RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:Effects of EVs on energy situationLets just review some facts first:
1.5 C (we're kind of screwed) and 2.0 Degrees (we're completely screwed):
So for 2.0 Degress just prefix these with even more/lots of/completely
- Sea Level goes up
- Food security threatened
- Losing GDP
- Vector-Borne Diseases
- No more coral reefs
- Extreme heatwaves
- Severe drought
- Change-induced water stress
- Loss of Species and Extinction
- Fires, Extreme Weather, Invasive Species
- deforestation and wildfires (vicious loop for more GHG)
- frozen permafrost soils (vicious loop of releasing more GHG)
Where does Natural Gas come in here? So we know now that every new well Peyto or any other Oil&Gas company drills is signing up for 2.0 Degrees.
Any new infrastructure is either screwing us over or a lost asset. Investing in Gas seems like a very risky strategy. You're betting that status quo remains and hoping for a last hurrah of growth. Its kind of like playing with fire. Things can change quickly or accelerate. Can we eliminate Gas by 2030? I don't know but a hell of a lot can change by 2025. Investing in something that the smartest brains on the planet will work to eliminate ASAP seems like a balsy move.
Natural gas emissions will blow Europe's carbon budget at current levels Another Guardian Article that quotes a Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research study that says Europe only has 9 more years to exhaust its Carbon budget.
But the report’s authors find that there is “categorically no role” for new gas, oil or coal production, because of their high CO2 and methane emissions.
Yasch22 wrote: GoldStandard: These are the two big questions:
1. Is it in any way realistic to stop net growth of fossil fuel infrastructure over the next 20 years?
2. More specifically, and especially, is it possible to stop the growth of natural gas usage as a replacement for coal and as a bridge to 100% renewable energy?
To me, the simple answers are NO and NO.
To backtrack for a moment, we can all agree on the importance of keeping CO2 emissions below a point that brings about a rise of 1.5 or 2.0 degrees Celsius, and we can all agree that the ongoing build-out of fossil fuel infrastructure will make it incredibly difficult to stay under the prescribed level. But that just brings us back to the question: Is it even remotely feasible in any real-world scenario to slam on the brakes?
Forget about NG for a second, and just think about oil used for transportation.
In 2020, roughly 3% of all cars produced were plug-in EVs, but even then about 30% of them were hybrid, meaning that they still needed some gasoline, oil changes, transmission fluid. Then there were the 97% of ICE vehicles. That number probably won't go down to 85% until 2025, possibly to 2030, meaning that we've got another 10 years of massive additions of gasoline-guzzling vehicles to the world's fleet of 1.2 billion.
Then take into account what could be increased demand worldwide for ICE vehicles as developing countries become developed. Add in the resumption of air travel, increase in international travel as standards of living improve, increased international trade requiring diesel freighters, etc.
Next, think about the huge amounts of electricity that will need to be added worldwide as we transition to electric cars, electric home heating, and renewable energy generation at the utility level. In the developed world, EVs alone will require additions to the grid that simply can't come fast enough from solar and wind -- because there just isn't enough manufacturing capacity or mining of essential materials to supply those additions. Then consider the increased demand for energy from developing countries, where they'll want the same good things we all have: air conditioning, washers, dryers, fridges, and even electric bikes, motorbikes, cars, etc.
A genuine solution is responsible NG. For sure, environmentalists justly point to all the abuses (methane venting) in production and delivery around the world. But just as surely Canada offers a model of the way forward. Everyone here, from producers to government regulators, has been seriously pushing for drops in emission intensity. In lots of ways, this is one of the only ways forward available to us, as there is no way in Hades that we'll be able to either stop or radically cut back on the needs supplied by NG+coal. (In other words, best to switch from coal to NG!)
There are other kinds of low-hanging fruit, too, but that would require a different kind of discourse. E.g., as Vaclav Smil says, we should all be
-- retrofitting our houses and other buildings.
-- driving more fuel efficient cars (until EVs become affordable to the masses)
-- cutting back on international travel
-- cutting way back on food wastage (something like 35% of all food produced goes to the garbage dump)
-- buying less useless junk