I'm sorry, Ed, but I find your first chart just plain depressing. Its prominence is yet more evidence of the utter lack of systems thinking among so many today. There is zero utility in exponential expansion of an energy source that is often unavailable and is use-it-somehow when it is on, without cost-effective ways to make it part of a 24/7 energy system.
And that is even without contemplating the folly of trying to move humanity to energy sources having low energy density.
I AM optimistic about technology. Not so much about judgement.
Yes the solar scam. It’s very real. Build solar panels and EVs in China using thermal coal. Build batteries with nickel from Indonesia smelted using ? Yes thermal coal. Amazing how people have no idea where things are made and how they are made.
quite obvious for any decent engineer, not a politician. If you need to built new infrastructure, you need energy. Since at the UN happily close their eyes and let China do whatever it takes, most of the renewable energy devices will be built on coal. The buyer (e.g. the EU) could have forced lower carbon (e.g. gas) or zero carbon (nuclear) energies to be used and saved the european industry of solar panels. But if God intended for politicians (and fellow activists and biased "scientists") to have common sense, should give them brains. Case in point is Angela Merkel which combine both impersonations and made most of the damage. Funnily enough, UE legislate that third world countries could not sell beef of grain produced in newly deforested areas. Because that helps inefficient agricultural producers in the UE and only hurts real third world countries, not China.
You are right to point out that IEA have been predicting peak coal for a while and it hasn't happened. However I am very surprised that you are comparing the solar chart that starts at zero with a coal chart with a false zero to show to imply the growth rates are comparable. Not what I expect from your usually balanced analysis. Coal has only grown by 1% in the last year hasn't it? and the pace of growth has slowed considerably from previous years. Still growing, yes, but hardly comparable with the growth rates of solar.
You're absolutely right that the growth rates are not directly comparable, though I'm not sure I said they were. The key point is the pattern in forecasts vs outcomes - not the growth rates. Frankly, it would be astounding if coal consumption were growing at anything like the rate of solar output given the latter is a nascent technology rather than a centuries-old one. The real point of this piece isn't about growth rates; it's that there's a flip side to the solar chart which needs to be pondered alongside it - but often isn't. NB Chinese coal consumption rose by 6% last year, not 1% (the 1% is the IEA's forecast for this year which is, given its past record, somewhat questionable). The rise in China's coal consumption in the past year is more coal than Britain burnt in the past decade and a half. That's not exactly trivial.
Solar is also growing from a much smaller base, so 1% growth of coal is much larger in amount than a higher percentage of solar.
This is also true of fossil fuels in general.
For example, between 2010 and 2023 coal alone (3577 TWh) added roughly the same TWh as wind (1979 TWh) and solar (1608) combined. And the other fossil fuels far surpassed that amount. Natural gas added 8508 TWh, while oil added 6510 TWh. All fossil fuels combined added 18,595 TWh of energy, which was four times all Green energy sources combined (4615 TWh).
Your book was one of my 2024 highlights and thanks for this article as well. One comment: the "Evil twin" chart doesn't have the same y axis so it makes it hard to compare coal and solar's relative impacts on the green transition. It would be useful to see them both as kw/h, or perhaps gw/year.
I don’t quite see the point of this. Of course we’re going to need to use existing energy systems to create new energy systems. This would only be a problem if the old systems were to continue on after we have the new systems.
Up here at 55deg+ latitude there are 3 months when solar barely happens and I expect NL is not a lot better. Winter wind is more likely but intermittent and still very capable of dropping to zero. Seems offshore will need more subsidy anyway. Well, there is all that maintenance. EV / cars & light vans? What about the diesel heavy stuff? All comes out of the same barrel. And what do you do with all that spare petrol.
I seem to remember if were still using coal it would almost all have to be imported. There are all sorts of dodgy twins to the continuing industrial roll-out?
There is no solar panel factory powered by solar panels... your article took a good step forward in helping techno optimist realize this... But your solar graph is a bit misleading installed GW is only the rating of the equipment not the energy resource. Who knows how many GW of solar is under performing... there is no energy transition.
