What were the most important technologies of energy? How did they develop? What did they allow? Why has that slowed down? What does that say about our future? What would happen if we made more progress on energy?
Tomas, Bill Gates has been a huge follower of research and books by Vaclav Smil. Since you are investigating energy issues, I feel that should not be missed in your coverage.
I came to say exactly this. As I’m currently reading Energy and civilization, reading this interview felt as a long story short.
I have strong doubts about the optimism I feel here about what are the real possibilities for the transition, even more with the scarcity problems that are already rising in many fronts, energy included of course, but I’m trying to get my ideas in order.
You’re right! I started reading him but he touches so many interesting topics that I take too many notes when I read him. I need to get back to him. I will when I put forward my take on the future of energy. Thx for reminding me!
A hugely valuable resource on the future of energy is The Energy Transition Show with Chris Nelder. Chris has been covering transition to renewables and interviewing academics and industry personnel for the last 6 years. Well worth reviewing for discussions on the future of energy. A recent podcast reviewed a new Oxford University study showing that the ever-cheaper cost of wind and solar energy, versus the now increasing costs of fossil fuel recovery, will drive renewables to outpace fossil fuels more quickly than older IPCC modeling forecasted.
An excellent blog that covers this topic, written by a physicist, is Do The Math: https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/ That was where I first heard the topic of energy density and physical limits of energy consumption growing equally along with GDP growth. Highly recommended!
Most of the examples sounds plausible, but I don't think extracting uranium from rocks on the ocean floor or recycling anything by heating it into plasma and separating out the constituent elements would be economically feasible with energy 10× as cheap as today, and I'm almost sure transmuting other metals into gold or rhodium wouldn't be even with energy 100× as cheap as today.
We finally do have nuclear-powered cars that go for thousands or tens of thousands of miles without ever being refueled: NASA's Mars Curiosity and Perseverance rovers. The conundrum for human use becomes radiation shielding.
Hi Thomas, entirely off topic but I'm not sure how to reach you best; could you consider a piece on the seemingly perpetual conflict zone Kushmir? Might be embedded into a broader piece about the Indus valley/geographical determinism. Maybe I'm being lazy now and should do my own research but maybe you already got something like this on the radar? Let me know!
Henry Adams curve has the strong appearance of exponential growth.
Exponential growth on a planet of finite resources can only end badly.
We as a species will only thrive if we can learn to taper off our growth in consumption to remain in line with the capacity of the earth to produce the foods and other resources that sustain us.
Once the inhabitants of Easter Island had chopped down the last of their trees and otherwise denuded their island, their population crashed dramatically. At least some of them had somewhere else to go.
Once we strip this planet bare of forests, and hoover up the last fishes from the ocean, we will be in enormous trouble.
Within the human body, we have a name for the exponential growth of cells, we call it cancer, and it never ends well.
Healthy bodies work because the cells within it know when to stop expanding, when to stop reproducing, and to share the body's resources within reasonable limits. A healthy human society cannot escape this need to avoid continued exponential growth.
Unlike the residents of Easter Island, once we cook this planet, there's nowhere else to go. Elon Musk may launch himself to Mars, but he will have a hard time finding a Whole Foods from which to procure his evening meals.
Thanks for your comment. I disagree, but I haven’t fully formed the thoughts. I look forward to publishing on the topic and hear your response. I’ll take your comment in consideration
It's worth remembering that global population is expected to FALL--it's already happening in Europe, Japan, and South Korea. Fertility rates have been collapsing for DECADES. The vast majority of countries are already below replacement rate (2.2 births/female).
SEE: Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline (Bricker and Ibbitson, 2019)
So consumption of natural resources will undoubtedly decline once the people already born have aged and died.
Exponential 'growth' is possible because growth is actually a fiction. What we call growth is the production of value added goods and services (GDP). GDP conveniently doesn't account for any of the negative impacts of economic activities. The purpose of this is so that we can pay the interest on our debts.
But this also suggests that we can maintain GDP 'growth' by carrying out activities that BENEFIT the environment AND by switching economic activity to services as these are less resource intensive.
The real difficulty will be in maintaining growth will be when population FALLS. This will be capitalism's greatest challenge.
Yes, one could interpret the departure of the energy curve from the Henry Adams curve to be an indicator of our finite limits. The curve inflection correlates with the (much maligned) forecast from the seventies, "The Limits to Growth" [Meadows]. Although there are plenty of technology opportunities to improve energy density etc, I've never heard a good refutation of the limits that are identified in that report.
