How many years or decades should we expect a full transition to renewable energy to take? People say the transition will be painful. How much pain should we expect?
Transition to renewable energy
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Many, many decades if ever for a full transition to renewable energy. I'll sound like a hardened cynic as I used to believe that wind generation would be useful, however it is intermittent, uneconomic and takes up too much land. It also requires conventional fossil fuel plants as back-up for the freezing cold winter days and roasting hot summer days when there is not a breath of wind.
Roof mounted solar panels and passive solar design of housing can work but in the former case the capital cost can take decades to be recouped by the homeowner, plus the materials for manufacture are not themselves renewable. In the latter case there is nothing stopping intelligent housing design except the cost and that modern housebuilders like to do everything on the cheap.
Tidal barrages are not strictly renewable, the capital costs are huge and they face objections from environmentalists; one reason why a tidal barrage across the Severn estuary here in Blighty has been talked about - and that is all - for over 40 years, since the 1973 oil crisis. Wave generation is renewable but again, it is blighted by high capital costs and intermittent generation.
Nuclear has high capital costs but it will always be essential for base load in highly developed nations with established transmission and distribution systems. Fusion has however taken longer to develop than originally envisaged, so a third generation of fission reactors is essential here in Britain, even though we'll now have to get the French to build and run them for us.
Roof mounted solar panels and passive solar design of housing can work but in the former case the capital cost can take decades to be recouped by the homeowner, plus the materials for manufacture are not themselves renewable. In the latter case there is nothing stopping intelligent housing design except the cost and that modern housebuilders like to do everything on the cheap.
Tidal barrages are not strictly renewable, the capital costs are huge and they face objections from environmentalists; one reason why a tidal barrage across the Severn estuary here in Blighty has been talked about - and that is all - for over 40 years, since the 1973 oil crisis. Wave generation is renewable but again, it is blighted by high capital costs and intermittent generation.
Nuclear has high capital costs but it will always be essential for base load in highly developed nations with established transmission and distribution systems. Fusion has however taken longer to develop than originally envisaged, so a third generation of fission reactors is essential here in Britain, even though we'll now have to get the French to build and run them for us.
How does Debt fit into this? I would think a government would have to spend a lot of money to make the switch to renewable energy. Would Debt limit the amount of money a government can spend on this if the debt is very large, such as the United States today? We're not likely to do much regarding renewables until something bad happens, so you have to take a poor economy as an issue as well.
A country whose treasury issues its own currency and whose debt is denominated in that currency can inflate away that debt as the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England have been doing for several years now. As long as that country retains a good credit rating then its government can borrow at low rates of interest to finance capital expenditure for infrastructure projects. A business with a good credit rating can do likewise, borrowing in order to grow its business. As far as the USA is concerned, its currency is still the world's reserve, so you have nothing to worry about.
Talking of a 'switch' to renewable energy implies that it can take over completely from other forms of electricity generation and from other forms of fuel used for transport and heating or cooling, however the reality is that it can't. It can be part of a mixed portfolio but nothing more than that. The USA has ample land and natural resources to sustain a good standard of living for a country with a population of approx 320 million people, so a higher proportion of land can be given over to wind farms and solar farms than could be done in a country with a much higher population density.
Talking of a 'switch' to renewable energy implies that it can take over completely from other forms of electricity generation and from other forms of fuel used for transport and heating or cooling, however the reality is that it can't. It can be part of a mixed portfolio but nothing more than that. The USA has ample land and natural resources to sustain a good standard of living for a country with a population of approx 320 million people, so a higher proportion of land can be given over to wind farms and solar farms than could be done in a country with a much higher population density.
Lou
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And Now This:
www.commondreams.org
For First Time on Record, US Renewables Generated More Electricity Than Either Coal or Nuclear in 2020 | Common Dreams
"About half of U.S. clean energy now comes from solar and wind, and the other half from hydroelectric power."
www.commondreams.org
David3
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You can actually look at California's real-time electricity generation (amounts of renewables, natural gas, nuclear etc.), on the website of the California Independent System Operator (CAISO). The CAISO is the agency that coordinates/monitors all of California's electrical power plants: California ISO - Supply
For example, as of 1:00 pm today (8/3/2021), here is California's real-time electricity generation mix:
During spring, when the sunshine is strong but temperatures are cool, California's daytime electricity generation approaches 90% renewables.
For example, as of 1:00 pm today (8/3/2021), here is California's real-time electricity generation mix:
During spring, when the sunshine is strong but temperatures are cool, California's daytime electricity generation approaches 90% renewables.
