We hear a lot about the need to get off fossil fuels. How is the energy transition really going and how fast is the world moving towards a green future?
00:51 How did the war in Ukraine impact the green revolution?
05:50 Why is green energy booming in unlikely places?
08:31 Rewiring the world for net zero
11:40 Is nuclear energy making a comeback?
14:20 Texas: the anti-green future of clean energy
18:09 Do environmentalists need to change?
Sign up to The Economist’s daily newsletter: https://econ.st/3s9WjPB
Read our quarterly report on electric grids: https://econ.st/3SnGejK
War and subsidies have turbocharged the green transition: https://econ.st/47h2vnO
Renewable energy has hidden costs: https://econ.st/3SlLww7
Listen to our podcast about whether the energy crisis could fuel the green transition:
https://econ.st/47gBX5X
Watch our film about heatwaves: https://econ.st/3u4qqbr
Can Europe’s power grid cope with the green transition? https://econ.st/46Vp4yy
Watch more of our Now & Next series: https://econ.st/46TXWjv
44 Comments
You can always count on the economist to turn any green energy story into a nuclear energy commercial.
No mention of how or where they will be storing the nuclear waste. Typical.
This just sounds like transition not transformation. The same people are in charge. It’s just a ‘change in the accents of the powerful’. And most of these examples are in the West, what about the Global South? Just sounds like western propaganda to me
We need to tax carbon emissions and let markets sort out solutions
Dolphins, whales and other marine mammals are beaching themselves to get away from the horrific sounds produced by these massive wind turbines…
Just posted. Important message. 2023 is almost done. What can we do today?
I'm sorry, Germany. Crying for the lack of energy but switching down nuclear. You cannot blame the worms because the body is dead.
Hinkley Point C – build cost an estimated 34 billion pounds, with an estimated 50 billion pound taxpayer subsidy for CFD (National Audit Office) to come. The UK has been closing down uneconomic nuclear plants hand over fist, with billions of decommissioning costs still in the pipeline. On the other hand it's hard to see why the Germans closed their existing nuclear early. Luckily they have the French nuclear plants to supplement their electricity.
EV Conversions like e-Muscle will always be a niche market as long as conversions are more expensive than used, original EVs. One company that is breaking the price barrier is EV-Evolution EU, which offers a variety of standardized kits for popular vehicle models. For example, a kit with a 20 kWh battery and 20 kW motor sells for 8000 €.
As much as I support their intent and message, destroying works of art is completely counter-productive to their, and our, cause. Protest and disruption is one thing, pointless destruction is another.
hate and destruction is what happens when damaged males rule🤮
Even if we move all the energy to renewables on the planet, latency is an insurmountable problem, converting all the proven reserves of lithium into batteries we have 4 Tw-h total (that's like 15 minutes of energy on the planet).
No reference to: the storage issues of nuclear; the V2G capability the world will see over the next 10 years, the likely outcome of COP28, the attitude of indifference from politicians including Sunak, the ignorance of the public generally in that a belief that the little we're doing will actually save us (we actually need more than the COVID effect every year). I don't think that the report really addressed the question.
The economist best video this year.
19:00 It took quite a while for any mention of the materials mining aspect of the "energy revolution". All that steel and concrete and copper and lithium etc. has to come from somewhere (dug out of the ground), and much of it is being processed in China using coal power. Some of the basic math (Simon Michaux's work) would also have been welcome.
cultist freaks
wind energy is a scam
I wonder if we can do this when AUTHORITARIAN ruler Donald J Trump will desimate our country as an act of defiance to OUR DEMOCRACY. I fear trump will do whatever it takes to destroy everything that President Joe Biden and his administration has ACCOMPLISHED. Voting for a Third party or a Third candidate of the same party will take away ALL of our Accomplishments for RENEWABLE ENERGIES and Electrifying our Transportation and Energy needs.
I find the fascination with nuclear always counter productive. Nuclear power plants are difficult to build expensive to operate and most of the fuel comes from Kazakhstan which than again can lead to political dependencies.
We need faster solutions as far as I can see it, but I'm not hopeful about that. I just hope, that climate change really is a hoax and everything didn't really matter.
Pleased to see nuclear power is being recognised as a vital component in this transition. Upcoming micro-reactors that can power towns or small cities will provide energy security and resilience to external threats.
You didn't tell us that those artworks were protected by glass. They weren't harmed. I thought The Economist was responsible journalism. Guess not.
This is GREEN WASHING, green energy isn't green! The only solution is an ECO fascists world government that control human breeding, to limit the world population to around 200 million people.
