could take decades to resolve. 🥲
The Diamond Princess was the giveaway... 3,700 passengers, mostly in their 70s & 80s. Quarantined for a month... everyone would have been exposed - a perfect closed system experiment. 9 died during the quarantine period, plus another 5 or so soon afterwards.
Out of an average group of 80 year olds, 1% will die every month, so it would seem the Covid outbreak REDUCED the death rate. Do the maths!
I remember I was too overwhelmed by the death reports from Italy at the time. Then the panic spread as the media down here started reporting thousands and thousands dying and it was much later that the truth began to surface about how exactly cause of death was being determined, per hospital protocols. In a better world, a lot of "health experts" and certain politicians should go to jail but, alas, we don't live in a better world and nobody will compensate us for the debilitating stress or the loved ones many lost because of inappropriate treatment.
The irony (amongst many ironies we see these days) is the aggressive push for the energy transition causes downstream economic ripples (read waves) i.e. this is all inflationary, ESG is inflationary. With less E&P in net terms (ESG pressure, governments not giving licences/permits), Saudis / OPEC+ holding their bpd, the price of oil is clearly going to rise this year and into next - to levels that will clearly make renewables, particularly solar, even more uneconomically viable than they may be now.
The macro view is also skewed too by the vast amount of debt in the West - we've clearly been insolvent since 2008 but are fudging our way along the can-kicking path, but nearing that hard wall. With a longer-term higher interest rate environment, the economic and financial reality around renewables needs to be reappraised. We need fossil fuels to be able to make the energy transition, but on a realistic timeline - and to reassess what we need to do to the energy infrastructure and existing electricity grids. Nuclear seems the most practical energy transition alternative - seemingly the only one that can buy us the baseload time and scale we need to execute an energy transition.
High energy prices will crush much of the economy way before that. As the economy is destroyed more and more people will get angry enough to do what is necessary to the climate change fraudsters.
Oh, they are in denial all right. Textbook case -- amid growing evidence that the plan does not work all the bigwigs in the UN, EU, U.S., etc. double down on exactly what's not working. If that's not denial I don't know what is.
I am still rather perplexed that it took so long to realize. To me the Green transition is almost an analogy to the "legendary" war on sparrows in China. First order logic with zero reflection on fundamental inputs or second/third order effects.
Praying for shorter but I think it will take a complete overhaul of the current political class, so I'd say 8 - 10yrs (can't bring myself to say 10yrs only for fear of sounding like a Net Zero Catastrophiser😄 - they always use 10yrs). I like some of the comments on here about 'changing the narrative' and am sure that will happen (haven't the EU recently classed gas as green?) but I do really worry about how divorced and insulated from reality our 'elites' (damn I hate describing them like that), really are.
Am I to understand "the transition narrative" to mean this?:
Rapid full replacement of fossil energy with 'renewable' energy sources (mostly wind and solar) with a concomitant near term reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, allowing the growth dependent (GDP/GWP) world economy to continue growing and modern industrial civilization and its consumer economy to continue unhampered at a similar energy intensity as we see today.
Rather than making a prediction about how soon that narrative will fall apart, I'd prefer, instead, to actively engage in undermining that narrative, as it is preventing the world from properly preparing for the dramatic shifts in our economies which are coming very soon, and which we will handle better if we aren't allowing fictions to fill in for facts.
A request: Can we have a post in which this Substack's commonly used acronyms are defined for reference purposes? I'm an eco-cultural philosopher with some reasonable grounding in the relation of energy, economy and ecology, but without expertise in "energy discourse" per se, broadly. Many of the acronyms used here go over my head.
I personally think that it will implode before that. - BP with Beyond Petrolium is back to just BP - Shell and Total are increasing oil and gas E&P efforts - Nuclear and Nat gas are in fashion (more so than in the past) more coal being used than before, and the number one issue: Energy Security.
GREAT question Irina.
Great question. These things tend to happen faster than we can imagine. The foundation for the transition is already showing cracks, and it lurched way off the tracks last year as demand for all fossil fuels expanded dramatically. So much depends on the U.S. election in 2024 and those in Europe in the coming few years. A Ron DeSantis in the presidency could turn things around very quickly.