Lou
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Jamie in Chile
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The comments from 2014 look unduly pessimistic and out of date, but I worry that news about breakthroughs of renewable energy will given people the mistaken impression that we are doing an OK job of dealing with climate change, which really isn't the case.
I know many of you know this, and just want to enjoy a bright spot or two giving us some hope amid the gloom. On the other hand maybe I need to pour cold water over all of this so we don't get complacent and realize we are in a moral crisis which we are not dealing with.
20% renewables by 2020 (and 40% gas) is fairly poor given the resources of the US. There are plenty of countries that I could name that have had a strong majority of low carbon energy in their electricity grids for many years.
But the US will deal with this electricity grid issues probably within a decade or two max, but it still doesn´t address emissions from heating, agriculture, cement, steel, aviation etc etc. All of these issues are simply ignored. In every country.
Rich countries (UK, Europe, US) have typically managed to achieve small reductions of total greenhouse gas from within their borders of about 2% a year so far. However the whole world needs to cut emissions by 5% a year and a country like the US ought to be aiming for more like 10% a year given its historical emissions, its wealth and ability to act, and the fact that its per person carbon footprint is about double or almost double the world average. The average person in the US even has a footprint about double or almost double of many countries in Europe that are equally wealthy.
But it gets worse. The only reason rich countries are able to claim a reduction of 2% a year is often by excluding aviation, shipping and imports. By the time these are included, the cuts have been approx zero per year. It may be argued that the UK´s successful closing of coal plants was achieved by simply offshoring coal plants to China as manufacturing moved abroad. Much easier to close your own coal plants when your total electricity use is not increasing because you are buying from other countries.
And we haven´t even got to the very difficult question as to how we are going to persuade Saudi Arabia and Russia to stop selling fossil fuels to the rest of the world.
Look at the world´s CO2 emissions here
Until 2019, every year increased or was the same to the previous year. The rate of increase has decreased and now due to the pandemic 2020 was lower than 2019 but once normal services resumes it isn´t yet clear whether we are heading for slight increase, slight decline, or almost exactly the same for the next couple of years.
Given what is happening around renewable energy and electric vehicles, we can expect to see 2030 being about the same emissions as 2019 under current policies. Perhaps slow decline after that as electric vehicles and renewables should be dominating by the 2030s.
But that still leaves heating, agriculture, cement, steel, aviation, economic growth and population growth.
If you do the math on that we are heading for between 2.0C and 3.0C above pre-industrial levels, with some risk of higher, especially if feedback effects turn out to be bad. We are still heading for the abandonment of cities due to sea level rise, making some countries unlivable without air conditioning, mass waves of immigration, and much worse disasters. The 3C world is more than 3x worse than the 1C world. The 3C world doesn´t have coral reefs and it may not have an Amazon rainforest that can actually survive long term, for instance.
We are probably heading for 2.5-3.5C under current policies, but I think we can assume a very high chance of additional policies being added over time if attitudes keep changing at the rate they already are, so 2.0-3.0C is what we are aiming for.
We all need to do so much more.
On a positive note we could get to much cleaner air by the 2030s. But climate change will be getting worse.
I know many of you know this, and just want to enjoy a bright spot or two giving us some hope amid the gloom. On the other hand maybe I need to pour cold water over all of this so we don't get complacent and realize we are in a moral crisis which we are not dealing with.
20% renewables by 2020 (and 40% gas) is fairly poor given the resources of the US. There are plenty of countries that I could name that have had a strong majority of low carbon energy in their electricity grids for many years.
But the US will deal with this electricity grid issues probably within a decade or two max, but it still doesn´t address emissions from heating, agriculture, cement, steel, aviation etc etc. All of these issues are simply ignored. In every country.
Rich countries (UK, Europe, US) have typically managed to achieve small reductions of total greenhouse gas from within their borders of about 2% a year so far. However the whole world needs to cut emissions by 5% a year and a country like the US ought to be aiming for more like 10% a year given its historical emissions, its wealth and ability to act, and the fact that its per person carbon footprint is about double or almost double the world average. The average person in the US even has a footprint about double or almost double of many countries in Europe that are equally wealthy.
But it gets worse. The only reason rich countries are able to claim a reduction of 2% a year is often by excluding aviation, shipping and imports. By the time these are included, the cuts have been approx zero per year. It may be argued that the UK´s successful closing of coal plants was achieved by simply offshoring coal plants to China as manufacturing moved abroad. Much easier to close your own coal plants when your total electricity use is not increasing because you are buying from other countries.
And we haven´t even got to the very difficult question as to how we are going to persuade Saudi Arabia and Russia to stop selling fossil fuels to the rest of the world.
