That's my feeling, right or wrong, on climate change. Major energy firms, like Chevron I worked for, have shifted the resources they're deploying into natural gas and developing a market for LNG. LNG is pushing coal out of the electrical generation market due to cost and emissions. There will remains a small market for metallurgical coal.
Every plant converted from coal to natural gas / LNG reduces CO2 emissions by 50%.
Chevron is also the largest geothermal producer in the world, has built solar plants with Google, and has spent a lot on renewable biofuels, which doesn't yet have very attractive economics. Virtually all of these decisions are market driven.
The problem is most of the incredible rise in living standards over the past 100 years or more is the direct result of fossil fuels. Replacing this enormous energy source with renewables has some remaining technological hurdles, which Germany is greatly engaged in.
The problem, also as demonstrated by Germany, is this effort has come at the cost of doubling the cost of electricity. And this price increase would have been much higher had German not simultaneously resorted to increased use of lignite, a locally mined cheap and dirty low energy value coal-like material.
This crazy behavior has come as a direct result of the anti-green closure of Germany's nuclear power plants - something which reduces risk from nuclear plants while increasing CO2 emissions from the nation investing most heavily in reducing CO2 emissions.
As a side not let me mention oil and gas reserves remain very abundant in spite of "peak oil" theorists. One of the first peak oil theorists was Exxon in 1928. Their management, believing oil would be gone by 1940 or so, invested heavily in coal and entered into a joint research project with IG Farben to hydrogenate coal to create gasoline and diesel like fuels. At least Hitler benefited from that research for a short period of time. Needless to say, Exxon has sold their coal division and that 1928 decision was simply wrong.
The shift from coal to gas / LNG has been nearly costless, but shifting energy sources further - or reducing CO2 emission further than this plan comes at a significant cost. Likewise, climate change comes at a significant cost.
It behooves our global society to do sufficient research on the various gases and processes which are changing the climate, as well as improving energy source and storage technology to make these decisions as cost effective as possible.
We don't want to be Exxon looking back at the money we wasted on an unfounded peak oil theory.
|