I'll give it 3 years.
I like your optimism. It will take longer in Europe than it will in the US.
We had Germany announcing a fleet of new CCGTs yesterday. Jennifer Granholm saying US will need fossil fuels for years to come. Five years sounds about right to me.
Yeah, but those will be "just in case", when the renewables don't produce. It would have been hilarious if it wasn't pathetic.
Hydrogen ready ccgts.
Hahahhaha
I remember discussing this in about 2010 and my guess was the whole thing would collapse by 2020...
There's now an enormous industry behind this nonsense and there is no political opposition to speak of.
Change willy only come after a ruinous economic depression.
Exactly why I try to be somewhat conservative with the timeline. Indoctrination at this level won't go away so easily.
Early in my career I caught the tail-end of a research project that was celebrating its successful conclusion. Two years later when clearing out an archive I found the slide deck (plastic overheads... this was 30+ yrs ago :-) ) which had the 10 objectives of the project listed. Nine of them had been totally missed - and airbrushed out of history to achieve a successful conclusion. My guess is we will see the narrative changing such that the transition is a success no matter what the end game looks like. Too much money and political status invested in not admitting a failure. I'm just looking forward to the creative nonsense that we will see to justify this.
My try for starters: Coal gets labeled as "Green" because the particulate matter it emits is shown to help "global dimming" and has a net cooling effect... Happy days.
Agree, the narrative will certainly "evolve" so the transition can be passed off as a success. That suggestion about coal might not be very far-fetched at all.
concur. was thinking a goalpost shift where coal and oil is reduced a little, they go to gas which is lower emissions, more nuclear and declare victory.
But 2050 is such a cool, evenly-rounded year to achieve utopia!
It so is, that's why our brave leaders like it so much. Until the next batch decides 2070 is even better!
It all depends on the economy. If a recession hits it is always be the economy that takes preference over the environment. Also, I don’t think the narrative will collapse suddenly across the world. Some countries and governments will hang on a little longer.
So my guess is that it will start to loose credibility in 2024 and be done by 2026.
Renewables will and must continue to be installed but reason will take over the narrative of what must be done, what can be done and what will be done.
Oh, it will not be sudden, certainly, for the reasons you've noted.
The "elites" (however one wishes to define them -- political, academic, NGOs, foundations, think tanks, international organizations, and media) across the western world are committed to the net-zero transition come h*ll or high water for reasons that have little to do with the environment. Logic would dictate that this movement should have collapsed (at least) two years ago. But this isn't based on logic. It might collapse under its own weight and internal contradictions, but not before there is much suffering amongst the western population. That suffering might very well cause civil unrest and a system crash.
The protests have already started and I see this as a great sign. Not sure how long it will take for the system to crash, if it ever does.
My heart wishes for 2025, but my gut tells me more like '26-27 via osmosis, or possibly whenever China goes on the offensive and starts tumbling turbines into the sea via jets and missiles.
Whichever comes first, of course....
If Republicans win the presidency in 2024, look for the government to ignore ESG and seek to end the subsidies. That will spell the final outcome
I don't know, the banks are on board with the whole ESG thing, publicly, and they do stand to gain, so...
I'm with you Irina. I would say 5 years but just to be conservative but let's go with 2030, the new decade. Assuming the global economy kicks into full gear again after the upcoming slow down, fossil fuel demand will rise accordingly, and emissions likely with it, so the decision will have to made either to stymy the recovery with more renewable mandates, raising the cost of energy for everyone, or let the benefits of higher economic growth run free. Needless to say, the latter will always win out with voters...
I think 2030 will be, as Winston Churchill said, "the end of the beginning." At that point, with energy costs shutting down industry in the U.S. as it is in Europe, and more people experiencing blackouts regularly, opposing net-zero will no longer be taboo. There will be, however, powerful people who will go to their graves never admitting they're wrong. They will continue to have some clout past 2030 to maintain energy transition policies, if not pass new ones. It's east to make a bad law. Very hard to repeal one.
Regaining the freedom to question the dominant narrative would be a great start. I'll take it. Pleasure to have you here, by the way, I'm a big fan of your work.