I'm sorry, Ed, but I find your first chart just plain depressing. Its prominence is yet more evidence of the utter lack of systems thinking among so many today. There is zero utility in exponential expansion of an energy source that is often unavailable and is use-it-somehow when it is on, without cost-effective ways to make it part of a 24/7 energy system.
And that is even without contemplating the folly of trying to move humanity to energy sources having low energy density.
I AM optimistic about technology. Not so much about judgement.
Love your book. Depressing that China is still using coal. You may be an optimist but I am a pessimistic. Human beings are greedy!
Using the most economical energy source is sensible, not "greedy."
Yes the solar scam. It’s very real. Build solar panels and EVs in China using thermal coal. Build batteries with nickel from Indonesia smelted using ? Yes thermal coal. Amazing how people have no idea where things are made and how they are made.
quite obvious for any decent engineer, not a politician. If you need to built new infrastructure, you need energy. Since at the UN happily close their eyes and let China do whatever it takes, most of the renewable energy devices will be built on coal. The buyer (e.g. the EU) could have forced lower carbon (e.g. gas) or zero carbon (nuclear) energies to be used and saved the european industry of solar panels. But if God intended for politicians (and fellow activists and biased "scientists") to have common sense, should give them brains. Case in point is Angela Merkel which combine both impersonations and made most of the damage. Funnily enough, UE legislate that third world countries could not sell beef of grain produced in newly deforested areas. Because that helps inefficient agricultural producers in the UE and only hurts real third world countries, not China.
You are right to point out that IEA have been predicting peak coal for a while and it hasn't happened. However I am very surprised that you are comparing the solar chart that starts at zero with a coal chart with a false zero to show to imply the growth rates are comparable. Not what I expect from your usually balanced analysis. Coal has only grown by 1% in the last year hasn't it? and the pace of growth has slowed considerably from previous years. Still growing, yes, but hardly comparable with the growth rates of solar.
You're absolutely right that the growth rates are not directly comparable, though I'm not sure I said they were. The key point is the pattern in forecasts vs outcomes - not the growth rates. Frankly, it would be astounding if coal consumption were growing at anything like the rate of solar output given the latter is a nascent technology rather than a centuries-old one. The real point of this piece isn't about growth rates; it's that there's a flip side to the solar chart which needs to be pondered alongside it - but often isn't. NB Chinese coal consumption rose by 6% last year, not 1% (the 1% is the IEA's forecast for this year which is, given its past record, somewhat questionable). The rise in China's coal consumption in the past year is more coal than Britain burnt in the past decade and a half. That's not exactly trivial.
Solar is also growing from a much smaller base, so 1% growth of coal is much larger in amount than a higher percentage of solar.
This is also true of fossil fuels in general.
For example, between 2010 and 2023 coal alone (3577 TWh) added roughly the same TWh as wind (1979 TWh) and solar (1608) combined. And the other fossil fuels far surpassed that amount. Natural gas added 8508 TWh, while oil added 6510 TWh. All fossil fuels combined added 18,595 TWh of energy, which was four times all Green energy sources combined (4615 TWh).
atmosphere needs about 300 ppm more CO2 for optimum plant growth.
sparky billboards are a stupid waste.
Your book was one of my 2024 highlights and thanks for this article as well. One comment: the "Evil twin" chart doesn't have the same y axis so it makes it hard to compare coal and solar's relative impacts on the green transition. It would be useful to see them both as kw/h, or perhaps gw/year.
I don’t quite see the point of this. Of course we’re going to need to use existing energy systems to create new energy systems. This would only be a problem if the old systems were to continue on after we have the new systems.
Up here at 55deg+ latitude there are 3 months when solar barely happens and I expect NL is not a lot better. Winter wind is more likely but intermittent and still very capable of dropping to zero. Seems offshore will need more subsidy anyway. Well, there is all that maintenance. EV / cars & light vans? What about the diesel heavy stuff? All comes out of the same barrel. And what do you do with all that spare petrol.
I seem to remember if were still using coal it would almost all have to be imported. There are all sorts of dodgy twins to the continuing industrial roll-out?
There is no solar panel factory powered by solar panels... your article took a good step forward in helping techno optimist realize this... But your solar graph is a bit misleading installed GW is only the rating of the equipment not the energy resource. Who knows how many GW of solar is under performing... there is no energy transition.
we are doomed