You call this journalism? The video title is a LOADED question. Stop and think about it. How will you build the infrastructure? Are you gonna do it with stone age tools? How will you let people continue with their lives while the infrastructure is being built?
We have to use what we have, which for better or worse is fossil fuels. Ridiculous, idealistic ideas that we can do it without continuing fossil fuels. This is a transition, which means becoming will green take time.
We need to do all above
No mention of china? I see where the funding is coming from
I got sick of the overly-dramatic tone and gave up.
To save Earth, breed less.
To put the protests and the whole transition into context, the video should also talk about the pace of climate change. Net zero by 2050 is not enough. Policy goals are outdated. We're outside safe planetary boundaries now. The risk of tipping points is too great. Protests have not been able to convey this, but this is what they are about.
Why do the greens hate hydroelectricity and nuclear so much? They love lignite more than they love life itself.
Get off ff by 2030?…that would definitely be a death sentence.
Is these the same folks who shut down the nukes? If Germany went net zero tomorrow would there be any measurable impact in world temperature? Well less than a fraction of one percent of one degree. This is a challenge of technology and infrastructure not ideology.
This is a field I know something about. I think this is one of the best pieces of reporting on the subject I've ever seen. Count me impressed.
Hydrogen is the key. Powering up the hydrogen economy is the most important fundamental technological change.
Other than that, greening the biome is of paramount importance.
Green energy is really a joke now
Nuclear is the most expensive electricity you can produce. Hinkley Point C contracted sale price is £92.50/MWh rising with inflation EVERY year v wind at less than £40/MWh with costs falling all the time!
Sellafield is estimated to be finished decommissioning by 2120 at an estimated cost of £121 billion
Fukushima's estimated final cleanup cost is a Trillion Dollars. That’s Trillion with a T
In general 20-somethings are not only smarter, but more pragmatic and wiser than average.
The rest of the world is urgently cutting carbon emission,
– China 🇨🇳 determines to accelerate its emission until 2030. Thanks China!
Name the world's largest oil company. Aramco. Founded by foreign oil interests and later nationalized. 98 percent owned by the government of Saudi Arabia. Holds the kingdom's economic crown jewel, its oil reserves.
Name the world's largest coal company. State coal of India, now known as Coal India. Created to nationalize reserves of India's largest energy source and still 70 percent owned by the Goverment of India.
Name the world's largest natural gas company. Gazprom, a name very familiar in Europe. Founded from a Soviet energy ministry, and still half owned by various organs of the Russian government. An extension of the Kremlins will.
For all the talk of how greedy fossil fuel companies are, standing in the way of action on climate change, fossil fuel revenues are to a significant degree going to governments.
From Russia to Mexico to the Middle East, Africa, or Venezuela, from direct state ownership of reserves to taxing of the efforts of private companies to the fuel taxes people pay at the pump when they fill their car, the revenues from fossil fuels go, in large part, into the coffers of government. If you want to see the end of the use of fossil fuels, you have to answer a political question: How do you propose to force the political left to accept the tremendous diminishing of government revenues, and consequently a comparable reduction in the size and scope of government? If we were to actually eliminate the use of fossil fuels, we would have to face the fact that a world without fossil fuels would be a world remade in the image of Reagan and Thatcher. There was a time when The Economist would have celebrated that outcome.
this is not journalism, it's a bios view and propaganda.
Then we need to get green quick when we talk about vehicles but people don’t think about is what happens to the batteries in the car when they go bad. They’re not easily disposed of where they go and with nuclear energy. It isn’t a zero some game there’s leftover nuclear waste. Where does that go?
Misleading title. I thought they were going to show us how oil is not needed to power the energy revolution. It is very much needed.
take a look at IEA data to get a sense of how renewable energy has progressed. coal-oil-gas still account for a significant share. renewable sources are insufficient, source diversification may be a short-medium term solution.
bring back. nuclear
This is a nice piece, but where is the data? This all seems pretty anecdotal. The data is there if you look for it.
Here's part of the energy transition the video missed.
Modern Geothermal.
This isn't the geothermal of the 1970s, now they've found ways to do geothermal practically anywhere, not just where the hot stuff is easily accessed.
Currently an American company called Fervo Engergy, has built their first test geothermal plant.
It's operational now I believe.
The company plans to scale up and start building commercially viable plants over the coming decades.
Fervo aren't alone, there are other companies working on the same, or similar technologies.
Google it to find out more if you're interested.