I think we are well on the way towards implosion (hopefully not just wishful thinking!) There are very big cracks at the seams. I'm NOT waiting for politicians to save us (never happen) - I think it will be the banking and insurance industries that will bring them down - those are the money makers and they are starting to unravel. When the money laundering or "greenwashing" slows up or begins to be regulated and credits are only worth the paper they are printed on, then it will take a dive. Then it will be back to the real things like - oh yes - product that works - oil and gas, hopefully nuclear! As for the milking of tax credits - when we are all taxed out of existence where will they go for their funding? Supply chains - China, unraveling will slow it somewhat, but if they have it to sell it will eventually get here one road or another! (Road & Bridge). I'm going for 3-5 years, giving it a bit of a spread, it's happening faster than we can see on the surface. Great question - thanks for keeping us all on our toes Irina!
You know, this is where I get stuck when I think about our governments' plans. You can't make life impossible for people and expect them to be accept it, nobody is that stupid. Or are they, I wonder.
I think we're agreed the drivers behind the transition are BS. Okay, so why deny people energy, if it's readily available. Maybe the last caveat is the clue?
Lots of good comments here. I think the "transition" will morph into other, more sensible forms over the years as world energy developments continue to inflict pain on people. At some point, even the Gretas will get less press as people tire of the endless yowling. That all said - a transition of sorts will continue - we don't have infinite oil and gas.
The word addition as a better alternative to transition has been cropping up recently more and more frequently. I like the idea.
Yes I have a nice graph in my Energy Transitions presentations showing energy sources for the United States from 1700 to 2010. Very clear that nothing has gone away, we've just continued to add more sources while consuming more and more of the old ones too
Perhaps we don't have infinite oil and gas, but known resources have more than tripled in the just the past 20 years, and with the advent of unconventional oil and gas we have learned that huge amounts of oil and gas exist where we thought none could be recovered only ten years ago. Those recovery rates continue to improve, and since we used to leave 70% of everything in the ground, we have known resources more than double what we have used in the past 150 years. With added technological energy efficiency and some supplementation from renewables, we can probably use oil and gas for centuries until we no longer need it. We didn't get to the moon without diesel in our rockets, so it will be oil and gas that gets us to the next phase of our planetary existence. I predict that at one point we are going to realize that many oil basins are still making oil and gas, still in the oil and gas window and cooking away, and that the earth does produce, and can continue to produce a quantity of new oil and gas that is roughly equal to our consumption rate. I say this as a geoscientist who has spent a long career studying this.
My take is that the collapse will accelerate shortly after the war in Ukraine ends. The current Russian regime will be overturned and the replacement government left with an economy in shambles and a dire need to generate revenue. Ukraine will be in a similar position regarding revenue generation albeit with better access to foreign investment. While Russia will initially be burdened with the international sanctions for its aggression against Ukraine, those will eventually end. Both Russia and Ukraine will be eagerly tapping their natural resources and flooding international markets with new O&G production thereby driving down prices. Although European energy buyers have greatly throttled back purchases from Russia, Russia can focus on the insatiable demand for low priced oil and gas from developing countries. The resulting realigned international energy market operating in a low O&G commodity price environment will undercut investment in intermittent renewables globally for years to come.
Something I have been asking for years: Is a transition necessary? I say, no. The whole global warming, climate change narrative is a lie, built upon lies. As you know, unless you want to own up to the truth, you need to keep lying and I do believe at this point, like any pathological liar, they believe their lies are true. My belief and I will stand by this forevermore, is that God created everything, including fossil fuels. And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good - Genesis 1:31
I just showed up here and don't know my way around. Is this a place where the belief that climate change / global warming is commonly held to be a lie? 'Cause if it is, I'm clearly in the wrong building.
If the answer to your question has not become clear from reading this post, I'm not sure I can help you make it clearer but I'll try. The climate changes constantly and also in cycles. It is also changing right now and human activity has a big part in it. The belief, however, that it is human activity in fossil fuel extraction ALONE that is responsible for climatic changes and that the only way to ensure long-term survival of the species is to reduce the amount of one trace element in the air is, while not necessarily a lie, a dangerous delusion.
