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This growth is being supported by many trends. One is the amazing drop of solar prices (Swanson’s Law): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swanson%2…. More than a factor 200 over 40 years, in constant dollars. pic.twitter.com/P2AMz91dQl
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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A couple of weeks ago I asked on Twitter what people felt they, individually (not others!), should do about climate change. There were many thoughtful replies: twitter.com/michael_nielse…
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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I don't yet have an answer to this question which I'm personally satisfied with. But here's a few observations.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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(Thoughtful comments welcome, but please read through before replying, since some ideas need to be unpacked over multiple tweets! I know: shock, some ideas require more than 280 characters!)
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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1. Renewable energy is growing like absolute gangbusters
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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According to BP's Statistical Review of World Energy, in 2018 renewable electricity grew 14.5%. For comparison, CO2 emissions from energy use (the vast majority of CO2 emissions) grew just 2.0% bp.com/content/dam/bp… pic.twitter.com/4vFInZ2YM1
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Not to belabour the obvious, but that’s a humungous difference! Renewable energy is expanding at an incredible rate. But in terms of overall energy use, it’s still just a tiny, tiny fraction. The tiny (top) sliver of orange here is renewables. pic.twitter.com/XMCrMxJYNW
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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It’s tempting to look at that sliver & feel pessimistic. On the other hand, ask Blockbuster how that tiny (but rapidly growing) upstart Netflix did. Compound growth is an incredibly strong force. That’s especially true when many govts are strongly supporting renewables
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Incidentally, this is a fun paper about _why_ prices have dropped so rapidly. static1.squarespace.com/static/56afb88… pic.twitter.com/zetlwDSxYN
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Battery prices show a similarly incredible drop. They’re down by a factor 7 since 2010, from $1,100/kWh in 2010, to $156/kWh in 2019: utilitydive.com/news/battery-p…
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Something I don’t understand are the price points at which solar + battery ought to take over most of the electricity system. I don’t think we can be terribly far from that point - 10 years? I don’t have a good model, nor of how centralized it will be.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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(Also: I’d like to better understand the environmental impact of batteries and solar. Lithium ion batteries seem to be pretty nasty stuff.)
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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In any case: there are incredibly strong forces driving renewable growth.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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At the moment, 6 of the world’s 10 largest companies (by revenue) are oil and gas companies. 2 are car companies, still mostly fossil fuels. And 1 is an electricity company, almost certainly mostly fossil fuels. pic.twitter.com/7pEoYIpaBD
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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My guess - this is just speculation - in 30-40 years time many of those fossil fuel companies will have been replaced on that list by either renewable energy or (maybe) nuclear companies. Or they themselves will have largely switched. Volkswagen is certainly in that mix.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Incidentally, when I talk to tech folks they sometimes tell me climate/energy is a niche, interesting but obviously much less important than tech. See all the tech companies on that list above? Neither do I.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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It’s true that by market cap tech is currently larger. But energy is a multi-trillion dollar industry. And the growth of renewables suggests a major transition in energy is near.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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(Just to be clear: I'm not saying tech isn't incredibly important! Just that there's a myopia on the part of some tech people I've chatted with about this. There's a very large world beyond technology.)
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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2. But hang on, aren’t capitalism and growth models the problem? Why are you talking about all this growth? Isn’t it a bad thing?
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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This argument basically says climate change is just a symptom of a much more unhealthy pattern: growth models. Capitalism produces growth produces more human ability to change the world. And that means goof-ups produce more damage to the world.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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I’m somewhat sympathetic to this argument. Certainly, and just as a for instance, battery waste really is something I worry about, if we’re all of a sudden using 100x the scale of batteries.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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And you do see this pattern over & over. Subprime mortgage derivatives seem, in principle, a great idea - pooling risk to provide capital to people who otherwise can’t afford homes. Except they were systematically mispriced, resulting...
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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... not just in the evaporation of trillions of dollars during the financial crisis, but huge followon effects that have massively changed the world.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Sometimes we find technological solutions to these problems. The original refrigerators used ammonia as a coolant. This sometimes leaked, killing people. Solution! Use CFCs instead. Except that damaged the ozone layer. Solution! Use HCFCs instead. And so on.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Maybe tomorrow some magic genie will produce a way of doing scalable direct air carbon capture at 10 cents per tonne of CO2. If so, we can be back down to pre-industrial CO2 levels in a flash, if we choose.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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The pessimistic view is that we keep playing with fire, & sometimes we get lucky. But eventually humanity will damage ourselves in a way that makes the financial crisis look like a rounding error. Maybe climate is it. But even if not...
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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... capitalism & growth models have this as an inevitable side effect. They’re the real culprits.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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The trouble with this point of view is that the alternatives seem far worse. Yes, you can go for a low-growth or communist model. I’m sure the Amish CO2 emissions are much lower than middle America. North Korea’s are 1.6 t / yr, one tenth of the US per capita, one third of global
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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But I don’t want to live in North Korea, & I suspect most of the “down with capitalism” crowd don’t either.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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(Of course, they don’t think of it that way. But whenever I’ve dug down into concrete plans, they seem poorly thought through, relying on wishful thinking and “this time will be different”.)
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Now, the optimistic point of view here - the opportunity! - is to try to find smart and wise alternatives that are much better than capitalism’s current incarnation. That really is an exciting opportunity.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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That’s one reason I’m enthused by charter cities. It’s why I’m enthused by the ideas of Elinor Ostrom. And by the liberal radicalism (papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf… ) of @VitalikButerin @zhitzig @glenweyl, a clever way of funding public goods and attacking collective action problems
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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I don’t mean to say I think liberal radicalism etc are likely to solve climate change! I just mean: this kind of thinking & work seems tremendously important, & worth supporting more experimentation in this direction. Reinventing capitalism will sound ludicrous until its not.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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(The more conservative approach - probably more likely to work, in this context - is to make a small modification capitalism by introducing something like a carbon tax. I may say more about that later, but I’ll leave it aside for now.)
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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3. What about nuclear?
I haven’t said much about nuclear (fission). That’s because, while in principle it ought to be an enormous help, there’s a set of problems with it that I just don’t know much about how to solve.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Between 1950 and the 1980s nuclear grew rapidly, from 0 GW to more than 300 GW of installed capacity. And then it levelled off, in the aftermath of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. It’s only 400 GW today, and provides about 10% of world electricity.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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The problems are interlocking: political unpopularity, security (country A doesn’t want country B to use nuclear power, because it can be used for weapons), cost (in part due to regulations, politics, & security), waste, and more.
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michael_nielsen
@michael_nielsen
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29. pro |
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Worse, there’s a cadre of people who like to shout loudly “nuclear is the only possible answer, and if you don’t think so you’re an idiot” (or the equivalent). These are not the people you want on your side in a battle for hearts and minds.
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