Thanks a lot for taking the time to answer in such detail. You are more patient than I am. Great points.
I fully agree that reduced energy use going forward is absolutely essential. That is one reason I decided to abstain from flying some years ago, in order to send a costly signal about what is needed. I am not sure I share your pessimism concerning alternative energy sources, though. Sunny parts of the world can build out lots of solar energy—with storage—fairly quickly. Non-sunny and stable parts of the world can build nuclear energy rapidly, like France and Sweden did in the 70s and 80s.
The modelling that has been done these issues have generally found that it is feasible to arrive at zero-carbon economies within two or three decades, if one combines changes in consumption and demand with rapid build-out of low-carbon energy sources. If we abolish animal agriculture and rewild large parts of the world, stop the expansion of private car use, fly less, etc—AND build nuclear and renewables like crazy, all while starting to keep fossil fuels in the ground, things can indeed change.
Here’s a very recent study, for example, which finds that a rapid transition is possible and not extremely expensive: Empirically grounded technology forecasts and the energy transition: Joule (cell.com) Such modelling is uncertain, of course, but I don’t think the present state of research validates deep pessimism about the physical possibility of doing an energy transition. The real difficulties seem political to me: Groups and actors who are heavily invested in polluting economic sectors and activities, and will often fight against change.
(I do believe that we will have to patch things up with solar radiation management in the end though, even though that will open up a new can of worms)
Not saying that any of this is going to happen or even that it’s likely, but the possibility to turn things around is there. It strikes me as odd that so many EAs seem uninterested in working on making these changes happen. For the next couple of decades, I think that contributing to making such a transition happen may be some of the most high-impact actions possible in the entire history of humanity.
OK, Oivavoi. My complaint about renewables is that they suggest an ideological stance that is too close to the stance that is the problem:
a refusal to accept limits on economic growth and energy production.
a focus on consumption patterns rather than production patterns.
a preference to reduce costs of production and tell people to “just say no” rather than reduce consumption through increasing costs of production.
a reliance on technology to boost production rather than use existing production more efficiently.
This ideology is basically one of economic growth, and is what got us into our problem in the first place.
But thank you for sharing that resource, there’s plenty there to explore. To constrain my earlier statements against renewables, I do believe in uses like:
solar water heating.
underground cold storage.
swamp coolers.
You can read more below, if you like.
renewables as a source of additional energy production, even if cheaper than fossil fuel sources, face issues with:
intermittent production
battery storage (solar, wind)
waste disposal (nuclear)
pollution risks (nuclear)
lifetime (solar, wind)
stakeholder support
nimbyism
As a quick illustration of the problem with a consumption-focused ideology, lets think about recent transportation choices in the US. In the US there have been opportunities to build fuel-efficient cars for a long time. Instead, we chose (I’m American) energy-guzzling SUV’s and big trucks. Lighter cars, lower speed limits, aerodynamic shaping, and smaller engines would have saved a lot of fuel since the 1970′s oil crisis. Carpooling, trains, recumbent bikes with traffic lights, less urbanization, fewer cars overall, energy independence, all ideas floating around back in the 1970′s. Back then we really did have time to make those changes, I think.
We could have restrained our energy production, but kept using fossil fuels without guilt and seriously reduced GHG production but just as a side effect of reducing our energy consumption overall.
Meanwhile, scientists monitoring other resource flows, like inputs to manufacturing would have been pleased to see fewer vehicles being built, fewer consumer products overall, and a slower pace of technology change, because it takes energy, mining, waste production, and environmental destruction to make products that break or are improved on too quickly.
Imagine a car from the 1980′s that gets 50mpg, seats four, and actually drives 4 people around (at 45 mph...), most of the time, but is still in use today. Who owns it? Some person who collects a ride-share credit from the state (and has for the last 35 years) to help pay for the gas. Everyone else uses bikes for short trips and trains for long ones. And they’re relatively poor in terms of material goods that they own. But they carry no debt, have a modest savings, belong to a large middle class, and are healthy and (relatively) happy. And a lot less into consumerism.