It's pretty clear to me that anthropogenic climate disruption is not exclusively caused by greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, but is also caused by a complex pattern of disruption of the complex functions of forests and other ecosystems, which has resulted in major global disruption of the water cycle as described and explained in this article and video: https://rword.substack.com/p/how-the-environmental-movement-can . However, I'm not in complete agreement with Charles Eisenstein's view concerning the proportional role water cycle and biotic systems disruption in causing climate disruption as compared with forcings from greenhouse gases. I strongly suspect greenhouse gases play a more significant role than Charles suspects.
Regardless of that matter of proportions, clearly most of the changes to the climate we're witnessing these days are anthropogenic. And these are obviously rather dramatic and disturbing changes -- e.g. changes to ocean currents now being so rapid that in the very near term we can expect much more major global changes in rainfall patterns (which will likely result in a global food crisis due to disruptions of agriculture -- and also the death of many forests).
Anyway, clearly I am a strong believer in
(a) anthropogenic climate disruption
(b) CO2 and other greenhouse gases are among the principal causes of this
(c) It's dangerous and disruptive
(d) changes in human behavior could make the risks less catastrophic than they would otherwise be
I think where I and many of the folks who show up here are in agreement is in the notion that rapidly building out a gargantuan amount of "renewable energy" infrastructure to replace current energy levels with these as a replacement of fossil fuels is neither accurate nor wise. But probably my reasons for doubting in this scheme are different from you and most of your readers.
I should also add that the rate and intensity of climate change now occurring is entirely faster and more intense than at any time in the history of our species has existed (300,000 years). And there have been only a very few times in the history of Earth that the rate and extent of such change has occurred before. These earlier extinction events were caused by giant asteroids colliding with Earth, or with massive increases in volcanic activity.
Here's what ChatGPT said concerning the current rate of climate change.
Me: "How does the rate of climate change occurring now compare with other times of rapid climate change in Earth history?"
ChatBot:
"The rate of climate change occurring now is significantly faster than many past episodes of rapid climate change in Earth's history. While climate change has occurred naturally throughout Earth's history, the current rate of change is primarily driven by human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels, deforestation, and other industrial processes.
One past episode of rapid climate change occurred approximately 56 million years ago during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), where the Earth's temperature rose by around 5°C over a period of several thousand years. This event was likely triggered by the release of large amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere from volcanic activity. While this event was rapid in geological terms, the current rate of change is happening much faster, with the Earth's temperature expected to rise by 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels as early as 2030.
Another notable episode of climate change occurred around 12,000 years ago during the Younger Dryas period, where the Earth's temperature cooled by around 3-5°C in just a few decades. This event was likely triggered by the sudden influx of freshwater into the North Atlantic, which disrupted ocean currents and led to widespread cooling. While this event was also rapid in geological terms, the current rate of change is happening much faster and in the opposite direction, with the Earth's temperature rising rapidly due to human activities.
Overall, while there have been past episodes of rapid climate change in Earth's history, the current rate of change is happening much faster and is primarily driven by human activities. This highlights the urgent need for action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the impacts of climate change."
We are, in fact, in agreement on most of the points you have made here.
Perhaps, then, you also understand that it is almost certain (I say 'almost' because it's a controversial topic) that a rapid "energy transition" of the kind which is the mainstream / popular narrative, would actually result in a sharp increase in CO2 emissions?
This is because 84% of the technological energy we consume worldwide at present is fossil energy, and it is this very fossil energy which would be used to mine the metals and minerals, smelt the metals, ship this around the world, manufacture the devices and infrastructure, ship these around the world, etc. -- all for "green" energy production.
Richard Heinberg (energy expert at Post Carbon Institute) has said a "rapid energy transition" of the sort which is in being sold as our "climate solution" would result in a "pulse" of increased GHG emissions. A sharp increase. (I've called this "the Heinberg Pulse". Which term you can "google". But I'm dropping this as the name for it due to Richard's explicitly gentle request that we don't make this be about persons, but about ideas.) I only mention the "Heinberg Pulse" because it's a means of locating my writings on the topic through an internet search -- in quotes -- "Heinberg Pulse".