Look at the world´s CO2 emissions here
Until 2019, every year increased or was the same to the previous year. The rate of increase has decreased and now due to the pandemic 2020 was lower than 2019 but once normal services resumes it isn´t yet clear whether we are heading for slight increase, slight decline, or almost exactly the same for the next couple of years.
Given what is happening around renewable energy and electric vehicles, we can expect to see 2030 being about the same emissions as 2019 under current policies. Perhaps slow decline after that as electric vehicles and renewables should be dominating by the 2030s.
But that still leaves heating, agriculture, cement, steel, aviation, economic growth and population growth.
If you do the math on that we are heading for between 2.0C and 3.0C above pre-industrial levels, with some risk of higher, especially if feedback effects turn out to be bad. We are still heading for the abandonment of cities due to sea level rise, making some countries unlivable without air conditioning, mass waves of immigration, and much worse disasters. The 3C world is more than 3x worse than the 1C world. The 3C world doesn´t have coral reefs and it may not have an Amazon rainforest that can actually survive long term, for instance.
We are probably heading for 2.5-3.5C under current policies, but I think we can assume a very high chance of additional policies being added over time if attitudes keep changing at the rate they already are, so 2.0-3.0C is what we are aiming for.
We all need to do so much more.
On a positive note we could get to much cleaner air by the 2030s. But climate change will be getting worse.
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David3
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Bear in mind that the United States, since 2005, has also drastically reduced its % of coal-generated electricity: https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=48896 . This also serves to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
David3
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Today, August 5 2021, President Biden signed an Executive Order that, by year 2030, 50% of all new U.S. car sales should be zero emission vehicles: Biden to aim for 50% EVs by 2030 with industry support . The Order is not legally binding 
. We'll see what happens.
. We'll see what happens.
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Jamie in Chile
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It is good news on coal but the graph shows that much of it was replaced by natural gas. Natural gas is mostly burning methane to produce CO2. When the methane leaks it is even worse for climate changing than burning it. By some estimates, natural gas is almost as bad as coal for climate change once these leakages are accounted for. It turns out that replacing coal with gas to fight climate change was mostly yet another scam/exaggeration pulled by fossil fuel companies (although it is a benefit for air pollution).
If they had replaced the coal with nuclear instead of gas, that would have been a better idea. Then I'd be happy with the graph.
Coal is actually no longer the enemy in the west. it is dying in the Americas and Europe (except Poland and not sure about the latest in Germany). China is burning I think half or more of the world's coal at this point if I remember right. Source: Coal Consumption by Country - Worldometer UK and US environmentalists ought to be more focused on gas at this point in my opinion.
Exception to that is environmentalists need to keep an idea on what Peabody is doing. It's a US headquartered company that will likely respond to failing coal in the US by selling more abroad. I might have a look into that this evening if I have time.
We need to stop using gas, first in electricity grids which is easiest, and then after than in space heating and hot water heating as well.
If they had replaced the coal with nuclear instead of gas, that would have been a better idea. Then I'd be happy with the graph.
Coal is actually no longer the enemy in the west. it is dying in the Americas and Europe (except Poland and not sure about the latest in Germany). China is burning I think half or more of the world's coal at this point if I remember right. Source: Coal Consumption by Country - Worldometer UK and US environmentalists ought to be more focused on gas at this point in my opinion.
Exception to that is environmentalists need to keep an idea on what Peabody is doing. It's a US headquartered company that will likely respond to failing coal in the US by selling more abroad. I might have a look into that this evening if I have time.
We need to stop using gas, first in electricity grids which is easiest, and then after than in space heating and hot water heating as well.
David3
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Jamie in Chile
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I actually work as an analyst in the transport industry and I can tell you almost for sure that 50% EVs in US is likely at this point from market forces alone, so this amounts to doing nothing and allowing the planet to cook beyond 2C. I did some back of the envelope calculations earlier and this policy is not consistent with 2C. We are not going to have any coral reefs or polar ice Pacific islands nations with this kind of policy, and we might not even have a world that has such important things as the Amazon rainforest or Bangladesh.
In my view, this more or less joint announcement with car companies today announcing that he is suggesting a non-binding target for what they were already planning to do anyway is just about the darkest day of his Presidency so far from a climate change perspective. It's the firmest signal yet that he's going to be yet another failure as a leader on climate change, which is a shame, at one stage he was promising more but he doesn't seem able to get much through the senate because of the Republicans.
I have to go now, but if someone could post some pictures of cute bunnies to even out the depressing nature of my posting, that would be handy.
I promise I won't reply to point out that the cute bunnies are at risk of dying from climate change. Bunnies can run really, really fast so they might be OK.