In that alternative future, fossil fuel consumption would have gone down by a lot. We wouldn’t be fracking or using shale (much). But we would still be using oil and gas, thinking worriedly about the 0.3 GAST rise we’ve seen over the last 40 years, and wondering what to do next.
But fast forward 40 years on our real timeline. Overall energy production is not a measure of sustainability. Fossil fuel production is not a measure of sustainability. GHG production is a measure but is also externalized by consumers and power producers, as much as possible (for example, a lot of US GHG’s have effects felt in other countries, that’s why some countries want reparations for our GHG production). Right now, we are talking about a future of nuclear and solar power where not only does nuclear power and renewable energy make sense, but also a bunch of restraint in other areas of consumption once we’ve solved our energy production “problem”. But that problem is really that we don’t have cheap enough energy to produce what we want with it, meaning that our consumption is unsustainable. We don’t want to conserve energy, conserve oil, or conserve resources that make our products. We could start doing that anytime. We’re not really into it.
I just don’t see Americans simultaneously accepting abundant cheap energy AND rejecting the rest of their lifestyles, come hell or high water. Which means we’ll get both. Hell and high water.
We will do everything else the same and make a bigger mess of the environment, which after this century, might not even be possible, with our cheap renewable energy and our typical pattern of overcoming resource limits and externalizing costs onto others or onto people in the future. Amazingly, there’s no talk from the public about reducing our birth rates. We still talk about the developing world as having high birth rates, places where people suffer in poverty and consume almost no resources. Given this lack of introspection and insight, I’m not expecting enlightened consumerism out of Americans, and nor should you.
We are important to ourselves, and we need to learn how to conserve. It’s simpler, and safer, to just conserve, not get all complicated with an approach like:
conserving but also making it cheaper for us if we do not conserve but decide instead to destroy the lives of some other people with our GHG emissions, resource extraction and pollution.
In reality, the US is under direct threat from climate change, regardless of our externalization efforts. Nevertheless, the externalization efforts continue.
EDIT: I’m not sure if many people use externalize the way that I do. By “externalize”, I mean indifferently shift negative consequences of actions onto other people (humans, animals, alive now or at a later time).
Thanks a lot for taking the time to answer in such detail. You are more patient than I am. Great points.
I fully agree that reduced energy use going forward is absolutely essential. That is one reason I decided to abstain from flying some years ago, in order to send a costly signal about what is needed. I am not sure I share your pessimism concerning alternative energy sources, though. Sunny parts of the world can build out lots of solar energy—with storage—fairly quickly. Non-sunny and stable parts of the world can build nuclear energy rapidly, like France and Sweden did in the 70s and 80s.
The modelling that has been done these issues have generally found that it is feasible to arrive at zero-carbon economies within two or three decades, if one combines changes in consumption and demand with rapid build-out of low-carbon energy sources. If we abolish animal agriculture and rewild large parts of the world, stop the expansion of private car use, fly less, etc—AND build nuclear and renewables like crazy, all while starting to keep fossil fuels in the ground, things can indeed change.
Here’s a very recent study, for example, which finds that a rapid transition is possible and not extremely expensive: Empirically grounded technology forecasts and the energy transition: Joule (cell.com) Such modelling is uncertain, of course, but I don’t think the present state of research validates deep pessimism about the physical possibility of doing an energy transition. The real difficulties seem political to me: Groups and actors who are heavily invested in polluting economic sectors and activities, and will often fight against change.
(I do believe that we will have to patch things up with solar radiation management in the end though, even though that will open up a new can of worms)
Not saying that any of this is going to happen or even that it’s likely, but the possibility to turn things around is there. It strikes me as odd that so many EAs seem uninterested in working on making these changes happen. For the next couple of decades, I think that contributing to making such a transition happen may be some of the most high-impact actions possible in the entire history of humanity.
OK, Oivavoi. My complaint about renewables is that they suggest an ideological stance that is too close to the stance that is the problem:
a refusal to accept limits on economic growth and energy production.
a focus on consumption patterns rather than production patterns.
a preference to reduce costs of production and tell people to “just say no” rather than reduce consumption through increasing costs of production.
a reliance on technology to boost production rather than use existing production more efficiently.
