Trying To Obtain the Impossible.

This post is a follow-up to my last, "Wanting The Impossible", of 3rd May 2023. I'll begin with the total global energy consumption in 2021, which was 176,431 TWh (Terawatt-hours) = 635.156 EJ (exajoules; 1 EJ = 10^18 J), of which 76.047 EJ (11.973%) was contributed by renewable energy of all kinds, and 25.3116 EJ (3.985%) by nuclear power. The remaining 84.042% was supplied by CO2-emitting forms of energy, including the 529.6644 EJ (83.39%) comprised of energy from oil, natural gas and coal; source: Ritchie & Moser (2022).

The world's population in 2021 was 7.8317 billion (source: US Census Bureau, 1), which implies that mean energy consumption per capita that year was ~81.1 GJ. Few, if any, are suggesting this was fairly and equitably distributed.

Let us now assume an average annual global economic growth rate of 1% p.a. between 2021 and 2050, inclusive, a total of thirty years, resulting in 30% growth. (This may well be on the low side, in fact; see World Economic Forum/IMF.) By 2050, the global human population is 9.7405 billion (US Census Bureau, 2), an increase of ~24.373%.

If energy consumption rises in line with economic growth, as one would expect, global energy consumption will rise 30% from its 2021 figure of 635.156 EJ to 825.7028 EJ in 2050. Global energy consumption per capita in 2050 will then be ~84.77 GJ, a modest increase of ~4.525%.

For there to be a "transition" from the state of affairs in 2021 to one where all the global demand for energy is satisfied by renewables alone in 2050 requires an increase in the supply of renewable energy of all kinds (and, obviously, a corresponding reduction in the amount of energy supplied by fossil fuels and nuclear) of ~985.78%, or ~32.859% p.a.

Between 2013 and 2022, i.e., over a ten year period, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA, 2023), renewable electricity generating capacity rose from 1.566487 TW to 3.371793 TW, a total increase of ~115.2455%, or ~11.52455% p.a. This is about a third of the required annual increase (it's actually ~0.35073), which has to be sustained every year up to and including 2050.

All this is quite apart from how one turns renewable electricity into useful forms of energy for such purposes as transport, not only via road, where electric vehicles may well generate more environmental problems than they solve (see Friends of the Earth; Wired) but sea and air as well. Trams and trains, thankfully, can run on renewable electricity quite easily, but government policies regarding public transport subsidies, and taxation of private road transport, as well as spending on roads, may well need to change substantially.

The "green transition" would be very much easier, and rather more likely to prove successful, if the global economy became smaller, rather than larger, and global consumption of energy correspondingly smaller, too. Of course, that would also entail a smaller global human population, and it would be a requirement of natural and social justice that the wealth and income generated by the smaller global economy should be far more equally, and equitably, distributed.

That, in turn, would require substantial material sacrifices by those in the "Global North", who have already signified they are unwilling to give up any part of their consumerist lifestyles for the sake of the climate (Guardian). They have even been assured, by the World Bank, no less, that such sacrifices are "unnecessary"! Pain-free climate action! How wonderful! And how utterly preposterous, and how utterly irresponsible of such an organisation to make so absurd and unfounded a claim!

How much less, then, will people in the developed world be willing to make any real sacrifices on behalf of the world's poor, when they can hardly bring themselves to make paltry contributions to charities like Oxfam and UNICEF, are happy that the UK government has cut overseas aid, but want refugees to be kept at bay, no matter what the cost to this country's reputation for respect for human rights and humanitarian law, and international standing? Other European countries and their citizens, alas, are pursuing very similar agendas.

I am all the more persuaded, especially given factors I have not referred to here (I will deal with them in another post), that humans will not do what's needed to solve the climate emergency themselves, but will leave it to nature herself. Her solution, however, will be decidedly unpleasant, and will entail - at the very least - a massive cull of our species, if not its total extinction, probably by about 2050. We have about twenty-six and a half years left.