David3
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.
Not true.
Per the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (epa.gov), the United States' methane emissions have remained the same for the past 20 years, despite the growth in electricity generation from natural gas.:
Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks | US EPA
The national greenhouse gas inventory is developed each year to track trends in U.S. emissions and removals. Find emissions by source, economic sector and greenhouse gas.
David3
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David3
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.
The electric vehicle transition ALONE is not enough to achieve climate change mitigation goals. That is already known.
Per the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the transportation sector (as of 2010) only generates 14% of global greenhouse gases: Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions Data | US EPA
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Jamie in Chile
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“natural gas is almost as bad as coal for climate change once these leakages are accounted for”
The graph you have posted is total methane from all sectors I think, that would presumably include everything from cow belches to rotting landfills to space and hot water heating. Given this, I don't think it can be used in this debate about gas vs coal in purely electricity. Also, the first of my sources below specifically calls out the EPA for not fully including this data.
To see discussion about how leakages of methane increased the total carbon footprint and takes away the supposed advantaqe vs coal, you can see here: Methane Leaks Erase Some of the Climate Benefits of Natural Gas
More methane in atmosphere linked to more fracking
Natural gas is a much ‘dirtier’ energy source, carbon-wise, than we thought
Re my comments >2C being problematic for coral reef, polar ice, Pacific Islands nations
that is scientific consensus that you can probably find in an IPCC report.
“50% EVs in US is likely at this point from market forces alone”
That is a forecast so I can’t prove it with sources. However EVs will be way cheaper in 2030 in total lifetime cost.
"I did some back of the envelope calculations earlier and this policy is not consistent with 2C"
To have a 50% chance of less than 2C, we have a total carbon budget of 1500 billion tonnes from the start of 2018.
Source:
IPCC
Mitigation Pathways Compatible with 1.5°C in the Context of Sustainable Development
Page 108
We can reduce that to 1350 budget as we are now at the start of 2021 allowing for 50 billion tonnes CO2e per year for the next three years.
(I'm not 100% sure that I should be using CO2e rather than CO2 here, but the difference does not affect the overall result much.)
With that budget we cut at a steady rate we can take 77 years to reach next zero (reaching it in 2098).
We need to cut at about 2% a year to get to that rate.
Given economic growth of 3% a year, and global population growth 1% a year (easy to google these two figures), we need to cut the carbon intensity of each product by more like 6% per year.
But we also need to consider that the US is a rich country with more capacity to change, that it will have less severe effects than the tropical countries, and that is has caused more climate change historically, and that is per capita footprint is currently higher than the world average by about double.
Given this it seems fair to cut at 10% per year carbon intensity for the US.
The next question is whether transportation should cut at above the overall rate. Here we can easily argue that we are much further on in availability of electric vehicles and solutions are much easier in transport than other sectors like heating, aviation, concrete and agriculture and meat where no one is even talking about the solutions at a political level. If we cut transport at 10% a year there's no way overall emissions will be cut at that rate. People are not going to stop flying and eating meat any time soon. I'll suggest 12% a year is needed for transport although that may be not enough.
After 9 years of 12% reduction (2021 to 2030) it works out US needs to have cut by 68% the carbon intensity of transport by 2030. (take 100% and multiply by 0.88 9 times and you get 32%).
You'll have to play around with these numbers in excel or something if you want to really convince yourself.
Now in 2030 with 50% electric vehicles and 50% conventional we have:
The 50% electric vehicles should cut its emissions by about 50%. The remaining half is mainly in the production of the electric vehicle, with some in the production of power plants, solar panels, wind turbines, grid and emissions from electricity generation (assuming significantly less gas in the grid by 2030).
The 50% conventional vehicles should cut its emissions by I would guess about 25% based on fuel standards, more hybrids. This actually assumes that we stop the decades long trend to increase vehicle size, which may be optimistic.
I'm assuming a slight improvement in the carbon footprint of vehicle production by 2030, but very little.
So the average of a 50% cut and a 25% cut gives us 37%.
Vs the 68% fair contribution from transport we need to have to contribute to a 50/50 of not going above 2.0C above pre-industrial levels.
The graph you have posted is total methane from all sectors I think, that would presumably include everything from cow belches to rotting landfills to space and hot water heating. Given this, I don't think it can be used in this debate about gas vs coal in purely electricity. Also, the first of my sources below specifically calls out the EPA for not fully including this data.