So we're on the same team here. I want us not to create a pulse of increased emissions in the name of "green energy". That would be madness!
But I also want to phase out fossil energy as much as possible! Not by replacement of current energy levels with 'renewables', but through using a lot less energy and materials. We can't possibly keep industrial civilization as we know it going ... even if there were not a climate emergency (and there is). That's because EROI will continue to decline on liquid fossil fuels and natural gas to the point that we simply cannot afford to run an industrial economy of the kind the world presently has.
The good news is that we can create a very high quality of life material culture anyway! My job is to show people how and why this is so. But it's a lot of hard work which far too few people are working on. Perhaps you'd like to help?
Indeed, I do understand. I am also all for the smart and efficient use of energy and all resources rather than their waste, which is unsustainable in the most literal sense of the word. I do my bit, small as it is, here and in my everyday life, and I teach my child to be responsible with resources. It's what we can all do.
There's danger in declaring "victory" over the oil and gas naysayers as though things would go back to where they were pre COVID if only E&P could drill like crazy again. Drilling up our best locations and basically giving away the energy is a short term high but would leave the US in a world of hurt in terms of energy security sooner rather than later. Shale isn't infinite and prices will have to go up to support the extra costs of monitoring, methane scavenging and remediating old wells. Are renewables the only answer? Of course not, but we can't assume that we don't need an answer to replacing hydrocarbons in some markets sooner rather than later either.
Nothing ever goes back to the way it was and that's not necessarily a bad thing. We would need to come up with a better plan, however, a mad rush is not the way to ensure long-term energy security.
But they're not a replacement and aren't accretive. We don't have an answer to replacing HC, which leaves the only course of action being radical societal remodelling. Maybe like what's been happening over the last three years....
Untrue. We do have an excellent answer to "replacing HC"....
Don't replace them. Synthesize them. The US Navy demonstrated a method of extracting the dissolved CO2 from seawater and combining it with cracked H2 to make synthetic jet fuel. The process is energy intensive, but aircraft carriers have lots of energy to spare.
It has been estimated that applying this technique using land based nuclear generators would result in synthetic gasoline at about $4 - $5 per gallon. Expensive, but not ruinously so.
There's enough Uranium to last until the Sun goes out. The CO2 dissolved in seawater (or any saline reservoir) comes from the atmosphere, so the system is carbon neutral.
HC fuel is burned and CO2 enters the atmosphere. Some of that CO2 dissolves into seawater (higher solubility than the atmosphere has). The US Navy synthetic HC (SHC) system extracts the CO2 from seawater, uses it to make HC fuel and the fuel is burned, completing the cycle.
I think y'all are right.
Leave it to the next generation to figure out how to make the most important transition in human history happen. It is, after all, going to be be their problem. Really.
What a crock!
100 years. or we go back to horses and shovels
It's happening now and they aren't pest of it James. Everyone here knows that low cost, available energy is a sine qua non for an industrialised society and that renewables aren't that. I think the elephant in the room is, ironically what we're advocating. The problem is it's decliningv
I see the nonsense everywhere - but with the complete takeover of public education by the "environmental mind set/religion and therefore our children"s belief system - we have lost the war - even when faced with massive energy shortages their indoctrination and religious like embrace of "wokeism" does not allow for any actions to force changes - and lets be honest here - with oil and gas selling at prices adjusted for inflation lower than in 2000 who can blame them? and a few trillion free dollars and euro's to give the "green" competitors free capital as well - hope I am wrong but math-science- logic- and critical thinking to solve problems is going extinct - it is all about " how does that make you feel?"
10 out of 10 Patrick... I posted something along the same lines below! This will end badly for the West!
Well, sub-zero temperatures make you feel cold and having to spend 50% of your income on your electricity bill makes you feel sad and angry, so maybe not all is lost. Anger is a great driver of change.
When I debate people on this topic, I bring up the idea that when the United States has gone from 20 Mbpd of oil consumption down to 5 Mbpd, the transition has succeeded. I know there is more to it than that but these are the round numbers I like to use. My math shows that all of the EVs we are going to be build in the next ten years will reduce our oil consumption by about 10%. A start, but much slower than most people think. This is how I try to convince people that whatever the energy transition is or isn't, it is going to be a long slow process. Just because your neighbor drives a Tesla doesn't mean we are done with oil.