The discussion here is far too optimistic about several things, especially nuclear power. Problems with the optimistic "too cheap to meter" fission/fusion future he's predicting here:
1) Nuclear power isn't a renewable energy, which matters because you still need to refuel the plant with uranium (even if it's only every 18 months). And where does that fuel come from? Uranium is common, but concentrated uranium isn't. Only five countries account for the vast majority of uranium mining, and the best indications are that we'll reach Peak Uranium in the coming decades, even under current consumption. Again, that's not to say that the earth is then devoid of uranium--it means that you don't have uranium at 0.25-1% concentration by volume anymore and the marginal returns of mining it get worse and worse. You could reuse spent fuel in "breeder reactors," but that increases the EROI, and even then, like recycling of plastics or paper, the fuel cannot be reused indefinitely.
2) Nuclear power (fission, but *especially* fusion) requires material strength and extreme tolerances that make it very expensive to build and difficult to miniaturize. It's not just the pressure and the need to have redundancies for safety. Radiation itself degrades steel and concrete over the decades. This is why we are now facing the inevitable decommissioning of plants built in the 70s: you can replace every single degraded part in the plant, but you hit a point where that becomes much more expensive than building a new one entirely. This is the same reason we don't have nuclear cars and planes and ships (except for aircraft carriers and strategic submarines, where capability trumps efficiency). Maybe the energy density of the fuel is great, but certainly not the "engine" that you must use to make it work. Similar problems plague natural gas- or hydrogen-powered transport: The fuel itself is energy-dense, but it's not stable and the "plumbing" you have to use to burn it for useful work must extremely robust and heavy.
3) Nuclear fission creates waste that remains radioactive for 100,000+ years. This is an externality problem as old as the first reactors in the 1950s and still hasn't been solved (not for lack of trying!). Sweden is arguably the only country with nuclear power right now with any kind of workable, long-term spent-fuel storage solution. But modern Sweden hasn't even existed for 500 years, so who's going to ensure the continuity of stewardship over this material in the next 100,000 years!? There are hundreds of other reactors in dozens of countries with far less conscientiousness and capacity than Sweden has (and even Sweden has has its share of "Level 2" incidents). The United States, for example, has a scary number of Superfund sites and leaking barrels full of nuclear waste that aren't even safely handled today, much less for the centuries to come.
Tomas, Bill Gates has been a huge follower of research and books by Vaclav Smil. Since you are investigating energy issues, I feel that should not be missed in your coverage.
I came to say exactly this. As I’m currently reading Energy and civilization, reading this interview felt as a long story short.
I have strong doubts about the optimism I feel here about what are the real possibilities for the transition, even more with the scarcity problems that are already rising in many fronts, energy included of course, but I’m trying to get my ideas in order.
You’re right! I started reading him but he touches so many interesting topics that I take too many notes when I read him. I need to get back to him. I will when I put forward my take on the future of energy. Thx for reminding me!
A hugely valuable resource on the future of energy is The Energy Transition Show with Chris Nelder. Chris has been covering transition to renewables and interviewing academics and industry personnel for the last 6 years. Well worth reviewing for discussions on the future of energy. A recent podcast reviewed a new Oxford University study showing that the ever-cheaper cost of wind and solar energy, versus the now increasing costs of fossil fuel recovery, will drive renewables to outpace fossil fuels more quickly than older IPCC modeling forecasted.
An excellent blog that covers this topic, written by a physicist, is Do The Math: https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/ That was where I first heard the topic of energy density and physical limits of energy consumption growing equally along with GDP growth. Highly recommended!
Thx!
Most of the examples sounds plausible, but I don't think extracting uranium from rocks on the ocean floor or recycling anything by heating it into plasma and separating out the constituent elements would be economically feasible with energy 10× as cheap as today, and I'm almost sure transmuting other metals into gold or rhodium wouldn't be even with energy 100× as cheap as today.
Indeed
We finally do have nuclear-powered cars that go for thousands or tens of thousands of miles without ever being refueled: NASA's Mars Curiosity and Perseverance rovers. The conundrum for human use becomes radiation shielding.
Hi Thomas, entirely off topic but I'm not sure how to reach you best; could you consider a piece on the seemingly perpetual conflict zone Kushmir? Might be embedded into a broader piece about the Indus valley/geographical determinism. Maybe I'm being lazy now and should do my own research but maybe you already got something like this on the radar? Let me know!
https://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/a-brief-history-of-india-and-the
Henry Adams curve has the strong appearance of exponential growth.
Exponential growth on a planet of finite resources can only end badly.
We as a species will only thrive if we can learn to taper off our growth in consumption to remain in line with the capacity of the earth to produce the foods and other resources that sustain us.
Once the inhabitants of Easter Island had chopped down the last of their trees and otherwise denuded their island, their population crashed dramatically. At least some of them had somewhere else to go.