To see discussion about how leakages of methane increased the total carbon footprint and takes away the supposed advantaqe vs coal, you can see here: Methane Leaks Erase Some of the Climate Benefits of Natural Gas
More methane in atmosphere linked to more fracking
Natural gas is a much ‘dirtier’ energy source, carbon-wise, than we thought
Re my comments >2C being problematic for coral reef, polar ice, Pacific Islands nations
that is scientific consensus that you can probably find in an IPCC report.
“50% EVs in US is likely at this point from market forces alone”
That is a forecast so I can’t prove it with sources. However EVs will be way cheaper in 2030 in total lifetime cost.
"I did some back of the envelope calculations earlier and this policy is not consistent with 2C"
To have a 50% chance of less than 2C, we have a total carbon budget of 1500 billion tonnes from the start of 2018.
Source:
IPCC
Mitigation Pathways Compatible with 1.5°C in the Context of Sustainable Development
Page 108
We can reduce that to 1350 budget as we are now at the start of 2021 allowing for 50 billion tonnes CO2e per year for the next three years.
(I'm not 100% sure that I should be using CO2e rather than CO2 here, but the difference does not affect the overall result much.)
With that budget we cut at a steady rate we can take 77 years to reach next zero (reaching it in 2098).
We need to cut at about 2% a year to get to that rate.
Given economic growth of 3% a year, and global population growth 1% a year (easy to google these two figures), we need to cut the carbon intensity of each product by more like 6% per year.
But we also need to consider that the US is a rich country with more capacity to change, that it will have less severe effects than the tropical countries, and that is has caused more climate change historically, and that is per capita footprint is currently higher than the world average by about double.
Given this it seems fair to cut at 10% per year carbon intensity for the US.
The next question is whether transportation should cut at above the overall rate. Here we can easily argue that we are much further on in availability of electric vehicles and solutions are much easier in transport than other sectors like heating, aviation, concrete and agriculture and meat where no one is even talking about the solutions at a political level. If we cut transport at 10% a year there's no way overall emissions will be cut at that rate. People are not going to stop flying and eating meat any time soon. I'll suggest 12% a year is needed for transport although that may be not enough.
After 9 years of 12% reduction (2021 to 2030) it works out US needs to have cut by 68% the carbon intensity of transport by 2030. (take 100% and multiply by 0.88 9 times and you get 32%).
You'll have to play around with these numbers in excel or something if you want to really convince yourself.
Now in 2030 with 50% electric vehicles and 50% conventional we have:
The 50% electric vehicles should cut its emissions by about 50%. The remaining half is mainly in the production of the electric vehicle, with some in the production of power plants, solar panels, wind turbines, grid and emissions from electricity generation (assuming significantly less gas in the grid by 2030).
The 50% conventional vehicles should cut its emissions by I would guess about 25% based on fuel standards, more hybrids. This actually assumes that we stop the decades long trend to increase vehicle size, which may be optimistic.
I'm assuming a slight improvement in the carbon footprint of vehicle production by 2030, but very little.
So the average of a 50% cut and a 25% cut gives us 37%.
Vs the 68% fair contribution from transport we need to have to contribute to a 50/50 of not going above 2.0C above pre-industrial levels.
Jamie in Chile
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The BBC did an article on methane yesterday that's relevant to the discussion:
www.bbc.com
This one from today also has a graph that shows info from Climate Action Tracker that we are heading for 2.7C-3.1C on current policies (similar to my previous estimate of 2.5-3.5C) or 2.4C if pledges are met
The search for the world's largest methane sources
Stemming the methane leaks from landfills, oil fields, natural gas pipelines and more is one of the most powerful levers we have to quickly slow global warming.
www.bbc.com
This one from today also has a graph that shows info from Climate Action Tracker that we are heading for 2.7C-3.1C on current policies (similar to my previous estimate of 2.5-3.5C) or 2.4C if pledges are met
COP26: What was agreed at the Glasgow climate conference?
A crucial climate change summit has been held in the UK which could change our lives.
www.bbc.com
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David3
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The Scientific American article references this study: https://legacy-assets.eenews.net/open_files/assets/2020/04/23/documhent_ew_03.pdf
This study analyzes the unusually high rate of methane leakage at one particular petroleum extraction site: the Permian Basin - its methane leakage rate is 60% higher than the U.S. national average leakage rate.
The Permian Basin's atypical methane leakage is fixable. The report states that the high methane leakage rate is likely contributed by extensive venting and flaring resulting from insufficient infrastructure to process and transport natural gas. In contrast, the much higher CO2 emissions of coal combustion (compared to natural gas combustion) can't be fixed, unless we implement CO2 capture and sequestration.
Per the IPCC, global electricity generation is responsible for 25% of human-caused climate change (https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data), so it's clear that fossil fuel-fired power plants can't continue operating as they have been.
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