Economics

تحول الطاقة يصطدم بالواقع

Jan 23, 2023 Daniel Yergin

واشنطن، العاصمة ــ في أيامنا هذه، يحتل "تحول الطاقة" من الهيدروكربونات إلى مصادر الطاقة المتجددة والكهربة مكان الصدارة في المناقشات السياسية. لكن الأشهر الثمانية عشر الأخيرة أثبتت أن هذه المهمة تنطوي على قدر من الصعوبات والتحديات أعظم كثيرا مما كان المرء ليتصور بمجرد دراسة الرسوم البيانية التي تظهر في العديد من السيناريوهات. حتى في الولايات المتحدة وأوروبا، حيث تبنت الحكومات مبادرات ضخمة (مثل قانون خفض التضخم ومبادرة RePowerEU) لتحريك الأمور، لن يجري تحديد عمليات تطوير ونشر وتوسيع نطاق التكنولوجيات الجديدة التي يعتمد عليها التحول في نهاية المطاف إلا بمرور الوقت.

يوحي مصطلح "تحول الطاقة" بأننا نخطو ببساطة خطوة أخرى في الرحلة التي بدأت قبل قرون من الزمن مع الثورة الصناعية. ولكن في دراسة وفحص تحولات الطاقة السابقة أثناء الإعداد لكتابي "الخريطة الجديدة"، أذهلني مدى اختلاف التحول الحالي. ففي حين دفعت التكنولوجيا والميزة الاقتصادية التحولات السابقة، تُـعَـد السياسة العامة الآن العامل الأكثر أهمية.

علاوة على ذلك، تتابعت فصول تحولات الطاقة السابقة على مدار قرن من الزمن أو أكثر، ولم تحل بالكامل محل التكنولوجيات القائمة. فقد تغلب النفط على الفحم باعتباره أكبر مصدر للطاقة في ستينيات القرن العشرين، بيد أننا الآن نستخدم من الفحم ثلاثة أمثال ما كنا نستخدمه منه في ذلك الحين، مع ارتفاع الاستهلاك العالمي إلى مستوى غير مسبوق في عام 2022.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 8 Comments on this article

Larry Kaumeyer Feb 1, 2023

Daniel, I'm not sure I can agree with you. If You look at Canada right now we are seeing Climate policy dominate a host of actions that are not well thought out in relation to there broader economic impacts. The emerging reality is we cannot afford this transition nor is it practical given the objectives are dreamed up by politicians not looking at the broader macro-economic implications.
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Thaomas H Jan 26, 2023

"But the last 18 months have shown energy transition] to be more challenging and complex than one would think just from studying the graphs that appear in many scenarios."

Not not more than from comparing the tax on net CO2 emissions needed ~$200/ tom and the actual average, zero to a rounding error.
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Angel Gavieiro Jan 25, 2023

Helpful reflection, and still does not cover a 5th critical headwind: climate finance.

As of 2021, ‘true’ climate finance (as per Climate Policy Initiave) barely reached $1Tr, estimates for 2022 perhaps $2Tr… which is not near enough to the $5-7.5Tr per annum required in this decade to 2030 to keep in a NetZero pathway to 2050.

This scale & speed of funding reallocation is impossible within the current gearing of int’l financial system, for several reasons:
1) It means 33-50% of annual global financing flows (approx. $15Tr)
2) $2Tr (of the 5-7.5Tr) are needed in Developing Markets, which usually receive 5-10% max of annual global financing
3) Substantial part of climate finance is required for ClimateTech that has still large green premium, so no attrative to private investment without public money support (1st loss, capex grants, carbon tax, PPI, 45Q,…)
4) Public financing is overstretched for most countries, with historical record highs of Debt/GDP both in developed and developing economies
5) Interest rates are going up, QE is now QT (so central banks stop buying public debt), and the risk of sovereign crises is looming not just for EMs but also Developed (eg UK mini budget crisis for a small test when you fool around with public deficits)

A new Bretton Woods led by US, China, EU and full G20 is sorely needed to devise & agree an alternative Transition financing mechanism that complements the current effort… there is no other possible way around it (unless a technical miracle like nuclear fussion at scale turns out tomorrow morning, sort to speak).

Energy fuels the global economic machinery, but Finance ultimately fuels it all… and, right now, regardless GFANZ and other efforts, we must admit it is the ‘weakest link’ … that is what Mdme Georgeva was saying at Davos (ie without the countries above agreeing big financing decisions now… NetZero won’t happen).
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Richard Allen Jan 24, 2023

In my opinion, Republicans should be urging the conversion of our electric generation to combinations of small modular nuclear reactors, natural gas powered electric generation plants and coal fired electric power generation plants. The natural gas plants and the coal fired plants are needed for load balancing to handle sags and surges in electricity.

From a perspective of continuing operations, it is hard to shut down a coal fired power plant with a 90 day supply of coal on the ground. Think a war with the People’s Republic of China.

Both the electric grid and electric generation plants need to be upgraded to protect against cyber attacks, physical attacks and weather. Like extended supply chains and just in time manufacturing, we create huge risks for America where the infrastructure can be disrupted. Instead of the least cost national electric grid, we need a loosely coupled electric grid which is less susceptible to cascading failures.