It won’t collapse. It will just morph into the new thing and all of the activists will chase the next shiny marble. Unfortunately not before doing a lot of damage to the world first...
I must say, when I talk to normal people who aren’t energy obsessed like I am, they just seem so relaxed about all of this anyway. A lot of them have picked up wrong ideas about wind and solar, but they don’t seem wedded to them. They all still drive automobiles and feed their children, so I think the screeching crazy will subside a bit over time and we will go about slowly reducing switching out technologies once they are shown to be feasible and superior, just like humans always have. And I guess that is the definition of a “transition” anyway...
The majority of people are normal. They have no time for activism because they have lives. But I think a moderate interest in energy is always warranted, if for nothing else, just to spare you the shock at the next electricity price jump.
Yeah, if only more people actually had some idea what energy is it would make things a lot better in the world. Of course you could say that about a lot of things...
A basic idea of the world around you is always a good thing. I blame social media and declining education standards for where we are now.
I don't think of it as "number of years" as much as milestones. I think things'll start fraying seriously when California hits 25–30% of (actual) electricity generation via wind and solar—that state with third-world power supply (or European price level energy) is a _powder keg_.
Oh, yes, California will be interesting to watch in the coming years.
There was a time before everyone became aware of the climate crisis, but I can claim that I’ve known how difficult the problem would become since 1980. That was when my friend (and superb energy analyst Dave Peters) forced EIA to insert a warning to congress in the Energy Information Administration’s annual report that global warming was coming, and it could only get worse unless something major was done. As you all know, Congress did nothing then or since.
The context is important. Three-mile island had just happened and the nuclear industry was on its way toward full stasis. The very elaborate and intense Republican policy of Project Independence, released in 1974, which did the right thing for the wrong reasons (turned America into a nuclear power-building nation where electric vehicles would prevail to escape Arab oil control) was abandoned after the auto companies demanded that America assume there would be no future oil-related energy problem and continue with the oil imports. And with the failure to go nuclear for climate reasons, the nation rolled on for 43 years without any policy. The costs of the change were going to be enormous, and no one wanted to pay them. Very understandable but incorrect.
But now lip service is paid to a new solution: we can be saved by wind, solar, renewables, and batteries. I know that isn’t the case and I know why. I am truly shocked by the failure of those making transition policies to understand that adding gigantic increases of new electricity production demand occasioned by ev’s will only raise the fossil fuel content required to produce current electricity. And raise it far beyond where current systems can perform correctly. There is even the danger that in a really bad winter natural gas distribution companies will have to command the share of natural gas that electric utilities think belongs to them. So I am aware that there are lots of real issues that require correct resolution.
I read this as I was listening to the BBC coverage of the Windsor framework and a rehash of all things brexit. With that as context I can see the EU insisting on this energy transition 20 years from now while trying to make that tight clown suit fit objective reality with legalistic contortions.
Three years ago (Mar 2020) I realised Covid was not the threat it was made out to be and challenged my friends with facts and logic... they didn’t agree then and to this day they still refuse to admit they were scammed.
If that’s anything to go by, terms like “Net Zero”, “Climate Change”, “Renewable Energy”, “ESG”, (along with other woke agendas) have been marketed effectively, they are deeply engrained and have so much momentum, the economic pain will need to be immense before this thinking will be reversed, by which time we will have had a total collapse, at least in the West. This could take decades to resolve. 🥲
Well done! I spent most of 2020 paralysed by panic. It's a good thing I'll never meet the people responsible for that panic in person.
The Diamond Princess was the giveaway... 3,700 passengers, mostly in their 70s & 80s. Quarantined for a month... everyone would have been exposed - a perfect closed system experiment. 9 died during the quarantine period, plus another 5 or so soon afterwards.
Out of an average group of 80 year olds, 1% will die every month, so it would seem the Covid outbreak REDUCED the death rate. Do the maths!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_on_Diamond_Princess?