Once we strip this planet bare of forests, and hoover up the last fishes from the ocean, we will be in enormous trouble.
Within the human body, we have a name for the exponential growth of cells, we call it cancer, and it never ends well.
Healthy bodies work because the cells within it know when to stop expanding, when to stop reproducing, and to share the body's resources within reasonable limits. A healthy human society cannot escape this need to avoid continued exponential growth.
Unlike the residents of Easter Island, once we cook this planet, there's nowhere else to go. Elon Musk may launch himself to Mars, but he will have a hard time finding a Whole Foods from which to procure his evening meals.
Thanks for your comment. I disagree, but I haven’t fully formed the thoughts. I look forward to publishing on the topic and hear your response. I’ll take your comment in consideration
It's worth remembering that global population is expected to FALL--it's already happening in Europe, Japan, and South Korea. Fertility rates have been collapsing for DECADES. The vast majority of countries are already below replacement rate (2.2 births/female).
SEE: Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline (Bricker and Ibbitson, 2019)
So consumption of natural resources will undoubtedly decline once the people already born have aged and died.
Exponential 'growth' is possible because growth is actually a fiction. What we call growth is the production of value added goods and services (GDP). GDP conveniently doesn't account for any of the negative impacts of economic activities. The purpose of this is so that we can pay the interest on our debts.
But this also suggests that we can maintain GDP 'growth' by carrying out activities that BENEFIT the environment AND by switching economic activity to services as these are less resource intensive.
The real difficulty will be in maintaining growth will be when population FALLS. This will be capitalism's greatest challenge.
Yes, one could interpret the departure of the energy curve from the Henry Adams curve to be an indicator of our finite limits. The curve inflection correlates with the (much maligned) forecast from the seventies, "The Limits to Growth" [Meadows]. Although there are plenty of technology opportunities to improve energy density etc, I've never heard a good refutation of the limits that are identified in that report.
Not directly related, but I though this would be something you may be interested in (if you haven't already seen it): https://www.ft.com/content/4240569a-aa55-468e-8dc4-2953612c38d1?fbclid=IwAR2YYSzRz219-cjTOi32fIZxOu_LtW2BLBVp9Tao_c8Nr_JN6mTsqxagAXc
Would love to read it! Unfortunately I’m not subscribed to the financial times.
The discussion here is far too optimistic about several things, especially nuclear power. Problems with the optimistic "too cheap to meter" fission/fusion future he's predicting here:
1) Nuclear power isn't a renewable energy, which matters because you still need to refuel the plant with uranium (even if it's only every 18 months). And where does that fuel come from? Uranium is common, but concentrated uranium isn't. Only five countries account for the vast majority of uranium mining, and the best indications are that we'll reach Peak Uranium in the coming decades, even under current consumption. Again, that's not to say that the earth is then devoid of uranium--it means that you don't have uranium at 0.25-1% concentration by volume anymore and the marginal returns of mining it get worse and worse. You could reuse spent fuel in "breeder reactors," but that increases the EROI, and even then, like recycling of plastics or paper, the fuel cannot be reused indefinitely.
2) Nuclear power (fission, but *especially* fusion) requires material strength and extreme tolerances that make it very expensive to build and difficult to miniaturize. It's not just the pressure and the need to have redundancies for safety. Radiation itself degrades steel and concrete over the decades. This is why we are now facing the inevitable decommissioning of plants built in the 70s: you can replace every single degraded part in the plant, but you hit a point where that becomes much more expensive than building a new one entirely. This is the same reason we don't have nuclear cars and planes and ships (except for aircraft carriers and strategic submarines, where capability trumps efficiency). Maybe the energy density of the fuel is great, but certainly not the "engine" that you must use to make it work. Similar problems plague natural gas- or hydrogen-powered transport: The fuel itself is energy-dense, but it's not stable and the "plumbing" you have to use to burn it for useful work must extremely robust and heavy.
3) Nuclear fission creates waste that remains radioactive for 100,000+ years. This is an externality problem as old as the first reactors in the 1950s and still hasn't been solved (not for lack of trying!). Sweden is arguably the only country with nuclear power right now with any kind of workable, long-term spent-fuel storage solution. But modern Sweden hasn't even existed for 500 years, so who's going to ensure the continuity of stewardship over this material in the next 100,000 years!? There are hundreds of other reactors in dozens of countries with far less conscientiousness and capacity than Sweden has (and even Sweden has has its share of "Level 2" incidents). The United States, for example, has a scary number of Superfund sites and leaking barrels full of nuclear waste that aren't even safely handled today, much less for the centuries to come.
The intro says there would be a recording. After scanning the article I didn't see one. Where can we access it?
In the premium version! This Thursday.