While living in Colorado Springs, Colorado, regularly, Wally Magda would make presentations to the Colorado Springs chapter of ISSA.

Support for the above statements.

1st small modular nuclear reactor certified for use in US By JENNIFER McDERMOTTJanuary 20, 202

https://apnews.com/article/us-nuclear-regulatory-commission-oregon-climate-and-environment-business-design-e5c54435f973ca32759afe5904bf96ac

ISA Interchange International Society of Automation

Wally Magda is an internationally recognized cyber and physical security expert for Industrial Control Systems (ICS) with many years of practical hands on experience. His deep security experience spans military nuclear missile command and control systems, intelligence agencies and enterprise cyber and physical security. As a regional North American Electric Reliability Corporation Critical Infrastructure Protection (NERC CIP) compliance auditor, Wally set a professional tone demonstrating for all stakeholders the necessity of adhering to governing rules of procedure.

https://blog.isa.org/author/wally-magda

What a Waste Tech Commentary by James B. Meigs

Or, to use the Department of Energy’s yardstick, all the nuclear fuel used in the U.S. since the 1950s “could fit on a single football field at a depth of less than 10 yards.”

Second, spent nuclear fuel isn’t really “waste.” When fuel rods leave the reactor, they still contain more than 90 percent of the energy they started with, as Madi Hilly, founder of the Campaign for a Green Nuclear Deal, recently explained in a Twitter thread. “That means we can recycle the spent fuel and turn it into new fuel, which is already routinely done in Europe, Russia, and Japan,” Hilly writes. According to Jess C. Gehin of the Idaho National Laboratory, there’s enough residual energy in those spent-fuel rods to power the U.S. for 100 years. That would require the development of next-generation fast reactors, as well as new industrial systems for fuel recycling. Private companies are working on both technologies, and the Department of Energy is helping fund that R&D. Someday, the “nuclear waste” storage sites like the one at Indian Point might instead be seen as precious repositories of clean energy.

https://www.commentary.org/articles/james-meigs/nuclear-waste-fear-game/

ISSA International Awards Winners Home » ISSA International Awards Winners

https://www.issa.org/issa-international-awards-winners/
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Daniel Livne Jan 23, 2023

Veganism is not a silver-bullet solution to climate change and no one has ever seriously suggested that it is. Still, a vegan diet is far more resource efficient, so yes, if more people went vegan it would technically help.
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Daniel Livne Jan 23, 2023

Climate change is not at all at the top of the policy agenda in the Global North. Developing countries constantly have to plead with Western Europe and North America to take climate change more seriously.
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Mirek Fatyga Jan 23, 2023

well, it is good to see that articles such as this one are finally permitted to appear in the outlets for the well connected. Better late than never.

Perhaps one could add to this discussion couple numbers:

if one wanted to extend North American oil consumption per capita to 8 billion people, world oil production would have to increase by ~600%. To the EU level by ~300%. I doubt it can do either.

In other words, the world population growth put the industrial civilization back in the condition of resource scarcity. This has two prime effects: in the developed world there is a relentless downward pressure on living standards. In the developing world there is an invisible lid on the development that is available. Political sociopaths helpfully translate this reality into a political message as to whose fault this might be. The other name for this activity would be "rise of fascism", euphemistically called today "populism" or "illiberalism" so we do not scare ourselves too much. Of course, scared or not, the reality squeaks and we have ourselves the largest tank battle in Europe since WW2.

The world needs to develop supplemental energy technologies and it is urgent. No time to waste, really. We can't decarbonize overnight because the world needs every ounce of carbon based energy it can lay its hands on. Our civilization is but a temporary pattern on the flow of energy. Take this flow away and it all falls down, rapidly and with much ugliness, again being euphemistic about what would really happen.

As far as the global warming is concerned, I would recommend this talk from Steve Koonin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Tz1MiX1p5I&t=23s, or his book. There are many others who have been trying to subject the global warming theory to the reality check, but he summarizes it all well and with limited hyperbole.

For those of you who prefer politics, politics again and politics all the time, think about the difference between these two political messages:

1. Some guys with a big computer in the ivory tower tell us that the sky is falling if we keep using fossil fuels. Accept lower standards of living, higher taxes and general unpleasantness to decarbonize. If you disagree with the guys who have a big computer, you are a denier and you know what that rhymes with. you do not want to be one of those, do you? The most charitable thing I can come up with for you is that you are really stupid, too stupid to understand real science.

2. The XXth Century population growth, a byproduct of the rapid drop in the mortality of the young. put out civilization back in a condition of resource scarcity. Together, through human ingenuity, we will overcome this scarcity by developing alternative sources of energy. While we are doing this, we also need to take good care of our brothers and sisters in the developing world. They need to use fossil fuels for some time to come, to help them alleviate poverty and raise their living standards. We in the West will forge ahead developing and implementing alternatives to fossil fuels because we are the only ones who can. It also happens to be a good business because our brothers and sisters will have to use these substitutes eventually. In the meantime, we need to maintain supplies of fossil fuels as this is essential to our survival as free and prosperous people.

Which one sounds better to you ,dear political reader? (1) or (2) ?
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