This commentary is by Fred Jagels of Cabot, who has operated Evergreen Economic Research, an independent investigation into sustainable economics, for the past 35 years.
A recent book, “Electrify” by Saul Griffith, lays out in detail how a crash program to electrify everything, using renewables as supply, could avoid climate catastrophe.
This, as he spells it out, will be a monumental challenge. Do we also need a crash program in reduced demand to make it work?
To electrify everything, Griffith takes us step by step to calculate the amount of solar panels, wind farms, storage capacity, grid modernization, regulatory and financial change and so forth needed to do the job and still satisfy today’s material expectations and lifestyles. Griffith allows that the storage conundrum is one element not yet solved (others maintain that compact modular nuclear can solve that problem), but is cautiously optimistic that his proposal can be done in time and with existing technology — “if we do it right.”
This well-researched book provides a number of fascinating details:
- Currently, we use 105 Quads of all forms of energy to power this nation yearly. (One Quad equals one quadrillion BTUs, or 293 billion kilowatt-hours). Yet, if we electrify everything with renewables, due to elimination of the waste heat inherent in fossil fuels, we would need only 45 to 50 Quads to do what 105 Quads does today. (Electric cars, for example, deliver 80% to 90% of their power to the road, with 10-20% wasted. Internal combustion vehicles deliver only 30% to the road, wasting the other 70%.)
- We will need 3-4 times the electrical energy we now generate in order to electrify (nearly) everything. This means 1,500-1,800 gigawatts compared to the 450GW that the grid supplies today. (For air travel, annual bio fuel regeneration will suffice, Griffith says.)
- Solar and wind are now the cheapest means of generation.
- Thus, to make it happen, we will need to cover all existing rooftops, parking lots and roadways (medians and verges, not the surfaces) with solar panels, and then integrate additional wind power into the 90 million acres of existing cornfields (or other 4% swath of land).
- The major technical hurdles are two: sufficient storage (meaning mostly batteries) for when the sun and wind don’t cooperate, and a modernized, interconnected and shared grid system to tie together the very complex variables of demand and supply to enable reliable service 24/7, 365.
He also outlines the needed changes in regulation (looser, speedier) and in user finance: estimated at $40,000 per household, to be paid with 30-year, low-interest, government-backed and subsidized mortgages.
Griffith calls this “World War Zero” and compares it to the massive arms buildup of the 1940s. To prioritize effectively, he wants us to get familiar with Sankey Diagrams. They illustrate in one snapshot the intricate flows of energy through the system, highlighting what to pay attention to and what to ignore. (For the home, space and water heating is the biggy; more generally, steel and cement manufacture.)
Given the nature of our economy and culture, Griffith has probably settled on the most realistic path. Enabling Americans to continue to live large — while generating thousands of new domestic jobs — will no doubt dampen opposition and potential civil unrest. Doubts, of course, arise as to whether we can actually “do it right.” An awful lot of ducks have to be lined up perfectly— and imminently — to make it work. So far, the needed public mobilization is lacking. World War Zero is a whisper, not a call to action.
Is there a role for serious demand reduction in this scenario? For about 10 years, I have been living (very close to) a 1.5 degree C lifestyle as recommended by the IPCC. (My particular strategy is to migrate seasonally, north and south, eliminating most of the energy needed for heating and cooling).
I find there is as much challenge and satisfaction in figuring out how to live fully modern on dramatically less as there is in achieving the opposite. As things stand today, not many are in a position to try this and for those who are, our economy and culture erect massive roadblocks.
With our flimsy social safety net, rampant inflation in basics like health care and housing, neighborhood and regulatory opposition, and a society that measures status and respect in terms of the size of one’s house and the title of one’s job, very few are willing to take these risks.
Greater respect and support for reduced demand would go a long way to move Griffith’s proposal from fantasy to doable. To get both paths working together, we need targeted public financial support and something like the Slow Living Lessons that are infusing the cultures of Italy and other aware societies that recognize that a post-carbon world means fundamental change in how we coexist with the Earth and how we structure our political economies.
History illustrates how failure to understand and cooperate in managing major transitions has taken generations of oppositional conflict to work out. The transition from an agricultural to an industrial economy and then from an industrial to a postindustrial, knowledge-based economy are cases in point. We are still in the painful throes of both these transitions today.
Climate change is a big-picture transition that requires big-picture leadership and wide-scale public understanding if we have any hope of getting it right. In my opinion, the reduced demand side of the carbon elimination equation requires the same sort of crash program that Griffith outlines for supply.