This ideology is basically one of economic growth, and is what got us into our problem in the first place.
But thank you for sharing that resource, there’s plenty there to explore. To constrain my earlier statements against renewables, I do believe in uses like:
solar water heating.
underground cold storage.
swamp coolers.
You can read more below, if you like.
renewables as a source of additional energy production, even if cheaper than fossil fuel sources, face issues with:
intermittent production
battery storage (solar, wind)
waste disposal (nuclear)
pollution risks (nuclear)
lifetime (solar, wind)
stakeholder support
nimbyism
As a quick illustration of the problem with a consumption-focused ideology, lets think about recent transportation choices in the US. In the US there have been opportunities to build fuel-efficient cars for a long time. Instead, we chose (I’m American) energy-guzzling SUV’s and big trucks. Lighter cars, lower speed limits, aerodynamic shaping, and smaller engines would have saved a lot of fuel since the 1970′s oil crisis. Carpooling, trains, recumbent bikes with traffic lights, less urbanization, fewer cars overall, energy independence, all ideas floating around back in the 1970′s. Back then we really did have time to make those changes, I think.
We could have restrained our energy production, but kept using fossil fuels without guilt and seriously reduced GHG production but just as a side effect of reducing our energy consumption overall.
Meanwhile, scientists monitoring other resource flows, like inputs to manufacturing would have been pleased to see fewer vehicles being built, fewer consumer products overall, and a slower pace of technology change, because it takes energy, mining, waste production, and environmental destruction to make products that break or are improved on too quickly.
Imagine a car from the 1980′s that gets 50mpg, seats four, and actually drives 4 people around (at 45 mph...), most of the time, but is still in use today. Who owns it? Some person who collects a ride-share credit from the state (and has for the last 35 years) to help pay for the gas. Everyone else uses bikes for short trips and trains for long ones. And they’re relatively poor in terms of material goods that they own. But they carry no debt, have a modest savings, belong to a large middle class, and are healthy and (relatively) happy. And a lot less into consumerism.
In that alternative future, fossil fuel consumption would have gone down by a lot. We wouldn’t be fracking or using shale (much). But we would still be using oil and gas, thinking worriedly about the 0.3 GAST rise we’ve seen over the last 40 years, and wondering what to do next.
But fast forward 40 years on our real timeline. Overall energy production is not a measure of sustainability. Fossil fuel production is not a measure of sustainability. GHG production is a measure but is also externalized by consumers and power producers, as much as possible (for example, a lot of US GHG’s have effects felt in other countries, that’s why some countries want reparations for our GHG production). Right now, we are talking about a future of nuclear and solar power where not only does nuclear power and renewable energy make sense, but also a bunch of restraint in other areas of consumption once we’ve solved our energy production “problem”. But that problem is really that we don’t have cheap enough energy to produce what we want with it, meaning that our consumption is unsustainable. We don’t want to conserve energy, conserve oil, or conserve resources that make our products. We could start doing that anytime. We’re not really into it.
I just don’t see Americans simultaneously accepting abundant cheap energy AND rejecting the rest of their lifestyles, come hell or high water. Which means we’ll get both. Hell and high water.
We will do everything else the same and make a bigger mess of the environment, which after this century, might not even be possible, with our cheap renewable energy and our typical pattern of overcoming resource limits and externalizing costs onto others or onto people in the future. Amazingly, there’s no talk from the public about reducing our birth rates. We still talk about the developing world as having high birth rates, places where people suffer in poverty and consume almost no resources. Given this lack of introspection and insight, I’m not expecting enlightened consumerism out of Americans, and nor should you.
We are important to ourselves, and we need to learn how to conserve. It’s simpler, and safer, to just conserve, not get all complicated with an approach like:
conserving but also making it cheaper for us if we do not conserve but decide instead to destroy the lives of some other people with our GHG emissions, resource extraction and pollution.
In reality, the US is under direct threat from climate change, regardless of our externalization efforts. Nevertheless, the externalization efforts continue.
EDIT: I’m not sure if many people use externalize the way that I do. By “externalize”, I mean indifferently shift negative consequences of actions onto other people (humans, animals, alive now or at a later time).