I remember I was too overwhelmed by the death reports from Italy at the time. Then the panic spread as the media down here started reporting thousands and thousands dying and it was much later that the truth began to surface about how exactly cause of death was being determined, per hospital protocols. In a better world, a lot of "health experts" and certain politicians should go to jail but, alas, we don't live in a better world and nobody will compensate us for the debilitating stress or the loved ones many lost because of inappropriate treatment.
The irony (amongst many ironies we see these days) is the aggressive push for the energy transition causes downstream economic ripples (read waves) i.e. this is all inflationary, ESG is inflationary. With less E&P in net terms (ESG pressure, governments not giving licences/permits), Saudis / OPEC+ holding their bpd, the price of oil is clearly going to rise this year and into next - to levels that will clearly make renewables, particularly solar, even more uneconomically viable than they may be now.
The macro view is also skewed too by the vast amount of debt in the West - we've clearly been insolvent since 2008 but are fudging our way along the can-kicking path, but nearing that hard wall. With a longer-term higher interest rate environment, the economic and financial reality around renewables needs to be reappraised. We need fossil fuels to be able to make the energy transition, but on a realistic timeline - and to reassess what we need to do to the energy infrastructure and existing electricity grids. Nuclear seems the most practical energy transition alternative - seemingly the only one that can buy us the baseload time and scale we need to execute an energy transition.
High energy prices will crush much of the economy way before that. As the economy is destroyed more and more people will get angry enough to do what is necessary to the climate change fraudsters.
This, at least, is already happening.
Noticed how wars continue way past the point of obvious defeat?
Noticed that the same institutions that created this mess is supposed to fix it?
Noticed windfall taxes on energy companies?
Minimum requirement is going through the 5 stages of grief. Not sure "they" have even started on "denial" yet.
Thus. Depends on the level of pain towards 2030. Zeitgeist in population will turn sooner than that of the priestly class. .
Oh, they are in denial all right. Textbook case -- amid growing evidence that the plan does not work all the bigwigs in the UN, EU, U.S., etc. double down on exactly what's not working. If that's not denial I don't know what is.
Chuckle. When you put it that way, agreed.
I am still rather perplexed that it took so long to realize. To me the Green transition is almost an analogy to the "legendary" war on sparrows in China. First order logic with zero reflection on fundamental inputs or second/third order effects.
Praying for shorter but I think it will take a complete overhaul of the current political class, so I'd say 8 - 10yrs (can't bring myself to say 10yrs only for fear of sounding like a Net Zero Catastrophiser😄 - they always use 10yrs). I like some of the comments on here about 'changing the narrative' and am sure that will happen (haven't the EU recently classed gas as green?) but I do really worry about how divorced and insulated from reality our 'elites' (damn I hate describing them like that), really are.
They like round numbers. They're easier to remember, I'm sure. :D Yes, the elites' divorce from reality is very concerning, however you look at it.
Very good question. I personally don't think it will collapse, more like crumble and then morph into another narrative. Very similar to the narrative around 1.5C: https://www.ft.com/content/450a59bb-7c83-4d04-851f-0bbc120c09f7
"Our goal was always to limit warming to 2.0C"
Am I to understand "the transition narrative" to mean this?:
Rapid full replacement of fossil energy with 'renewable' energy sources (mostly wind and solar) with a concomitant near term reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, allowing the growth dependent (GDP/GWP) world economy to continue growing and modern industrial civilization and its consumer economy to continue unhampered at a similar energy intensity as we see today.
I don't believe that's possible. And I partly explain why here: https://www.resilience.org/stories/2022-10-31/energy-transition-the-luxury-economy/
Rather than making a prediction about how soon that narrative will fall apart, I'd prefer, instead, to actively engage in undermining that narrative, as it is preventing the world from properly preparing for the dramatic shifts in our economies which are coming very soon, and which we will handle better if we aren't allowing fictions to fill in for facts.
A request: Can we have a post in which this Substack's commonly used acronyms are defined for reference purposes? I'm an eco-cultural philosopher with some reasonable grounding in the relation of energy, economy and ecology, but without expertise in "energy discourse" per se, broadly. Many of the acronyms used here go over my head.