Our Hunger for Energy
The world is bingeing on fossil fuels. While kicking the habit may prove impossible, the solution could be surprisingly simple…
Words Eleanor Besley-Gould
Illustration Jean Jullien
The human race has a vast appetite for fossil fuels. In 1965, the world’s energy consumption was equivalent to 3.8 billion tonnes of oil; by 2013 that figure had more than tripled, rising to 12.7 billion — and 87 per cent of that came from the use of oil, coal and natural gas.
We’re drilling for these fuels to sustain a growing, global demand that is unlikely to begin tailing off until the second half of this century. Given the known contribution of our current energy mix to global warming, it would seem logical to make alternative choices today. Unfortunately, the reality is not that simple.
We are not just dependent on energy itself — we’re dependent on the means by which we generate it. The average lifespan of a fossil fuel power station is 25 years, so even if the entire world were to decide, overnight, that all future investment in energy would be ‘clean’, we would still be left with the problematic infrastructure we’ve relied upon for decades. And despite recent momentum calling for fossil fuel divestment (e.g. the heirs to the Rockefeller oil fortune recently joined a campaign to withdraw $50bn from fossil fuels),much of the world simply isn’t ready for an alternative system. To generate huge amounts of low-carbon energy requires investment, impetus and delivery models — things that most nations simply don’t have yet.
“To make the changes to our global energy system that will avoid catastrophic climate change, we’ll need to move with survivalist urgency.”
The Obama administration knows this. When the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) revealed its Clean Power Plan back in June 2014, it came with the frank acknowledgement that fossil fuels will still be required and used for some time yet.
“We know that coal and natural gas play a significant role in a diverse national energy mix, said EPA administrator Gina McCarthy. “This Plan does not change that — it recognises the opportunity to modernise ageing plants, increase efficiency, and lower pollution. That’s part of an all-of-the-above strategy that paves a more certain path for conventional fuels in a carbon constrained world.”
The key word here is ‘efficiency’. Despite planning for flexibility, the Obama administration is confident that by the year 2030, the US will meet its goal of cutting carbon pollution from power plants to 70 per cent of 2005 levels. To reach this target, efforts will be taken to “squeeze the most out of every electron”, as McCarthy puts it.
This seems to be a sensible idea — both for the US and for the rest of the world. But is it one that we’ve hit upon too late?
“We’ve got 10 to 15 years,” says Michael Jacobs, senior climate change advisor to L’Institut du Développement Durable et des Relations Internationales in Paris. Jacobs believes the window is this small: to make the changes to our global energy system that will avoid catastrophic climate change, we’ll need to move with survivalist urgency. Yet he remains optimistic that we can achieve a low-carbon energy future in a way that requires neither huge spending nor groundbreaking technology.
Admittedly, efficiency isn’t very sexy — but it could represent the single biggest hope for the future of our energy consumption.
“Energy efficiency is slightly paradoxical as it’s the cheapest way to meet rising demand, but in many ways it’s the most difficult,” explains Jacobs. “It doesn’t come in one lump sum of investment, but needs the combined efforts of lots of relatively small actions taken by lots of firms, building owners and consumers.”
We’ve already come a long way, in some regards. Jacobs points to huge improvements in the fuel efficiency of cars and household appliances: modern fridges, for example, are 70 per cent more effective than those that were made twenty years ago. Even so, we need to go further and, perhaps more importantly, we need to work faster.
While efficiency may have the biggest role to play, Jacobs also believes we must look to renewable energies. As he’s keen to point out, wind, and in some countries, solar and hydro, are already cheaper than their fossil fuel equivalents. He’s also a major advocate of carbon capture use and storage — the process of using waste carbon dioxide to make new materials or capturing and storing it, thus minimising the atmospheric damage.
“Countries need to take a more rounded view of their energy system,” says Jacobs. “It’s all too easy to turn to coal and gas because we know how to use them. But increasingly, a cleaner energy system is not only better value, it’s also proving instrumental in reducing air pollution — potentially saving millions of lives a year and insulating countries from growing risks to their energy security.”
“Efficiency isn’t very sexy — but it could represent the single biggest hope for the future of our energy consumption.”
President Obama’s plans to cut carbon emissions are undoubtedly a big step in the right direction. But while the US accounts for 17.8 per cent of the world’s primary energy consumption, China, at 22.4 per cent, uses even more. With the help of Russia, Japan and Canada, these countries collectively represent 52 per cent of the global appetite for primary energy. And while their consumption may be comparatively minimal at present, the world’s developing economies are using more and more power with each passing year.
The truth of the situation is that every nation, not just the US, will have to commit if significant change is to become a reality. Following the 2014 Climate Summit in New York, China has pledged to slow the growth of its carbon emissions; Canada has also expressed confidence that new agreements will be reached in late 2015 at the crucial UN Climate Change Conference in Paris. Even so, Canada’s own environmental department has confirmed that it is currently lagging behind its reduction targets for 2020.
The global challenge may seem Herculean, but for now Jacobs remains optimistic: “The great thing about climate change mitigation is that the majority of the things countries need to do are an economic benefit rather than a cost,” he says. “They create jobs and improve living standards. It’s just always harder to make a decision to change something, rather than carrying on with business as usual.”
This article is taken from Weapons of Reason’s first issue: The Arctic. Read the next article: Greetings from Iqaluit.
Weapons of Reason is a publishing project to understand and articulate the global challenges shaping our world by Human After All design agency.
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